Why Your Lower Back May Hurt After a Run—and How to Find Relief

You’re gliding along, striding smoothly and having a great run until you get a few miles in and it hits: a dull aching in your lower back that doesn’t let up for hours after your workout. Even if your back is something that never normally bugs you, running can irritate it. But exactly what does it mean if your lower back hurts after running—and what can you do about it? 

It turns out that there are a few potential causes, and you can typically address them simply by cleaning up your running form and building the strength and mobility your body needs to run efficiently. But the key is to be proactive. “For most people, the issue starts by only affecting you during and after the run,” says physical therapist Sarah Tyndall, owner of Restore & Reform in North Carolina. “But if we don’t address it, then it can lead to chronic pain affecting you day-to-day.”

Instead of ignoring the problem, read on to learn what experts want you to know about this common issue. 

Why Does My Lower Back Hurt After Running?

If your lower back hurts after running, you’re not alone. Research shows this happens to up to 20 percent of all runners (and is particularly common among ultra-trail runners). Your back might just ache for a few hours, or the pain could last for weeks on end, depending on what’s causing it and how severe the problem gets.

Here are a few of the most common reasons you might be experiencing lower back pain after a run:

1. Arching Your Back

When we run, the force that powers us forward comes from driving our leg behind us. But that leg should only move from the hip—and not involve our back. “A lot of people have a hard time separating out motion from their hips from motion in their back,” says physical therapist and biomechanist Jay Dicharry. If your lower back arches along with each stride, you’ll end up stressing it in a way it’s not meant to handle.

Many of us even stand in an arched position regularly rather than with a neutral spine. Or, we end up arching in a mistaken attempt to not slouch. “A lot of people have been told to ‘run upright,’ like lift your chest up,” Tyndall adds. “That can cause us to flare our ribs open, which puts us into a bit of hyperextension and can lead to a lot of compression in the bones of the lower back.”

2. Overly Tight Muscles

Some runners complain of low back pain because their muscles tighten up after the run and they don’t stretch, says physical therapist Karena Wu, owner and clinical director of ActiveCare Physical Therapy in New York City and Mumbai. The hip flexors and glutes are typically the biggest offenders: Because of where these muscles sit, when they’re too tight, they’ll pull your vertebrae together and compress the spine, Wu says. 

3. Overstriding

When your foot hits the ground too far in front of your body rather than underneath it, you’re not allowing the muscles and joints that are supposed to absorb the impact of your strides to do their job. “Most of the time, we’re going to strike with our heel, which doesn’t have a lot of natural shock absorption, and then it immediately starts driving that load up the chain,” Tyndall says. One place that can end up taking on more impact than it should is the lower back.  

Tyndall advises against lacing up a pair of highly cushioned shoes as a solution to this problem. “While it does do that job upfront, it allows you to foster inefficient patterns, causing you to actually load your body more over time,” she says. She recommends gradually working toward wearing shoes with less cushion and a lower heel-to-toe drop where the foam beneath your heel and toes is pretty equal.

4. Dehydration 

Here’s one more reason to keep that water bottle close by: Dehydration could also be the culprit behind your achy lower back. 

“Chronic dehydration will lead to less water and sponginess in the intervertebral discs that sit between the spine bones,” Wu says. That can increase the compression on your spine and put more pressure on the structures and nerves back there. When fluid levels get especially low after a sweaty run, you might feel it. 

5. Bone or Nerve Issues

It is possible that there’s something more serious going on, like a stress fracture, herniated disc, or sciatica. If you have sharp or “zingy” pain, if it shoots down the back of your legs, or hurts at night, don’t wait to have it checked out by a healthcare provider, Dicharry says. 

How Is Lower Back Pain After Running Treated?

To treat lower back pain from running, it can help to spend some time on a little self-care at home. “Stretching, foam rolling, and stability exercises should be the go-to for self-treatment,” Wu says, adding that ice and anti-inflammatory medication (so long as it’s recommended by your doctor) can also help you manage the pain.  

One surprising way to keep training without that low back pain? Run up an incline. “Keeping your upper body stacked over your lower body gets much easier when you raise the treadmill incline to 2 or 3 percent,” Dicharry says. For some runners, this can be enough to help them get in a workout without pain. But as we’ll discuss below, there are a few signs that indicate you should pause your runs altogether and talk to an expert.

When You Should See a Healthcare Provider

If your lower back hurts after one run then the pain goes away, you probably don’t need to worry about it. But it becomes a consistent problem, “that is your body telling you that something’s off,” Tyndall says. A physical therapist can help you figure out whatever’s causing the issue—and how to fix it. “Get it checked by somebody early rather than waiting too late to a point where it’s affecting other aspects of your life,” she says. 

Whether or not it’s safe to keep running in the meantime depends on how bad your symptoms are. “If the pain is sharp, severe, and traveling down the leg, then stop running until you see the healthcare provider,” Wu says. 

The treatment will depend on the exact problem. “Find a provider who can work with you one-on-one and specifically tailor recommendations for your goals and your body,” Tyndall says. 

And don’t avoid an appointment out of fear they’ll tell you to stop running completely. “I might decrease [a runner’s training] volume slightly, but in most cases, you can keep running,” Tyndall says. Remember: The sooner you get help, the sooner you can get back to running pain-free.

Tips for Preventing Lower Back Pain After Running

So, how do you keep running from messing with your lower back in the first place? Here are a few things to try. 

Work on Your Running Form

There’s some evidence that running might actually be good for our lower backs, as long as we run with proper form, Dicharry says. That might be because, if we’re in the right alignment, running gently rotates our upper body away from our lower body in a way that’s quite healthy for the spine.

To find a proper posture, Dicharry guides runners through a simple exercise: Put one hand on your chest and the other on your belly button, then drop your chest forward until your weight is evenly split between your heels and forefoot. That’s the torso position you should run (and walk and stand) in.

Build a Stronger Core

Some people can keep up a neutral spine for the first couple miles of their run, but as they get tired, their form falls apart. This is a sign to work on that core strength, Dicharry says. “Your legs are writing checks that your core can’t cash,” he says. Even if we know what the “right” position of our trunk feels like, we need that core strength in order to maintain it. 

Open up Your Hip Mobility

Don’t let tight hips and glutes leave your back in pain. Regularly do some dynamic stretches before your run, and some static stretches afterwards. Which brings us to…

Lower Back Stretches to Ease Running Pain

Opening up the range of motion in your hips can be one way to bring your back some relief. “Dynamic stretches will loosen up the muscles and soft tissues and mimic the activity so that you don’t hurt yourself,” Wu says. “After a run, static stretches are great to lengthen to soft tissues, improving flexibility and reducing spine compression.” Here are a few ways to do that:

Leg Swings

This dynamic movement can help to open up your hip flexors and train your legs to move from your hips rather than the spine. During this stretch, Dicharry recommends thinking of your pelvis like a cereal bowl. “Put your hands on your pelvis and practice swinging your leg front to back without spilling the cereal,” he says.  

Butt Kicks 

This is a great way to get the glutes, hamstrings, and calves firing before a run. As you kick, focus on maintaining a straight line through the front of your hips (rather than arching your back) to open up the hip flexors. 

Hip CARs

This mobility exercise stands for “controlled articular rotation,” which means you’ll actively move through your range of motion. “You gain mobility by strengthening through a full range of motion,” Tyndall says.   

Figure 4 Glute Stretch

Because of the way our fascia connects from the gluteal muscles to our lumbar spine, tight glutes can add compression to that low back, Wu says. One way to find some relief is doing a figure 4 stretch after your run.