By James Smith, Athlete Consulting, Global Sport Concepts

As a coach and consultant, past and present, to a large number of athletes, coaches, and management associated with a variety of team, combat, and individual sports, it is my personal and professional objective to educate my clients.

I strive to reveal the irrefutable nature of the information that lies at the bedrock of the subject matter in question—the basal constituents.

In response to Ken Jakalski’s article “A Farewell to Arms,” what readers must be made aware of is the basic lever physics of arm action and then surmise the significance of this when considering the role of the arms in the realm of sprinting.

Arm swing is something I discussed at length in my book Applied Sprint Training and various on-line publications.

For the sake of experiment, if the sprinter collapses the elbow as much as possible, during front and backside action, the following is true:

• The lever is shortest
• It requires the least amount of time and energy to cycle it back and forth
• It generates the least amount of power

Alternatively, if the sprinter extends the elbow as much as possible, during front and backside action, the following is true:

• The lever is the longest
• It requires the greatest amount of time and energy to cycle it back and forth
• It generates the greatest amount of power

This only reflects the front/back (extension/flexion of the shoulder) action of the arms and in both cases, the sprinter is assured to mitigate their potential to achieve a smooth and rapid acceleration and peak maximal velocity.

Of course, we see neither demonstrated from any elite sprinter, and while the elbow naturally collapses less than 90 degrees during front side action and extends more than 90 degrees during backside action, there is undoubtedly, by way of observation of the elite, a set of commonalities that all sprinters and athletes in general with competitive aspirations would be wise to study.

Short of this, however, no more than a cursory review of the sub 9.8, let alone sub 10.0, the population of male sprinters demonstrates all that need be known with respect to the optimal kinematics of the arms.

As for the trajectory of the arms, there are also critical points to observe.

A purely forward and backward motion involves minimal deviation from the line parallel to the sagittal axis and results in the least impact on influencing thoracic rotation.

Alternatively, by intentionally crossing the hands over the midline of the body as much as possible, there is a significant deviation from the sagittal axis. By associations, this poses a significant impact on influencing thoracic rotation.

The hips rotate as a result of the action of the legs. In simple terms, the hips rotate as a result of the scissoring of the legs. For example, the flexion of the left hip of the recovery leg, subsequent to toe off, simultaneously along with the extension of the right hip at the conclusion of knee drive, initiates the clockwise rotation (axial view) of the hip. As the femur of the left leg travels forward, the femur of the right leg is traveling backward. The maximal degree of rotation is achieved when the left knee is farthest, in front, from the coronal axis and vice versa.

From this we know that the optimal degree of hip rotation about the vertical axis ends when the knee of the femur of the front side leg is farthest from the coronal axis. Now we ask ourselves, to what extent does the action of the arms influence the rotation of the hips. The answer is related to the rudimentary lever physics example listed earlier, regarding the position of the elbow and trajectory of the arm, coupled with the volitional effort.

Neuroscience reveals compelling information in that FMRI demonstrates that when we reach our hand out and touch a finger to our nose, the sensory cortex receives the sensory input from our nose first due to the closer proximity of the nose to the sensory cortex. By association, the late Charlie Francis suggested that the arms receive the signal from the motor cortex before the legs, due to their closer proximity to the cortex and, as a result, the arms must play a significant role in dictating the sprint action.

It takes no scientific biomechanics data to support such a claim, however. All one need do is attempt sprinting while allowing the arms to dangle by their side then ask themselves the question—to what extent are the arms relevant.

Most important is that the fastest men and women of all time demonstrate strikingly similar commonalities in arm action that have long since been established as the model by which all aspiring sprinters are wise to emulate.

The fastest men and women of all time demonstrate strikingly similar commonalities in arm action.

As to the question whether or not the arm action as a separate entity contributes to faster sprinting, this is moot. While the legs are of greater proportional relevance to sprinting there will never be a plausible scientific theory or discovery that states that elite sprint results may be attained regardless of what the sprinter does with his/her arms.

Dr. Mann stating that it is the legs, not the arms, that primarily dictate success in sprinting is no more revealing than a gastroenterologist stating that the stomach, and not chewing, is primarily responsible for digestion. Lest, not anyone disregards the contribution of chewing your food sufficiently well in light of such a statement.

Further, Dr. Mann’s statement that “regardless of the quality of the sprinter, there is no significant difference in the arm action“ is no more relevant than stating: regardless of the quality of the sprinter, there is no significant difference in their leg action. The reason for this is because the vast majority of athletes are capable of propping themselves up and cycling their legs fast enough to run sub 10.00 in the 100m, the question is what happens when their feet hit the ground.

In this way, the postural and spatial limb positioning attributes of developing sprinters may emulate, with striking efficiency and accuracy, that of their elite counterparts; all the while sprinting nowhere near as fast.

The same may be stated regarding nearly all sport movements; the difference between the performance attributes of juniors and elites lies nearly exclusively in outputs as opposed to kinematics.

As with nearly all sport training contexts, the question of how something is done supersedes the significance of merely doing it. Thus, regardless of the measurable significance of the arm action towards sprint velocity regarding deviations from what is considered to be optimal, there are irrefutable standards demonstrated by the entirety of the world’s past and present elite that deserves the attention of all.

Note the commonalities shared among them.

Ato Boldon

Ben Johnson

Carl Lewis

Christophe Lemaitre

Dwain Chambers

Justin Gatlin

Maurice Green

Nesta Carter

Tim Montgomery

Tyson Gay

Usain Bolt

Yolan Blake

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By Leslie Sherlin, Ph.D., Co-Founder of SenseLabs, Co-Creator of Versus

Analytics have become a religion in sports. And why not? Coaches are looking for every possible way to squeeze more skill out of their athletes, and a data-driven approach makes sense.

But most developing athletes need something much simpler: more sleep.

It shouldn’t come as a surprise. Still, it’s rarely recognized as the low hanging, performance enhancing fruit that it is. I suspect that’s because it isn’t well understood.

Sleep, Memory, and Skill Development

Sleep prior to a big event is the most important, right? Not necessarily. It’s actually sleep after a lesson, practice, or big game that impacts skill development. If you don’t sleep the night after training, you’ll never learn. It doesn’t matter if you sleep well the following nights. Getting seven to eight hours of sleep allows the brain to process events from the day, and commit it to knowledge.

It is the sleep after a lesson, practice, or big game that impacts skill development.
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When we sleep, we repeatedly go through 90-to-120-minute cycles. Within those cycles, there are two main types of sleep: deep and rapid-eye-movement (REM). Deep sleep comes first. During this process, the brain consolidates memories and rebuilds energy stores. As the night goes on, the balance shifts, with REM dominating the final cycles. You’ve probably heard most of the dreams we remember occur during REM.

Solidifying knowledge requires both types of sleep. Phase one, which happens during deep sleep, is basically a rehearsal: Your brain files away the facts and practices the moves it learned that day. Phase two is integration. This is where those facts and lessons are combined with existing knowledge. This happens during REM.

There is an excellent study conducted at MIT that demonstrated how sleep helps build long-term memories in mice. Spoiler alert: Researchers were able to determine that the mice were replaying new experiences in their brains as they slept.

Sleep and Recovery

Many benefits of getting enough sleep—clearer thinking, more consistent metabolism—are well established and widely understood. Most coaches should also be aware of the connection between sleep and growth hormone secretion.

But the effects of sleep deprivation are less understood and more worrisome.

Clinically, we know that sleep deprivation leads to depression, high blood pressure, weight gain, heart disease, and possibly mortality. But here’s what track and field coaches need to know about sleep deprivation:

Numerous studies have shown that reaction time nearly triples when a person misses an entire night of sleep. Regularly it’s at about a quarter of a second. Didn’t sleep last night? Ok. It’ll increase to 800 to 900 milliseconds.

Losing that half a second on the track is, well, costly.

And here’s another doozy: After just one week of sleeping five hours or less each night, a man’s testosterone levels drop as if he’s aged about 11 years. You’re aware testosterone is critical to male sexual behavior and reproduction, but it also plays a critical role in recovery — think muscle mass and strength, bone density, and even decision-making abilities.

Techniques for Better Sleep

“Get a good night’s rest. We’ve got a big day tomorrow.” You’ve said this before, so you’re already prescribing sleep. Excellent.

But how many of your athletes can’t quite shut their minds off when it’s time to rest? They’re too excited, too anxious for the big meet. If you’re coaching developing athletes, it’s probably a big number.

One simple technique we prescribe our athletes (in addition to neurofeedback) is a combination of breathing exercises, heart rate monitoring, and sleep tracking. It sounds complicated. It’s actually very simple. So simple, we’ve turned it into a free app—SenseSleep.

Basically, your brain should be produced relaxed brain waves when it’s time to go to bed. This can be difficult to do when you’re mind is racing with thoughts about tomorrow. Research has shown that controlled breathing exercises can help the brain enter a more relaxed, sleepy state.

Here’s how it works:

Record your heart rate — If your heart is beating too quickly, your brain and body are probably too active to fall asleep—obviously. It’s a simple indicator in your autonomic system, and it’s a measurement you can watch improve in real time.

Begin breathing exercises — SenseSleep will guide you through simple breathing exercises designed to lower your heart rate, calm your brainwaves, and prepare your body for rest.

Rate your sleep — The next time you open SenseSleep, you’ll rate your night’s sleep on a scale of 1 through 5. This allows you to track improvement over time and learn what techniques work best for you.

Thanks For Reading

If you’d like to learn more about self-regulation techniques like biofeedback and neurofeedback, feel free to follow me on Twitter @LeslieSherlin or my Facebook page. For more information about SenseLabs be sure to check out our Twitter (@sense_labs), like our Facebook page, or visit our website SenseLabs.

