Five-time Olympian uses innovative running leggings with built-in knee supports in order to help avoid injury

Jo Pavey says she has been lucky during her career when it comes to avoiding serious injuries. Such consistency with her training helped her reach five Olympics and win multiple major championship medals such as European 10,000m gold in 2014.

Now aged 51, though, she is feeling a few aches and is doing a number of things to combat this. The Devon-based runner enjoys sticking to the soft trails around her home in the West Country. She also feels modern shoes help to protect her legs. When it comes to her knee joints and keeping her hips and legs aligned, she uses Imbrace Dynamic+ leggings.

The innovative products have been a game changer for one of Britain’s greatest distance runners. As well as reducing knee pain and tight hips, they promote blood flow and reduce swelling and their thermoregulation fabric technology prevents over-heating.

“I've been really excited to wear the leggings and work with Imbrace because I thought it’s a really unique concept to have leggings with in-built support around the lower back, the IT bands, the hips and around the knees," she says.

“You can really feel that sort of level of support. But also for me, I additionally benefit from the fact that it keeps my knees warm!”

Imbrace was the brainchild of Geoff Hanson, a sports fanatic and former designer who was training when the idea came to him.

“I was in the gym just before the pandemic and wearing leggings with a knee brace over them while doing squats,” he remembers. “Every third or fourth rep had to pull the brace up as it was slipping and I remember thinking ‘for goodness sakes, why doesn’t someone just put the brace in the leggings?’

“Then I paused and thought ‘that’s an interesting idea’. And that is literally how this all came about. It was the lightbulb moment.”

He adds: “I spoke to a few friends who had rickety knees and they said ‘that’s a good idea’. And then I spoke to my brother and he said, ‘you should do that’. I told him, ‘you know what? I will!’”

Hanson was working in property development but he says the job was “losing its lustre” for him. So instead he made Imbrace his passion project and during the first Covid lockdown began doing sketches and research on the dynamics of knee and hip health, in addition to contacting old friends who had knowledge and skills that could help him.

In October 2022 his first product was launched. Then 12 months later Chemmy Alcott, the four-time Winter Olympic ski racer, got in touch with him to recommend doing a ski legging. “It took off dramatically and really put us on the map,” Hanson says.

“We then developed a legging for runners and it’s how we ended up with the dynamic+.”

The leggings have certainly helped Pavey, who is now inspired to increase her training load in coming months. “I'm really motivated to get my fitness levels up,” she says.

“I feel like I spend a lot of time doing things involved with running but I need to make sure I get out there and do more myself. I'm still really motivated and I'm still loving it, definitely.”

AW readers can purchase a pair of the Dynamic+ support leggings at a discounted rate. Enter code AW95 to claim your discount at imbrace.com

See the April issue of AW magazine for more on Jo Pavey