One of the claims made by the inventor of Chirunning, Danny Dreyer, is that by leaning the whole body forward from the ankles a running can using gravity to pull himself forward. Is this even physically possible? Won’t the gravity pull the person straight down and the only thing that would pull the runner forward would be inertia and the effort of running. In fact would not gravity not only not help the runner but would hurt him by pulling him down?
Unless you have a tailwind, you must lean forward to counteract aerodynamic drag. Of course, you do this unconsciously and without the aid of expensive videos. The only way, on level ground, gravity pulls you forward is if you fall on your face, and this is good for only a short distance.
sOUNDS TO ME LIKE HE IS LYING TO HIMSELF, AS A TECHNIQUE TO HELP HIMSELF RUN FASTER.
Seems like you could accomplish the same thing by running downhill. Also it looks like it would be a better technique for rollerblading than for running.
The only picture I could find on a brief jog through their web site shows a runner who is not leaning forward.
Using the method suggested in the OP; everything you gain in leaning forward, you would lose in having to push yourself back up.
Sure, for your first step you gain the benefit of gravity without any extra effort in your part. But if you don’t devote extra energy to elevating yourself upwards in your very next step; within a few steps you’re going to find your face acquainted with the ground.
The very mention of “Chi” is usually enough to set my BS detector off. Basically what’s being recommended here is that you don’t use your muscles to run, you use your ‘chi’. What’s 'chi"? To quote the web-site; “Chi is energy - the life giving energy that unites body, mind and spirit.” :dubious:
It’s also worth pointing out that walking, and especially running, relies on gravity already. Some writers have described walking and running as controlled falling, which is a fair description.
The method described in the OP is a scam.
I don’t know if the scam is the way I would describe this. His reasons for running like this seem to be a scam, but actually running the way he proposes would help most people (I don’t think it would work well for heavy runners or runners who don’t have reasonably neutral biomechanics). Basically, the author is describing a running style that is popular among certain Africans (Ethiopians and Kenyans mostly) except he has changed the forefoot strike to a midfoot strike for some reason. This method should be vastly more efficient for people than jogging.
Actually, the chi reflects off of the tin-foil hat and helps keep you in kinetic balance. You just have to make certain that your free radicals are properly ionized in a ketonic solution than that your scalars are properly polarized, else you might create a short circuit in your neuroquantum filaments.
Hey, I could get good at this. I wonder if there’s money in this thing…
Stranger
Well, I’d say that’s about an 8.
For the full ten you would have to have used in addition any two of the following: “penta-, aura, life-force, qi, energy, natural, toxins, purity, holistic”.
Not bad though.
Maybe it’s like that thing in the Hitchhiker’s Guide, where the secret to flying is not to think about flying.
Apparently there is: http://www.chirunning.com/shopping/customer/home.php 
Anyway, I think gravity can be useful in getting yourself started, but not for anything long-term. In fact, a step that dancers often use as a “running start” when they need to get moving quickly in a short time is a tombè, which is literally French for “to fall.” Still, the link in the OP is BS.
And/or 'Vibrations, harmonics, energy patterns, force pathways and the prefix bio~, in conjunction with anything.
I have created inserts for my shoes that is thin at the toes and quite thick at the heals.
Wearing shoes thus modified gives permanent downhill lean, which means the wearer is always running downhill.
I call them anteChiShoes®.
Leaning forward… isn’t that how everyone runs anyway?
I’m a mite suspicious of anyone who liberally sprinkles his text with terms that are registered trademarks.
Would that be because as a technical writer you know that only the first instance of a trademark on the page should have the (R) symbol after it? 
I have created a cranked neck brace which forcibly tilts the head of the wearer backwards by about 10 degrees; even if you’re walking up a slight incline, it will look like it’s downhill and will therefore be much easier going. Except for the slight problem of tripping over unseen obstacles, which I have still to solve.
This guy should design vehicles. They wouldn’t even need engines; they can just lean forward. It would solve the energy crisis!
To elaborate on what I said, I believe that he is likely to be setting a nice, even pace for himself. Rather than attribute it to mental discipline, perhaps it is better to blame it on nature, or so he thinks. “That is why my strides are so even! Gravity is pushing me into a groove!” , he might say to himself.
There was a ‘revolutionary’ design for bicycle wheels based on this principle a long time back - instead of the wheel being mounted on a single, tightly-fixed axle, it had a ring of pins passing through a ring of holes into which they only fitted loosely; the idea was that each of the pins would be ‘sliding down’ the slope at the back of each of the holes, so in effect the bike would be constantly travelling downhill.
Total bunk, of course, but the exact basis on which many a proposed perpetual motion scheme has been based.