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By Craig Pickering

Now that Christmas and the New Year are out of the way, the indoor season is quickly coming around. For a lot of people, especially sprinters, this provides a good opportunity to test their speed early on after undergoing a big block of training pre-Christmas. Depending on how seriously an athlete is approaching the indoor season, it may or may not be appropriate to consider a taper before a competition, especially the key competition. After the indoor season, athletes generally go back to a period of higher training stress, before the outdoor competition season occurs. As the outdoor season is generally the focus of the athlete’s year, pretty much every athlete will undergo a taper at some point. The purpose of this article to review some of the research on what to do when tapering for competition.

First, it’s probably a good idea to define what a taper is. The taper is a reduction in training load to allow the athlete to peak. Peaking refers to the improvement in athlete performance following this reduction in overall training load, the taper. Athletes generally aim to peak for 1-2 races per season. As an athlete my main two were the national championships, and then the World/Olympic/European Championships after that. I had to taper for the National Championships to qualify for that year’s global/regional championship, then build up training load again, before tapering off in preparation for the major championships.

Why do we need this reduction in training load? Well, in order to elicit physiological adaptations through training, the body has to be stressed through load. Without adequate stress, there won’t be sufficient adaptations, and the athlete won’t improve. We can’t start the taper too early. Otherwise we will start to see detraining, which will lead to a reduction in performance. There is also something called the delayed training effect, or supercompensation. This refers to the effect that recovery has on various physiological variables to do with performance, and fatigue and training load are an important aspect of this. When training, we accumulate fatigue, which leads to a reduction in performance.

However, once training load is reduced, fitness and performance levels “rebound” above pre-training levels – the supercompensation effect. Performance is only elevated for a short period, however before it begins to drop off and additional stimulus from training is required. A final point to add is that the harder the training before the taper period, the longer the taper period needs to be before this supercompensation effect occurs. If prior training load is low, then 3-5 days may be sufficient; however if prior training load is high, up to three weeks may be required. This has implications for the position of the taper within the competitive season. If the athlete is competing a large amount before the major competition, then overall training load will likely be low, meaning that only a short taper is required. However, if the athlete is emerging from a heavy training block, a longer taper should be programmed.

Not only are the positive effects of a taper physiological; a taper can also have important psychological effects. The mood of athletes generally improves with a taper, as does their Profile of Mood States (POMS) score, indicating that motivation and other important variables are improving, further enhancing the chances of competitive success.

Tapering for speed-power events can have important psychological effects.
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But does tapering work? For sprint performance, this is a difficult question to answer, as most of the research is done in endurance athletes. One of the reasons for this is that the physiological changes to training in endurance athletes are sometimes more pronounced than in power athletes, but also because the world leading researcher on tapering methods, Inigo Mujika, bases most of his research on endurance athletes. In a meta-analysis of 27 studies, it was found that tapering did improve performance, particularly when some specific training recommendations were followed (which we will come to later).

In a study on strength athletes, the utilization of a taper increased strength by 2%, compared to a 9% loss in those who just completely rested. In a group of rugby league players, the use of a taper improved vertical jump performance, 3RM squat and bench press, and also 10m sprint performance.

Another important aspect of this study is that performance in these measures was actually decreased followed a block of heavy training, illustrating the importance and use of a taper. There is also some evidence that a taper allows for an increase in fast-twitch muscle fibers and also muscle cross-sectional area which is obviously going to be of interest to those competing in speed power events. This is especially important when you consider that some research illustrates that resistance training can change fibre type from type IIx to IIa, although this effect is reversed with a taper. In fact, not only might the effect be reversed, but there may be an “overshoot” effect, such that as the result of a taper an individual has a greater amount of type IIx muscle fibers. This is evidence of the importance of a taper to speed-power athletes such as sprinters.

How to Taper

So, if we know that tapering works, and can improve performance, the next thing to consider is how to implement a taper. As previously stated, we need to reduce training load, and this can be done through manipulation of volume, intensity, and frequency of training.

A taper can either be step-wise, or progressive. A step-wise taper is an immediate reduction of training load to a set level for the duration of the taper. For example, in a 10-day step-wise taper, I might reduce my training load to 40% on day one, and maintain it there for the whole ten days. A progressive taper, as the name suggests, takes a much more progressive approach; on day one I might train at 90% load, then 80%, and so on, until I reach the desired intensity, whatever that may be. Within a progressive taper, the reduction in training load can be linear or exponential. In a linear progressive taper, the training load reduces in a linear fashion, perhaps by 10% per day. In an exponential progressive taper, the reduction is not linear. It can drop off quickly to begin with (a fast decay), or slower (slow decay). A great review of these methods can be found in this paper by Mujika. Generally, some progressive taper is thought to maintain performance to a greater extent.

Next up, we need to consider how to manipulate this training load. As sprinting is a high-intensity exercise, it seems logical that intensity is kept very high during training. This ensures a high transfer from training to competition, particularly with regards to coordination and muscle firing. Certainly, we don’t see many sprinters preparing for a competition by focusing on jogging, so intensity must be kept high. The same has been reported for endurance activities, with research showing that intensity shouldn’t be compromised, but volume can be.

If intensity is to be maintained (or even increased), then there must be a reduction in volume. This can occur by either training less frequently, or by doing less work per session. The research in endurance athletes appears to show that a reduction in frequency may not improve performance during a taper and so less work per session appears to be the way forward, particularly if the intensity is kept high. The previously mentioned meta-analysis shows that an overall reduction of between 41-60% leads to the greatest performance improvements, and so this seems like a reasonable goal.

One final thing to consider is training time; there is some evidence to suggest that training at the time of competition is beneficial to performance, so, if possible, it may be sensible to attempt to do this. For various reasons this was never particularly possible for me, usually because the competition was late evening, and so I felt that it might have a negative impact on my sleep patterns if I had to train at that time, particularly if I was using caffeine.

Taper Examples

To illustrate the programming on a taper, I’m going to give some examples of real life tapers I have come across. The first is mine from the 2011 World Championships, where I was competing in the relay:

As you can see, the intensity is kept high throughout. There is quite a pronounced drop off in training load for me, achieved by the elimination of accessory/supplemental exercises, and also an increase in rest days from one every six days to one every 2 days initially, and then one every other day in the final run. This taper came off a three-week loading block after that national championships, in which the goal was to regain some strength and training volume lost during the competitive season. Frequency is reduced from my typical training programme (6 days per week), which does go against some of the recommendations for the research – however, I felt this reduction in training frequency was useful. It certainly allowed me to maintain intensity in the key sessions.

The second example is a fairly famous one; Ben Johnson’s pre-Canadian Championships 1987 taper, where he ended up running 9.98 for the 100m.

You can see a few differences between the two examples here – most notably is that Ben Johnson utilised tempo during this period (I never did much tempo), and we also don’t have his weight training sessions, if indeed he did any. You can, however, see the similarities. The final hard session is ten days before the race, and this is followed up by a large reduction in overall volume, but a maintenance of intensity.

In conclusion, we can see that tapers are well utilised in high-level athletes to improve performance. As a starting point, intensity should be maintained during training, with the focus on an overall reduction in the volume of training. This can be achieved through shorter sessions or fewer repetitions and sets, or through less frequent training. The psychological aspect of the taper is also important, as athletes will see an improvement in mood.

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By Carl Valle

Every year the NFL Combine tests power and speed but rarely do the athletes get tested again. The reason is twofold: the athletes only need to prove themselves once, and many coaches are afraid to test and train speed because of the possibility of injuries to hamstrings and other muscle groups. Everyone is fearful of losing their job, and that is understandable.

But by not taking the risk, this hyper-conservative approach often backfires. Athletes usually lose speed by not training it, and injuries that result from not preparing for speed show up during games. The most precious gift in sport is speed, but it’s also a responsibility coaches are afraid to be involved with.

This article shows how to test safely and train speed while screening for injury. This solution is not a magic bullet, but the ability to train speed, test it, and screen for injuries—all at the same time—is a game changer.

Risk Factors with Sprinting in Team Sport Settings

An infographic on sprinting as one of the most important modalities to improving speed from Yann Le Meur is all over the internet. But while everyone is re-tweeting and sharing socially, the next week hardly resembles a speed training session on the field. While weight and jump training both help, sprinting is the number one standard for getting faster. With everyone falling prey to being conservative and using secondary modes of improving speed or, at least, preserving it, coaches who take reasonable risks are gaining the edge over their competition.

Three primary factors create the risk of pulling muscles:

• Effort – Athletes who run submaximal speed will likely not pull, but they will also likely fail to stimulate the body to either maintain speed or get better.
• Distance – Athletes who do super-short sprints usually don’t get enough velocity to prepare for games that may have longer possible bursts or higher outputs from arousal.
• Mechanics – Running mechanics are hard to change when athletes become elite because very little time is available to teach train and teach.

So what can coaches do besides the holding pattern of injury reduction exercises and hoping the practices do enough? Athletes fresh and fit from advanced monitoring are not immune to muscle pulls. With all the advancements in sport science and sports medicine, where are all the bulletproof teams and immortal athletes?

The truth is no matter how much one is educated, the practical side of the culture and legal constraints of collective bargaining agreements make it hard to implement the science. I have found success testing speed for years and never once had an injury, but having the luxury of small groups all wanting to train and sprint is not the same as other environments. Last year I found a simple solution that coaches are starting to adopt. With new technology, we are going to see a big revolution in speed training.

The Honest Truth of Why Teams Don’t Sprint

I surveyed a group of professional strength coaches, and they came clean with the problem of speed training during the season. Here’s the summary of their thoughts:

When athletes come in after an offseason, they are dealing with an unknown situation as weeks and months of training offsite is sometimes a ticking time bomb. The unknown unknowns are a risk, and testing sprints is a mixed bag. Testing speed shows how well an athlete has prepared, but testing also comes with the risk of pulling. So many coaches resort to movement screens, activation techniques, and injury reduction exercises.

