Are You Wearing The Right Sports Bra?

You love to run. So let’s get you a sports bra that can pass our high-intensity support test.

We’re going to level with you: Running is the mother of all unrelenting highimpact workouts. For starters, each foot strike sends a jolt equivalent to two to three times your body weight right back through you in the form of something called ground reaction force. And when you consider that you’re pounding the pavement some 150-plus times per minute, you can see how running is tougher on breasts than stop-and-start types of plyometric (a.k.a. jumping) exercise are. In fact, around one in three female runners surveyed at the 2012 London Marathon reported that they had experienced breast pain. The good news? The right sports bra can reduce your bounce by as much as 74 percent.

Picture this: Your breasts don’t just go up and down as you run. When unsupported, they each move an average of 10cm in a butterfly pattern up, down, side to side, and forward and backwards. “With up to 4 percent of your total body weight in your breasts, that’s a lot of demand on your natural support system,” says LaJean Lawson, an adjunct professor of exercise and sport science at Oregon State University in the US, who has been researching breast health and sports bras for 38 years.