What usually happens is a coach reading about speed but sitting on the sidelines and not training, and the next year the process repeats itself the next year. I have been conservative with new athletes and waiting for a few weeks before sprinting. But with short pre-season periods, sprint training and testing are rarely done.

Even if the coach is a risk taker and brashly wants to train and test speed, the athletes are often unwilling. They may see speed training as an unnecessary risk. Since they have a job after getting tested at combines, they feel they served their time. Speed training requires everything to be nearly perfect: The athlete must be ready to sprint and have proper mechanics, the coach must have a plan to load speed properly, and the training program must have the right tools to measure speed. All these factors may be viewed as the stars aligning or the speed gods blessing the coach, not something realistic.

Why Miminum Resistance Sprinting is Pure Gold

I have written about the value of warming up smarter to reduce injuries and a hamstring article to reduce their occurrence. Still, these are parts of a sprinting program, not replacements. Eventually, one must take the leap of faith and run fast. So what is the practical way of sprinting with less risk besides the workarounds above?

The answer for reducing risk in speed development is simple: Add a therapeutic load and sprint with light resistance in training.

Figure 1: This curve shows one athlete’s acceleration pattern with load. Each athlete has a unique profile of overcoming inertia and changing velocity with resisted sprints.

Adding light resistance solves the problem of the risk of sprinting by addressing the three factors that coaches are afraid of or don’t have the option of removing. Light resistance does the following three things specifically tp reduce risk:

• Slows down the motion slightly, just enough to rehearse fast sprinting.
• Forces pushing mechanics that are more efficient and safer to the athlete. No overstriding that sometimes recruits the hamstrings too early and awkwardly.
• Encourages athletes to go hard instead of holding back from instant feedback.

I’ve seen several coaches use this method and finally get results. Injury rates decreased during the season and athletes stayed sharper even during the later phase of the year near playoff time. Athletes were more eager to sprint as they got benchmarked or tested for the first time in years. Everything worked perfectly by adding resistance instead of eliminating speed.

The Science (Evidence) of Minimum Resistance Sprinting

Sled pushing, sled marching, sled dragging, and similar exercises have some relative value in preparing athletes. My issue is that when preparing athletes, lighter is better. Nearly every study focuses on comparing sled training only, not entire programs. I have read dozens of studies, and I see the same thing. A researcher seeks to isolate the differences between sled loads compared to body weight. This is not the ideal way to train in the real world. I understand the need to isolate variables, but it’s better to do that in a holistic program. My article reviewing Boo Schexnayder’s speed workshop emphasizes the importance of harmonizing work. Sprinting at high velocities is essential nowadays.

This website has several articles on sled sprinting creating a case for loading based on velocity. I am not the only one advocating for the need to look at body speed more than body weight percentage.

Using the old concept of body weight percentage for sled loads is throwing darts in the dark.
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Figure 2: As the load increases, studies indicate specific kinematic and kinetic changes that are sometimes favorable and sometimes problematic, based on each athlete. Here the Dartfish app shows limb kinematics changing based on loading protocols. Overstriders need to cut overextension and flexion, and short striders need more RFD.

Everyone has their personal philosophy and many roads lead to Rome, but the analogy becomes reality when one has to get to Italy’s capital faster and more consistently. The best path is repeatable, clear, and safe. The following factors lead to successful speed development.

• Sprinting is a primary way of improving speed and is often overlooked because people overthink. Do the sprinting and things will fall into place.
• Strength and power are a neurological change, not an attempt to recreate visually sprinting motions with low intensity. Based on current research, the compromise of using low specificity movements and low loading in training yields very little.
• Heavy sled work has value, but usually, those athletes respond to a combination of fast sprinting and a conventional strength and conditioning program. Read the research to see what athletes are doing overall, not just in isolation.
• Small changes in contact time and kinematic motion occur at different loads. They can present an opportunity to change timing and technique over time as well as a potential problem in different parts of the acceleration for some.
• Overcoming inertia requires old school maximal strength or high volumes of sprinting. The fastest 10m ever recorded was accomplished without heavy squatting or even very much lifting, but long training calendars of sprinters are not models for most team sports.
• Sled work is usually a static load during short accelerations of less than 50m. Most coaches are trying work early departure, so they compromise the velocity at later parts of the sprint.
• Athletes produce resultant forces (lateral, vertical, horizontal) that change during the sled sprints because of posture and loading with some equipment. Coaches must be aware of this if they see dead spots with specific force profiles.

Most of these points support the use of a classic program that nearly all major sprint and strength coaches have implemented over the last 100 years. No need to reinvent the wheel unless an opportunity exists for something significantly better.

Coaching Minimum Resistance Sprinting

Everyday training of sprints is about adjusting the workout daily and planning seasonal speed development with goals. The old paradigm or training dogma about using body weight percentage has several flaws:

• Two athletes of the same weight may have different speed abilities, so using an arbitrary approach is convenient but not tailored and personalized.
• Two athletes may have similar speeds and weights but different strength abilities, so they respond differently to resisted sprints.
• Athletes who don’t get exposed to high effort and high speeds of sprint training need access to immediate work, so light loads are smarter.
• Athletes are usually going to have fatigue and speed abilities that fluctuate during the year and during the session itself.

Currently very little—if any—research exists on the velocity approach. That’s the reason coaches exist, and the right instrumentation helps support the innovators. Since the 1980s, some good studies have noticed crude trends with body weight and velocity based on general and average observations. In 2016, we can do better. Since 2009, I have been putting more time into velocity approaches to sled work, and this practice accelerated when I used timing for feedback. The evolution is continuing with more powerful options.

Figure 3: The above table was taken from Alcaraz and colleagues in 2009 and provides evidence to focus on the velocity changes of different phases of the sprints. Using more instant and higher resolution of splits (2-5 meter increments with 1 kilogram changes) is the future.

Nobody has a pure blueprint for success with body speed and acceleration curves, but many coaches are adopting the same approach to speed training with sleds as with barbell tracking and weight training. The 10% rule for speed is based on the entire run time, so coaches must decide where they want the speed to drop and by how much. The chart hints what the speed should be based on paper, but every day the coach has to see what the athlete is bringing to the table and adjust on the spot. The problem is that long accelerations will not address different sections of the acceleration so compromises are made. But using light resistance means the general training session will be successful.

The Results of Minimum Resistance Sprinting

I learned about athletes sprinting fresh at small doses from various coaches this past year. Light resistance sprinting in any form helps—meaning a good sled or slight incline is valuable—but one needs to get an accurate measurement of absolute speed to know what is trending up or down. After adding more super-light sleds as Todd Lane suggests, many coaches did speed work safely. It was a great start for everyone.

One issue still not addressed is the need to individualize not just the total resistance load, but the entire acceleration curve. Sled sprinting is one load that is rather static. Each athlete has small but noticeable areas that must be smoothed out. A coach usually has to limit the session to one area of development instead of improving the entire curve.

Enter the 1080 Sprint and Getting to the Next Level

Some coaches experimented with something more finite and advanced last year: using “robotic” resistance with speed training. While I was satisfied with timing sled sprints, like anyone in the sprint world I wanted more.

Screenshot 1: This is part of the acceleration curve showing every step. Note the mean (white line) and individual step count (colored line).

I found out about the 1080 Sprint from Randy Huntington last year as he suggested it as the marquee solution for coaches who are training speed. Randy shared the overspeed and sprint resistance device of the future, and Christopher Glaeser from SimpliFaster was determined to help provide it for performance coaches. I patiently gathered information on the 1080 Sprint and its potential.

The 1080 Sprint is the right tool for elite teams and facilities making their living from the evidence of their athletes getting faster. While I am a fan of quality sleds and have suggested timing using the Freelap Pro Coach, the 1080 is likely the best option because it does speed assessment and provides a spectrum of resistance at very precise increments. One obviously can get splits every 10m or so while adjusting the load with small plates, but this process loses several benefits. I have used the time and load for years and found ways to accomplish it by hand. But four features I found indispensable require the 1080 Sprint.

• Stride asymmetry – Basic right and left differences are a key feature of the system and every step is displayed after the sprint.
• Step quality reporting – Every step is sampled to 1/100th of a second for gross perspective of possible dead spots when accelerating.
• Variable adjusted resistance – Instead of one resistance throughout the sprint, the 1080 Sprint can create smooth acceleration to mirror an athlete’s unique profile.
• Ultra-precision loading – The increments of resistance are thinly sliced so coaches can instantly fine-tune every run.

Screenshot 2: The bottom half of this report shows an instant table of force, velocity, power, time, and distance with razor-like precision. The data is displayed on a tablet for instant feedback.

Every athlete has personalized needs with loading, and the key is not killing the elastic response and making it a strength exercise instead of a speed development modality. The 1080 Sprint is not a resistance tool. It’s the offspring of one part speed lab and one part finely tuned resistance equipment.

Winning the Arms Race and Getting the Edge

If you are not doing speed work and playing it too safe you are eventually going to get burned. Not sprinting is putting your head in the sand and betting against the spread. I suggest that every team sport do speed work as fast as they can go with some sort of light resistance, and save the heavy loading for the weight room. Speed training is a precious commodity, so don’t slow it down with heavy loads.

Every professional team should value speed training as a priority. Using light resistance as well as measurement is the future. The 1080 Sprint is not for everyone, as it isn’t a toy and is inappropriate for many programs. If you run a private facility, it’s a great assessment option. For professional teams, it’s the solution for getting athletes safely engaged again in speed. Whatever you do, find a way to sprint in some form. The faster it is, the more likely you’ll get better results.

Suggested Reading

I recommend that readers go to the research and see some of the specific differences and benefits with loading sprints, as each article has unique study designs. Many potentiation studies are produced in a vacuum versus a true season of training that coaches experience. Thanks to George Petrakos for his article on Freelap helping to drive the velocity approach to speed, rather than the body weight loading method of the past.

1. Lockie RG, Murphy AJ, and Spinks CD. “Effects of resisted sled towing on sprint kinematics in field-sport athletes.” J Strength Cond Res. 2003;17(4):760-7.
2. Alcaraz PE, Palao JM, and Elvira, JLL. “Determining the optimal load for resisted sprint training with sled towing.” J Strength Cond Res. 2009; 23(2) (epub)
3. Kawamori N, Newton R, and Nosaka K. “Effects of weighted sled towing on ground reaction force during the acceleration phase of sprint running.” J Sports Sci. 2014;32(12):1139-45.
4. Martínez-Valencia MA, Romero-Arenas S, Elvira JL et al. “Effects of Sled Towing on Peak Force, the Rate of Force Development and Sprint Performance During the Acceleration Phase.” J Hum Kinet. 2015;46(1):139-48.
5. Okkonen O and Hakkinen K. “Biomechanical comparison between sprint start, sled pulling, and selected squat-type exercises.” J Strength Cond Res. 2013;27(10):2662-73.
6. Seitz LB, Reyes A, Tran TT et al. “Increases in lower-body strength transfer positively to sprint performance: A systematic review with meta-analysis.” Sports Med. 2014;44(12):1693-702.
7. Cronin J, Hansen K, Kawamori N et al. “Effects of weighted vests and sled towing on sprint kinematics.” Sport Biomech. 2008;7(2):160-72.
8. West DJ, Cunningham DJ, Bracken RM et al. “Effects of resisted sprint training on acceleration in professional rugby union players.” J Strength Cond Res. 2013;27(4):1014-8.
9. Bachero-Mena B and Gonzalez-Badillo JJ. “Effects of resisted sprint training on acceleration with three different loads accounting for 5, 12.5 and 20% of body mass.” J Strength Cond Res. 2014;28(10):2954-60.
10. Rumpf MC, Lockie RG, Cronin JB et al. “The effect of different sprint training methods on sprint performance over various distances: a brief review.” J Strength Cond Res. 2015.
11. Petrakos G, Morin JB, and Egan B. “Resisted Sled Sprint Training to Improve Sprint Performance: A Systematic Review.” Sports Med. 2015.

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Marco Cardinale was Head of Sports Science and Research for Team GB at the Beijing/Vancouver/London Olympics. He is currently Head of Physiology at Aspire in Qatar and has published many studies on human performance. He also served as an editor of the great resource Strength and Conditioning: Biological Principles and Practical Applications, a gold standard in the profession. His blog has many valuable suggestions to sports training and can be found here.

Dr. Marco Cardinale

Freelap USA – Your study with Dr. Michael Stone looked at explosive jumping and hormonal profiling of different athletes and found sprinters had the best androgen metrics for power. One interesting finding was the different levels between handball and soccer. What may be confusing is how genetics (fiber type) and volume of aerobic work in a sport affect free testosterone. Could too much aerobic work create interference at the receptor level? I am sure coaches would love to split training into group practice for tactical reasons and split volumes based on athlete DNA (fiber profile) since the preseason is so short and seasonal training is essential.

Marco Cardinale – Let me clarify the paper and correct some terminology. The study found sprinters had the highest testosterone levels when compared to other athletes. I am not sure what “androgen metrics for power” means. Because the correlation coefficient between T levels and jump was 0.61 in the study, we can say that 37% of the performance in CMJ (Counter-Movement Jump) can be explained by testosterone levels. This is it, nothing more. The differences between the groups considered are specific to those groups, not necessarily that football players will always be different from handball players in team average values and every part of the world.

Now to the other questions. There is no doubt that to some extent T levels are regulated genetically (recent work here or here) or by genetic aspects connected to SHBG. These influence the bioavailable free testosterone as well as being regulated by pathological conditions (e.g. polycystic ovarian syndrome, common in some female athletes).

With regard to the volume of aerobic work and circulating testosterone levels, we need to differentiate what happens acutely (e.g. at the end of a training session) versus what happens as a consequence of chronic loading. With chronic loading (no matter if aerobic or mixed) alterations in various hormones (not only T) suggest the possibility of a status of overreaching and overtraining (see here for a study of military recruits).

The role of acute hormonal and other systemic responses in modulating muscle mass remodeling has recently been questioned. We should look at the meaning of T levels in a different way, as I have mentioned with other authors. Aerobic exercise has been suggested to interfere at the molecular level with mTOR in many molecular biology studies (which by the way do not replicate what elite athletes do in terms of volumes and intensity and concatenation of activities/nutrition etc.). For readers unfamiliar with molecular biology, I suggest the following:

• To explain exercise-induced phenotype from molecular data: rethink and reconstruction based on AMPK and mTOR signaling
• Mechanisms regulating skeletal muscle growth and atrophy
• Exercise- and nutrient-controlled mechanisms involved in maintenance of the musculoskeletal mass

Editors Note: Marco also suggests following the work being done by Professor Keith Baar on this topic.

Image 1: Genetics is a new frontier that various coaches are talking about. While we still need time to see how things work, it’s clear that talent matters.

I think coaches should individualize training according to the needs and characteristics of individual players. However, I have to say that in my previous life as an S&C coach I tended to sort athletes according to their characteristics (fast vs. endurance type) when I planned group activities. In the weight room, they all had loads/progressions and individualized programs. All S&C coaches should do this.

Too many people are hung up on testosterone and what it means. Testosterone is one of many things affected by training that contribute to the adaptive responses we see (or don’t see if the program is not effective). But it should not be the ONLY parameter we use in deciding what to do. Testosterone levels alone don’t tell us much unless they are way above or below the clinical ranges.

Freelap USA – In 2000, Viru, Bosco, and Bonomi did an experiment with explosive training and EMG with hormonal profiling. It was interesting to see the relationships between neuromuscular fatigue and testosterone. A clear relationship exists between deep sleep and testosterone with both “regular” adults and athletes, yet rock-star lifestyles and international travel can cripple athletes if they are not careful. Since the early 1990s, teams have spent money on sleep science. But few—if any—point out testosterone changes. Do you think athletes will be more receptive with infographics of their testosterone and sleep for compliance? It seems everyone knows what to do, but not many are changing their behavior.

Marco Cardinale – As I stated before, T is only one parameter of interest. Sleep causes many disturbances which affect cognitive and recovery abilities and trainability. Travel and sleep disturbance also affect the immune profile. We have much data on athletes traveling across multiple time zones and showing clear signs of immunosuppression. I think athletes will be more responsive when they understand that lack of sleep affects many things which negatively influence performance rather than just testosterone.

I would like to add that I am not sure teams have spent lots of money on sleep science. The only team I have seen investing in improving sleep quality and sorting out the basics (e.g. quality of beds! Sleep hygiene workshops! etc.) is the British cycling team. My colleague Matt Parker headed their sports science department. He is now doing similar work with the England rugby team. If coaches are serious about improving their athletes’ quality of sleep, they should make sure the athletes have good beds to sleep on before looking for magic supplements or potions. Get the basics right first!

Freelap USA – Some programs use the SJ (Squat Jump) and CMT (Counter-Movement Jump) as simple tests to help manage the development of power and monitor fatigue. Since doing vertical jumps daily can be monotonous and the training effect is slight, what do you think of using those options with load in the beginning of a weight training program to get a warmup, training status, and a small training effect? With so many tools now, this may be a good idea. What frequency would be needed to see good adaptation?

Marco Cardinale – SJ and CMJ don’t help manage power development. They assess vertical jumping ability and potentially monitor any effect of training and/or competition on this ability. They rely on the fact that the athlete performs a maximal effort. Yes, they might be monotonous. But so is much of any training. Weightlifters might call it boring, but they always have to work on the same lifts no matter how many variations one can apply! Changing the test is not the issue. Even with a weighted jump, the athlete still needs to perform a maximal effort to consider the value for any diagnostic purpose.

Image 2: Marco Cardinale suggests embedding testing into training programs and finds monitoring key lifts to be valuable.

It is easier to embed testing within a training session. I used to have a Monday session with my teams which included CMJs. A testing station was part of their schedule. I monitored squats and bench presses, asking athletes always to lift as fast as possible in the concentric phase independently from the load. It was useful.

It is easier to embed testing within a training session.
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Frequent assessment allows the determination of the normal variability of this measure. It, therefore, allows the practitioner to detect “true” changes, which may suggest serious alterations to the program. Each measure has an error (instrument/human) In order to see a “true” change, one needs to know what is the error of the measurement. Having longitudinal measurements might help in establishing the error. In reality, it takes few weeks to see a TRUE change in a vertical jump score (good dissertation from Bill Sands’s and Mike Stone’s lab here.)

Freelap USA – In your blog you talk about the recent not being new:

“Not all the recent literature is ‘recent.’ Lots of things have been done before, but they are ‘sold’ as new. If you are looking for examples, read the work of Professor Angelo Mosso and look at his ergograph, developed in 1890. You will find out that the use of dynamometry to measure fatigue is not a new idea after all.”

A lot of equipment is now consumer-friendly because of smart devices such as HRV for mobile devices, thermography for the iPhone, and wearable sensors using Bluetooth. Not all available products are medical or research grade, making conclusions very limited. Could you get into more detail about using measurements outside jumping in the weight room? Is bar velocity enough to get a decent indication of athlete progress?

Marco Cardinale – Bar velocity measurements are useful, though again just one of the many things needed in your toolbox). But they don’t make sense in linear types of lifts (e.g. squats/bench presses) unless the device can make corrections for the cable angle of pull. Otherwise, this would affect the noise of the measure.

Image 3: Linear encoders can provide specific information on lifts to help coaches make better decisions. The technology is over 20 years old, and thanks to smart devices have become more coach-friendly.

But linear encoders with appropriate testing protocols and data reduction and analysis can provide information on the effects of training only on the exercises performed for testing. Such improvements need to be related to performance-specific aspects, just like any other assessment in the gym. Used appropriately, dynamometry can provide useful data on how training is progressing as well as having useful applications as a biofeedback tool.

So yes, I think when the aim of weight training is to improve speed/power, they definitively are useful and yes, having bar velocity data can provide useful information. Most of all, having the ability to determine F/V and P/V relationships can provide valuable information on the effects of training as well as on loading choices. I explained it here.

Freelap USA – In 2004, your presentation exploring neurotrophins and fatigue in Stockholm was very interesting. The brain is, of course, popular now, and every trendy science book is trying to hack the brain for better results. Without getting into deep chemistry of BDNF and other physiological areas, can you show the value of mood state as part of the equation of monitoring? Athletes nowadays find subjective questionnaires boring and tedious. Besides talking to the athlete, what do you think can make POMS and other methods more compliant with athletes? Also, what do we need to do to see the biomarkers to ensure we know the difference between lifestyle and training loads?

Marco Cardinale – POMS is a valid questionnaire, though as you say it might be boring to do it too routinely. The problems with biomarkers are cost and time. I don’t think they are within reach for most people. So simple questionnaires (wellness and POMS type or DALDA or RestQ or others) can be administered routinely and provide some information. However, just as with T, one needs to know the noise of such measurements to understand the TRUE variation which should trigger an intervention. To date, we don’t have one magic measurement which provides all the answers. We need to use various assessments to make informed decisions.

Image 4: Mobile tools from AMS systems can keep coaches from being Excel slaves by allowing technology to work for them.

In extreme cases, some clinical assessments might uncover serious issues (depression/stress/pathological conditions) which are not manifested in a questionnaire nor clearly evident if a single biomarker is used rather than a comprehensive approach. Questionnaires should also be used according to the protocols to make sure they are valid, not in shortened/altered forms. I see so many wrong versions of questionnaires which are presented in the wrong way and poorly interpreted. Furthermore, attention should be paid to translated versions if you work in non-English-speaking countries. Questionnaires should be validated in the language in which they are meant to be used.

Sadly, the conclusion to all this is that there is no magic marker/measurement which can tell you everything. When implementing measurements, people need to understand what the test measures, what the data mean, and the limitations of that measure before jumping to conclusions. Too many times in the S&C community I hear strange and dubious terminology as well as various indices which make no sense. Jump tests measure the ability to jump with and without countermovement, and data tell us only about the lower limbs. The original papers about these testing methods date from the 1970s and their assumptions are still valid.

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By Greg Hull

ALTIS and Freelap—two of the biggest names in T&F—have come together to celebrate progress in our sport. We hope you enjoy this week’s blog-post. Share if you enjoy it!

It strikes me as unusual that society automatically assigns respect to people involved in certain professions or positions in life, without said respect being earned or demonstrated.

These professions include doctors, pilots, teachers, and—for the sake of this discussion—coaches. But why is it that when we apply such titles in front of people’s names there seems to be an immediate assumption that these individuals are always professional, well-educated, well-trained, competent, and caring?

Are we so naïve to think that every individual in these professions exhibits the traits listed above, and that said training and education are universally well-delivered and appropriately applied? When we send our children to school or athletic programs, do we doubt that their teacher or coach is not only well-prepared but also has their best interests in mind? How many of us question the competency of a doctor or a dentist? Do we ask for the pilot’s credentials before boarding a flight?

The obvious answer to these questions is “no.” We generally accept any individual’s level of professional competency on the basis of blind faith. Thankfully instances of malpractice in medicine or pilot error in commercial aviation are rare in the grand scheme of things—unless, of course, you end up in the small minority affected by breakdowns in the system. There are also high standards in most professions for the education and training of people employed in these positions.

The coaching profession, however, is an exception. Increasingly, the trend is that coaches in many school settings are often teachers, parents, or volunteers. In many if not most cases, these people are primarily motivated by the desire to help young athletes improve their skill sets. We have also seen an increase in ex-athletes moving directly from their competitive careers into the coaching realm. Yet are they always equipped to understand that not all the young athletes they will influence are capable, willing, or driven to achieve at the levels they once did?

Few of these scenarios include professional training in coaching the technical or psychological aspects of the given sport. In contrast, the backgrounds of many of our greatest, long-established coaches include both pedagogical training and experience with classroom-based teaching as well as specific training in coaching skills, kinesiology, and the like. It is from this environment that these superior coaches learned the most effective ways of communicating, motivating, and relating to the young people under their care.

Study after study show that coaches are one of the greatest influences on young people’s formative years, but often people put in these positions have no formal training. Is it, therefore, any surprise that we sometimes encounter the unsettling issue of inappropriate coaching, with the possibility of damaging young people who have placed their faith in someone with “Coach” in front of their name? The responsibility falls on all of us who love our sport and embrace the calling to coach to strive for further educational certifications for those who want to be honored with the title of “Coach.”

Coaches are one of the greatest influences on young people’s formative years.
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Throughout history, the path to mastering a profession often has through a cycle in which one started as a laborer, moved on to an apprenticeship, and eventually became a craftsman or master in the chosen profession. Many of those I consider great coaches followed nearly identical methods to achieve the mastery I observe when they apply their skills to their athletes. A sense of humility drives them during this journey. They always focus on seeking knowledge at all opportunities and realize they are first and foremost there for the betterment of the athletes they have been charged to assist.

These coaches tend to be voracious readers, and are never afraid to ask questions and seek help from their fellow practitioners. There are many programs for coaching education, and the one that stands out to me is the ALTIS-led Apprentice Coach Program. The apprentice—and sometimes fellow master coaches—stand side-by-side with the master coaches from ALTIS. They have the opportunity to observe, ask questions, interact with athletes, and listen to a variety of lectures on many different topics.

My single greatest learning experience as a young coach was in a similar format. In the mid-1970s, the USOC put on a learn-by-doing clinic in Colorado Springs, Colorado. Nearly 150 young coaches spent a week learning from, listening to, and being coached by some of the era’s true innovators. Many years later, more than 70% of them are leading American coaches in athletics. There is no substitute for this type of classic apprentice/master craftsman interaction. It saddens me that there are few similar opportunities in coaching development.

“I’m only sure I don’t know all I need to know.” - Stephen Hawking
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Classroom or online courses are far simpler to administer and participate in but lack the ability to impact the art of coaching. I hope that future generations of coaches spend more time with master craftsmen, listening to and being evaluated by these leaders. We must put our egos aside and open up our minds to realize, as Stephen Hawking said, “I’m only sure I don’t know all I need to know.” We are part of an amazing profession whose subjects place a great deal of trust and faith in us. What is more telling than the willingness of parents to entrust their children to someone else?

Let’s be sure we are always vigilant in deserving that trust.

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By Mike Boykin

ALTIS and Freelap — two of the biggest names in T&F — have come together to celebrate progress in our sport. We hope you enjoy this week’s blog-post. Share if you enjoy it!

“You will be the same person in five years as you are today except for the people you meet and the books you read.” – Charlie Jones

Last summer, Dustin Imdieke recommended I read Good to Great by Jim Collins. Although I did not get around to finishing it until early fall, once completed it made an immediate and significant impact on how I viewed the growth and development of any performance center.

In the writing of the book, Collins and his team logged something to the effect of 15,000 hours of work spanning a five-year research effort in their quest to answer the question: “Can a good company become a great company and, if so, how?” I will not go into the nuances and minutia of Collins’ criteria for what constituted a “great” company, but instead will assure you that they were numerous. To top it off, Collins and his team developed a list of control companies that did not make the leap from ‘good to great’, or, if they did, were unable to sustain their results. The search, simply due to the amount of data collection needed, focused on the examination of large companies that had – at one time – been on the Fortune 500 list.

After finishing Good to Great, it was clear that the principles and concepts outlined in the pages of the book were not limited in their application to major corporations with thousands of employees or billions of dollars in their budget, but had a far wider-reaching scope.

In my journey to try and understand excellence in sport, I have been fortunate to work in a multitude of settings with some incredible mentors. It has been my observation that there are key common denominators between these people, the environments they work in, and the messages they deliver. Most importantly, however – their actions exhibit synchronicity.

Below I will outline the key concepts that carry over from Collins’ book to any high-performance center. This is by no means an exhaustive list, nor does it include all of the major points examined in Good to Great; my aim is instead to spark thoughts leading to conversations affecting potential change.

Level 5 Leadership

The first major consistency across all great companies was the presence of what Collins and his team referred to as Level 5 Leadership. Level 5 leaders are people who create organizations and environments that last – always past their resignations, through a seemingly dichotomous blend of humility and professional will. These are not ego-less individuals without personal ambitions, but instead, people who are able to funnel their unrelenting drive into the development of the organization, rather than themselves.

The most recent example of this in my professional journey has been experiencing first-hand the growth of ALTIS within the past few years. John Godina’s vision and passion to create something unique in the world of Track & Field go well beyond achieving success at major meets. The vision is to create a system where ALTIS as an organization can assist with the support of professionals competing in the sport of Track & Field, in the same way athletes operating at the upper echelons of other pro sports can make a livable wage. I sat across from John during dinner a year ago and listened to him unabashedly outline this vision – there was no hesitation in his voice, nor doubt in his mind that it could be done. I knew then he would work relentlessly until this mission becomes a reality.

In the same vein, none of this is accomplished with the intention of growing his personal brand over the reputation of the company. You will find fewer facets of the company headlined by the name “John Godina” than you would have at the inception of the World Throws Center. As he put it with respect to ALTIS athlete clinics, the fewer people that come to learn because of his name versus the reputation of the organization, the better.

As I read through the chapter on Level 5 Leadership, it became clear that this doesn’t necessarily need to pertain to the obviously important role of a great CEO. Coaches have an obligation to the athletes they work with to set them up for sustained success. This point was exemplified in a recent conversation with Dan Pfaff. He gave multiple examples of both athletes he had worked with at the end of their careers, as well as those who had moved on to other coaches. In the former group, he was sometimes fortunate to have inherited them from great coaches. These athletes had refined skills and abilities, and Dan was the beneficiary of years of progress. He felt like any credit he received for their successes was much more deserved by their former coaches. For the latter group, he was comfortable watching from a distance and finding joy in their triumphs, despite the fact that he no longer played an active role in their progress.

Art Horne, former Director of Sports Performance at Northeastern University and current Head Athletic Trainer for the Atlanta Hawks, was recently in town – and his approach to organizational development is rooted in concepts outlined in Good to Great. I had the privilege of interning for Art during his time at Northeastern; not only does he embody Level 5 Leadership qualities, but strives to set athletes up for sustained success. As he put it bluntly one day: “Someone [an athlete] leaving your university after four or five years should be healthier than when they walked in.” Elite sport is massively demanding in nature, and this is no easy task, but should serve as a brutally honest assessment for those coaching and keeping the athlete’s well-being as a first and foremost priority.

First Who … Then What

By far the most crucial point highlighted in Collins and his team’s analysis was the concept of first who … then what. The importance of getting “the right people on the bus (and the wrong people off the bus) and then figuring out where to drive it” cannot be overstated. The executive members of your team will guide the course of the company, and not the other way around. Being highly selective in whom you bring on the bus, and which seat you put them in, is another crucial aspect to the long-term growth and success of a company. Hiring people for the sake of filling seats will ultimately throttle how far the company can go.

During my reading of Good to Great, I realized Collins was describing how many of our current staff members, and even athletes, had come to ALTIS. It wasn’t necessarily that everyone had a clear image in their mind of where the company would be in five years. How could they? Instead, coaches and athletes uprooted their lives to work with people like John Godina, Dan Pfaff, Stu McMillan, and Andreas Behm. As Collins described: “if people are on the bus because of who else is on the bus, then it’s much easier to change direction.” When Kevin Tyler was hired, he subsequently brought Ian Warner on board. I watched a shift occur in how ALTIS presents educational programs and saw new plans develop to continue to grow online platforms in this way. Without Kevin’s experience in this realm, combined with Ian’s expertise and unrelenting drive to make things happen, the coach education quest ALTIS looked to embark on would have taken a different turn. Tying this back into Level 5 Leadership, it’s very clear that many of our staff do things differently, and often even better, than John Godina would have done it himself. However, having the right people on the bus allows him to step back and let people autonomously do the job they were brought in to do.

Three summers back I had the opportunity to intern at Cressey Sports Performance. Having followed their growth since 2009, and knowing how they had grown since the company’s inception in 2007, it amazed me how each staff member helped define the course the company would take. At the onset, the key trio of staff members had little intention of turning the company into a center for baseball development. With Eric’s thorough, and unique understanding of the shoulder and elbow (stemming from his injury history), training baseball athletes from the youth to professional ranks fell naturally into place. In the same vein that Eric and Tony’s skill-sets and knowledge allowed them to effectively program, manage, and coach athletes, Pete, with entrepreneurial skills and an educational background in business, was able to grow that side of the company. While Pete has written extensively about the business side of fitness, this is an area that Eric clearly respects, but does not dedicate the majority of his time to master. This separation of interests is reflected in their role within the company.

As Cressey Sports Performance has grown and hired a diverse staff with a variety of perspectives, the amount of support services and programs expanded secondary to this. What always struck me about Eric and Pete’s managerial styles was the confidence they placed in their employees, including interns. If the staff made the executive decision to bring someone on board and pour numerous resources into them, there should be no reason to micromanage their every move. To ensure that they bring the right people on the bus, the staff at CSP have developed a policy that they will not hire from outside of the internship program. With the right people on your staff in the right positions, motivating them to do their job, and be exceptional at it, is a non-issue.

When Art was the Director of Sports Performance at Northeastern, he specifically sought out sports performance and medical staff members to add to the team. He opted to fill the bus with people he was confident in and knew would be the right fit, rather than trying to motivate and change the mindset of people already there. This attitude was contagious to those he worked with – as a few years later when Keke Lyles (a former colleague of Art’s at Northeastern) became the Executive Director of Player Performance with the Hawks, he began to do just that. The current performance and medical staff of the Hawks have ties to Art and Keke and are people with diverse backgrounds and the full confidence of those at the top of the organization.

One of the final points of the “First Who … Then What” chapter in Good to Great that is clearly exemplified in the culture of ALTIS, is the intrinsic drive of those employed to pursue their goals and fight for what they believe to be best for the team, but at the same time ultimately stand united behind the company’s final decision. It is necessary to have team members who are willing to violently debate and argue to search for the best answer to a problem, without losing respect for one another. Our staff meetings, whether it’s with regards to programming for an upcoming cycle of training, or discussing a future project, always involve people questioning the merit of one decision over another. This can be traced back to a core training philosophy that all of our coaches hold in that, if you can’t justify every aspect of the training program, it shouldn’t be in there. Upon beginning my journey with ALTIS a year and a half ago, it struck me how much of an open forum these staff meetings were. It was not John, Stu, or Andreas lecturing and asking everyone to follow blindly, but instead, an honest conversation where everyone’s opinion was heard and acknowledged, even if it did not change the team’s course of action.

I hope this blog sparked some unique thoughts in how you view the development of excellence in sporting culture. I would highly recommend you pick up a copy of Good to Great as this is just the starting point of Collins and his team’s guide to building a great company. What follows next is Disciplined Thoughts, Disciplined Actions, and the Flywheel of how to keep things building upon one another.

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By Carl Valle

Editor’s Note: This is the first of a series of articles showing how deeper metrics of bar tracking technology can improve the quality of training in the weight room.

Coaches use the weight room to make athletes better. One of the most precious qualities that can emerge is first-step quickness, or explosiveness. In previous articles on Freelap and other sites, I have shown that velocity based training (VBT) is becoming mainstream, with the goal of improving performance on the field or court. Along with managing power and monitoring fatigue, VBT can profile specific traits. While VBT in its early form is a great starting point and solution, the problem with barbell speed alone is that it does NOT always equate to body speed.

The Beyond Bar Speed series is about embracing what coaches have applied to this point and laying the foundation of what should be considered next—understanding, assessing, and applying RFD (rate of force development). This first article provides three important takeaways related to this crown jewel:

• What is RFD in the real world?
• How does it help athletes?
• How can you adjust training programs to improve it?

How RFD contributes to athletic performance

Rate of force qualities in strength and conditioning provide a wide range of possibilities. A practical way of getting the best bang for your buck is to look at the primary benefit.

Overcoming inertia is the cornerstone of most sports, where the slowest movement can make or break success.
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Instead of first step quickness, it’s better to think in terms of overcoming inertia. Overcoming inertia or momentum can mean starting from a dead stop or a change of direction.

A simple example illustrates the importance of RFD. The first 5 meters in a sprint are always the slowest, as the starting point is a dead start or stationary period of no motion. The first three steps are slow because gravity always must be paid up front with power to get going. Some athletes are effective early in motion while others require more time to get up to speed. Rate of force production doesn’t exactly equate to how fast one can move early. It does equate significantly to being fast off the snap in American football, and can help in other sports as well. Besides performance, RFD is a major player in protecting athletes from injuries. Many movements with fast actions require the body to act quickly before excessive motions can damage tendons and ligaments.

Figure 1. Classic ideas from CFTS (Charlie Francis Training System) of how the rapid rate of force development is seen in stride contacts. (Courtesy of Derek Hansen)

Something to think about: sport demands may be in time frames earlier than full speed and power. This comes back to the point of making sure training prepares for the demands of the sport. Comprehensive evaluation, including peak and average bar speed, need to be dissected to reveal what is happening in applied or “real world” settings.

One of my favorite examples of RFD in action is ground contact times for sprinters. While it is more complicated than just doing jump and weight training, most elite sprinters quickly deliver a lot of energy into the ground and if all works out, do it over and over.

Jumping high and far is not the same as jumping fast. Many sports need an athlete to have a high-level combination of two important qualities: the ability to displace oneself maximally and get to the ball or opponent quickly. For example, NBA rebounders are not just great jumpers. They can jump repeatedly and jump fast to get to the ball first.

RFD is not just about sprinting or jumping. It’s part of the responsibility for fatigue and power management as well as a way to dissect assessment of power for more granularity and effective programming. RFD is a valuable asset, and coaches can gauge their training design better if they understand it and test it properly.

Why RFD Measurement is Controversial

Bring up RFD with some sport scientists and you will get a mixed bag of opinions. The use of RFD in the research is not easy to assess because it’s such a sensitive measure. It can be worthless if not sampled properly with the right testing protocol and the right interpretation. RFD sounds like a subcomponent of power, but it’s in the middle of the spectrum—not a particular location on the force-time curve I discussed in my article on force plates. It’s important to know the simple expression of power and when it shows up on the field or in the weight room. We will start with something comfortable like a simple vertical jump, and then dig deeper into how it relates to other exercises and measurement tools.

On the force-time curve, the rate of change of force is what one is measuring. This requires precise instrumentation and interpretation. When you think RFD, think about how steep the acceleration is—usually the earlier, the higher. Sometimes athletes gather force slower as they care about what happens at the end of the movement, sort of like pitchers moving from slow to fast. Summation of forces uses the time and distance during the preparatory phases of absolute performance, similar to throws in track and field. Some actions in sport simply don’t have time to work with, and the absolute amount of force isn’t as important as the rate that a percentage of that force can be used. Thousands of American football players are stronger that Usain Bolt, but nobody with the same RFD qualities creates better relative forces into the ground at high speed.

A common argument against RFD use in testing athletes is the reliability of the data, but not the value of the quality of sport performance. The most common problem with RFD is the vague and general use of the term. Just like barbell speed, RFD alone as a quality doesn’t move the needle much as RFD is so specific. Even peak RFD is so vague and poor an indicator that I would not suggest using it. To properly use RFD, the exercise must be properly executed, the precision must be high, and the magnitude of change must show up so well that it passes the coaching eyeball test (not visual, but clear data that doesn’t require a statistical package to decipher).

Sampling RFD is easy when you know what you are looking for. I like early motion measurement, as well as the end, and how they connect in the middle. RFD sampling can range from the first 0-50 milliseconds to 0-100 or 0-250. To understand—or better yet, appreciate—those small time frames, think about what goes on in such a short period. A stride contact in sprinting lasts about 80 milliseconds. That means the foot touches the ground, transfers forces, and is off before the blink of an eye. RFD is usually a fraction of that time period, as the athlete must overcome gravity eccentrically and then produce propulsive forces. RFD is sampled during part of the second phase of the contact period, and that is how winners and losers in sprinting are truly measured. The good news is that RFD is slightly trainable—it’s a stubborn genetic quality—and can be improved by patient and quality programming.

How to Measure RFD Qualities Practically

I have read a lot of RFD articles and some research studies that frankly wasted my Sunday morning education time. I don’t care about stuff that looks at isometric frog leg contractions unless it bridges the gap from lab to the podium. I do care about stuff that shows up on the watch, scale, or tape. RFD measurements are similar to more crude forms that coaches are familiar with, such as average and peak barbell velocity. Instead of the speed of the bar, the measurement looks at actual forces, mostly leg actions like jumping or squatting. Sprinting through a force plate set-up is also an RFD measurement, but coaches need to look at film more than they need to look at ground reaction forces.

Several options exist for instrumentation, but don’t let getting testing data interfere with training. Research on RFD in muscle performance is often found in isokinetic dynamometry. While that may help tease out important changes, it’s not helpful for coaches outside of research studies.

The primary “field test” option is jumping, and even that is very difficult to do correctly because of all the possible variables. An athlete may be extra-motivated, change his or her starting position slightly, and/or have residual fatigue from a different training set-up. Even testing at a different time of the day can change performance scores. So the obvious question is what can be done to reduce the variability of the exercise for better data. Reliable data means you can trust it every time you test;, the information is what it should be, and it is solid during every assessment. I went over data quality in great detail with my article on VBT information, and that can be found here.

A sound option in testing is squat jumping with a light load. The exercise is simple and doesn’t create room for mistakes. A squat jump with an agreed-on starting depth and a load for slowing the motion slightly allows a theoretical opportunity to peer deeper into the nervous system. Jump testing is not a perfect solution for monitoring fatigue, but if done properly and repeatedly—while combined with other data sets—yields enough valuable information to make sensible conclusions.

Jump squats with moderate loads might be an option provided the athletes are experienced, and their technique is repeatable enough. Instead of using average and peak RFD measures, which may be a moving target, measuring the first 0-100 or 0-200 milliseconds can help reveal joint-specific qualities like getting out of the hole in squats. I like defined starting and stopping points, which are valuable for comparison purposes and getting a baseline.

Figure 2. Highlighted in yellow is a metric from the Bar Sensei system called the Pop-100, or the RFD in the first 100 milliseconds of applied force. Coaches are going to want to see more than just average and peak velocities.

How to Improve RFD for Athletic Development

Moving away from valuing and measuring RFD to training to enhance it, a fair summary is that RFD values are velocity- and movement-specific. Generally, it’s wise to test the actions you want to see how they develop over time, and measure the exact training options to see if they connect. It is possible to see early relative RFD (first 100 or 200 milliseconds) improve without much change in absolute maximal strength. Many coaches want to know how an athlete can turn a load around, meaning from eccentric to concentric action. Not too many options exist to improve RFD, but it is possible to augment the ability over years of hard training.

Figure 3. Another key concept from CFTS regarding force and time. Note the higher quality of force earlier in the movement or contact time. (Courtesy of Derek Hansen)

Eccentric strength can create improvements in propulsive forces that show up in RFD measurements. Most RFD scores are about overcoming gravity and evaluating concentric patterns, but eccentric training can improve RFD systemically.

• Solid maximum strength is a cardinal option for coaches, but when used too aggressively the mode of strength training can backfire. RFD is likely to be more of an early responder to fatigue. That’s why countermovement jumps alone may not detect a tired athlete as well as the RFD early in other testing options.
• Sprint and jump work tend to help specifically improve the ability to produce force quickly in small time frames, but sometimes they can help with slower actions as well. Testing RFD in slower motions—along with electronic timing—is a valid way to see if weight training is corresponding to speed training, but the literature on jump and speed relationships is scarce.
• Long-term adaptations are paramount and likely only to show up in training data rather than research. What is showing up is the preservation of higher isoforms in the muscle fiber. These contribute to faster conduction velocities that improve early explosive actions of less than 100 milliseconds. Excessive volumes of conditioning can permanently decrease RFD for some athletes.
• Olympic lifting has been shown to help some populations with RFD, but keep in mind that the early phases of the lifts are more about starting strength and the later phases are more about peak velocity work. How RFD improves is a bit of an enigma with Olympic-style weightlifting, but several neurophysiological adaptations occur from chronic training over time.

Of course, other options may contribute to RFD enhancement, but most of the time rest and pushing conventional options will show up on the testing device.

A Final Thought on RFD for Coaches

RFD is not the Holy Grail, but it’s a great tool for coaches wanting to make sure their athletes do fundamental barbell lifts maximally. Power and/or strength can benefit. Even those training for other sports and not performing heavy barbell training can be profiled and screened based on testing data. RFD changes from training are hard to see but can be improved by smarter training and weekly measuring. In the future, it’s up to coaches to see RFD as a more effective option for improving athletes. We can expect to see more in the near future with VBT.

Please share so others may benefit.

Suggested Reading

I highly recommend this Mike Stone review at EliteTrack as a primer for understanding explosive exercise. In addition, these peer review studies can explain key concepts in RFD and neuromuscular performance.

1. Aagaard, P., Simonsen, E. B., Andersen, J. L., Magnusson, P., & Dyhre-Poulsen, P. (2002a). “Increased rate of force development and neural drive of human skeletal muscle following resistance training.” Journal of Applied Physiology, 93(4), 1318-1326.
2. Andersen, L. L., & Aagaard, P. (2006). “Influence of maximal muscle strength and intrinsic muscle contractile properties on contractile rate of force development.” European Journal of Applied Physiology, 96(1), 46-52.
3. Andersen, L. L., Andersen, J. L., Zebis, M. K., & Aagaard, P. (2010). “Early and late rate of force development: differential adaptive responses to resistance training?” Scandinavian Journal of Medicine & Science in Sports, 20(1), e162-e169.
4. Blazevich, A. (2012). “Are training velocity and movement pattern important determinants of muscular rate of force development enhancement?” European Journal of Applied Physiology, 112(10), 3689-3691.
5. Burgess, K. E., Connick, M. J., Graham-Smith, P., & Pearson, S. J. (2007). “Plyometric vs. isometric training influences on tendon properties and muscle output.” The Journal of Strength & Conditioning Research, 21(3), 986-989.
6. Cormie, P., McGuigan, M. R., & Newton, R. U. (2010). “Influence of strength on magnitude and mechanisms of adaptation to power training.” Medicine and Science in Sports and Exercise, 42(8), 1566.
7. Ebben, W. P., Flanagan, E., & Jensen, R. L. (2007). “Gender similarities in rate of force development and time to take off during the countermovement jump.” Journal of Exercise Physiology, 12/2007; 10(6):10-17.
8. Haff, G. G., Jackson, J. R., Kawamori, N., Carlock, J. M., Hartman, M. J., Kilgore, J. L., & Stone, M. H. (2008). “Force-time curve characteristics and hormonal alterations during an eleven-week training period in elite women weightlifters.” Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research, 22(2), 433-446.1.
9. Häkkinen, K., Alen, M., Kraemer, W. J., Gorostiaga, E., Izquierdo, M., Rusko, H., & Paavolainen, L. (2003). “Neuromuscular adaptations during concurrent strength and endurance training versus strength training.” European Journal of Applied Physiology, 89(1), 42-52.
10. Marques, M. C., Izquierdo, M., Van den Tillaar, R., Moir, G. L., Sanchez-Medina, L., & Gonzalez-Badillo, J. J. (2014a). “The reliability of force-time variables recorded during vertical jump performance and their relationship with jump height in power trained athletes: original research article.” International SportMed Journal, 15(2), 146-155.
11. Mirkov, D. M., Nedeljkovic, A., Milanovic, S., & Jaric, S. (2004). “Muscle strength testing: evaluation of tests of explosive force production.” European Journal of Applied Physiology, 91, 147-154.
12. Oliveira, A. S., Corvino, R. B., Caputo, F., Aagaard, P., & Denadai, B. S. (2015). “Effects of fast-velocity eccentric resistance training on early and late rate of force development.” European Journal of Sport Science, (ahead-of-print), 1-7.
13. Peñailillo, L., Blazevich, A., Numazawa, H., & Nosaka, K. (2014). “Rate of force development as a measure of muscle damage.” Scandinavian Journal of Medicine & Science in Sports. 25(3), 417-427.
14. Thompson, B. J., Ryan, E. D., Sobolewski, E. J., Smith, D. B., Akehi, K., Conchola, E. C., & Buckminster, T. (2013a). “Relationships between rapid isometric torque characteristics and vertical jump performance in Division I collegiate American football players: Influence of body mass normalization.” The Journal of Strength & Conditioning Research, 27(10), 2737-2742.
15. Thorlund, J. B., Aagaard, P., & Madsen, K. (2009). “Rapid muscle force capacity changes after soccer match play.” International Journal of Sports Medicine, 30(4), 273.
16. Thorstensson, A., Karlsson, J., Viitasalo, J. H. T., Luhtanen, P., & Tillin, N. A., Jimenez-Reyes, P., Pain, M. T., & Folland, J. P. (2010). “Neuromuscular performance of explosive power athletes versus untrained individuals.” Medicine and Science in Sports and Exercise, 42(4), 781.

By Carl Valle

My recent article about Boo Schexnayder attracted more than a thousand readers in record time, and is now a primary resource for coaches here on Freelap. During the past decade another amazing resource, Pierre-Jean Vazel, has become one of the major hidden geniuses in the world of athletics. His insights and statistical knowledge about sprinting are unmatched.

The Story of the Sundsvall Windsprint Seminar

I met P-J, as he is often called, during the summer of 2008. I had the honor and privilege of presenting some of my best regeneration findings at a small seminar in Sweden. I learned and shared some great information with the wise coaching legend Hakan Anderson and other European coaches. It was a true wakeup call, as their balanced views on training in the realm of strength and power are more progressive and less reliant on talent than here in the US. Pierre-Jean’s detailed hour and a half presentation had some information needing to be expanded for those less familiar with his work. I’ve updated and clarified the notes I took at that time.

Figure 1. One of my favorite examples of a professional is Stefan Tärnhuvud, a 100m sprinter who has put in the hard work and represents the sport the right way.

The purpose of this article is to preserve invaluable information that needs to be shared with coaches of all levels. Athletics is a wonderful example of art and science being performed on the world’s biggest stage. While perhaps a cliché, the reality is that coaching athletics is pure with the honesty of the clock or measuring tape. I hope you will find this information enjoyable and practical for your athletes.

Stride Development in Elite Sprinting

Throughout coaching history, numerous attempts to break the sprinting stride into simple groupings of frequency and length have created considerable misinformation, such as the myths that frequency is genetic and length is weight-room specific only. While some truth of absolute limits may have talent and strength interactions, the reality is that both qualities are likely to be developed by good coaching. While it’s artificial to break a sprint cycle into frequency and length in training, the value in doing so is to see what type of sprinter athletes are and what they need to do to maximize their potential.

Figure 2. Small but significant changes in stride development with both length and frequency happen over the years. I learned how to drill down to a single stride and see what areas in training can help transfer to ground reaction forces.

Development of the stride cycle requires a complete understanding of the course of an entire career, not a knee-jerk reaction to exercises or drills. Often a new modality will create false hope of what might lead to a rapid evolution of ability, which we often see with some crazy exercises and foolish approaches. In his presentation, P-J shared a lot of charts and graphs of changes to athletes in ways they improved over the years, not just time slopes. Coaches need to use the information of stride parameters and be cognizant of the ways athletes improve.

I found it useful to see how elites improved with awareness of the combination of their body type and stride style. After P-J shared his annual plan as well as his career work with African 100m recordholder Olusoji Fasuba of Nigeria, he delved into general discussions regarding sprinters. This is where things got interesting—the breakdown of how sprinters realize their genetic potential, and the trends and patterns that occur because of their body types and stride characteristics. P-J proposed that athletes have a relationship between stride length and body height. In fact, it almost seemed like a golden ratio of sprinting that one would eventually break 1.2 or more of their SL/BH. After knowing the ratio with elites, coaches must be aware of what is needed in order to achieve such standards.

Figure 3. This chart is redesigned from P-J’s original chart to show key variables like stride frequency and length, body height (in cm) and body weight (in kg), and composite scores such as SL/BH. It is a good example of how athletes develop over the years. I am in the process of updating it for other athletes and faster performances.

From P-J’s graphs (not pictured), it looks like both stride length and frequency improve concurrently, yet the real improvement goes to the less developed quality. The real question is not why this happens, but what specific efforts in training balance stride parameters for better performance. Another question is whether improvement comes from just getting years of racing and general training versus efforts to directly improve the weaker quality. The amount of notes necessary to reveal how athletes improve requires a lot of data in both training and performance.

When discussing stride mechanics P-J didn’t get much into drills as he was very open about not knowing if they worked or not. I interpreted that to mean no clear evidence pointed to what was going on. I concluded that drills are specific actions that could bias stiffness, muscle recruitment, or and/mobility of the stride.

Drills are potential diagnostic tools and ways to increase the motor learning “sponge size” of the athlete.
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When he discussed the stiff-legged prancing drill as one that could have an influence, I thought drills were just categories of locomotor phases that exposed sprinters to motions outside their comfort zone. I have spent years teaching drills because I feel that athletes need to “learn to learn.” General exercises during a warmup are more than just burning time and getting hot. Drills are potential diagnostic tools and ways to increase the motor learning “sponge size” of the athlete.

P-J was especially vehement that there is no such thing as “French Training Methods,” as no organized structure of training or unified training philosophy exists in France. Yet the most successful coaches and scientists have made a massive impact on the training world from a global perspective. For example, Jacques Piasenta is not “the” voice for France, but his international stable of athletes must be recognized.

P-J also touched on the theme of stiffness. The polish bench, a Russian box with sagittal plane emphasis, is one of many devices Piasenta uses to help with the lower limbs for proper transmittal of forces. Other exercises with weighted vests are multidirectional as well, confirming my suspicion that he builds massive stiffness for his athletes.

Adjusting to Chaos

Pierre-Jean spoke in fantastic detail about his work developing Fasuba. P-J’s training can’t be considered ordinary, as his attention to the daily tasks of training is very precise. At first, the training seemed way too simple to work, yet it often had to be that way because the circumstances were often in turmoil. Poisonous spider bites, workouts in parking lots next to soccer stadiums because of venue limitations, witch doctor tea drinks, and cold indoor training centers in Paris were all reality. His stories of daily circumstances provided vital documentation of the painstaking recording of the context of training. Workouts without the background story are literally only half the information, so I never send workouts alone anymore.

One of P-J’s important lessons was keeping detailed logs to share the metadata of training and competing. Everything should be placed into accounting, or the numbers are meaningless. Many times athletes will have false peaks and poor performances that are actually indicators of early tapers or good training hit with poor circumstances. Often training is changed for the worse because the results are not indicative of good training and the coach and athlete simply needed more time. I have changed my training protocols many times simply because I thought I was not doing the right things. If I had had more trust in the process, maybe something could have worked.

In reality sometimes life will be a stronger element influencing performances than a magical workout the week before. What I thought were excuses were in reality just honesty that sometimes life gets in the way of good training. It’s important to know the difference between explanations and excuses. With enough seasons, one knows what the real problem is—be it the coach, the athlete, the environment, or many times a combination of factors at the wrong time. While performances indoors may appear more consistent because weather does not play a major role, the reality is that many coaches will need the story behind the story to see the fruits of their labor.

Relationships and Athletes

At midpoint of the 60m final at the 2008 World Championships, Fasuba’s calves were cramping but he didn’t panic. He ran the exact same time in the previous heat (semi time of 6.51) with slight cramping. The lesson learned was that he was capable of a 6.4 but mustered another 6.51 under adverse circumstances. When your training is going well and your training times are good, you are bound to have a performance that demonstrates that ability.

Figure 4. The OHB or overhead back throw with a medicine ball seems to be an interesting test as it shows the best relationship outside the actually running speeds. Here one makes a good argument that athletes who can coordinate more muscle groups with the time frames of a behind-the-back throw are the most successful in the long run.

The lesson is that meets are all relative based on the context of the situation. The beauty of coaching is not the art and science, but the human side of working with people that makes all difference. While P-J may be known primarily as a statistician with times and splits, his relationships with his athletes are more than just numbers.

Many coaches tweet about “building trust” or “bonding” and then boast a week later about training 400 or more athletes. I think small training groups extract more information than larger, superficial pools. Let’s face it—it takes time to truly know people and offseason training for a few months is not my idea of fostering a connection with someone.

Elegance in Design

When you can’t deliver ornament, you have to deliver substance. – Paul Graham

My biggest concern about elegance in design is that training will be misinterpreted as easy solutions to the challenges of developing speed and timely performances. In reality, a simple solution is often a concise decision from a complex scenario. I am fearful that someone would interpret the summary below as a simple formula to success, when the truth of the matter is that the information is just a representation of the primary decision-making.

Figure 5. The calendar is the most straightforward way to represent results. The building blocks can always be split into more granularity, but a basic summary of how one achieves good performances is what I find most enlightening.

During his presentation, P-J shared his training outlines as well as other graphs that provided a nice summary of what he was trying to accomplish with his athletes, specifically Fasuba. I liked his reductionist approach and he often explained his rationale to what might be considered strange decision-making. A primary example is his weight training work with Fasuba. It could be considered very primitive in architecture, as it demonstrated no intricate periodization. I believe that what seemed a weakness actually became a strength, as his numbers were not unimpressive or lacking.

What I like about the summary of information is the absolute records and clear characteristics of what his athletes could do. In the latter part of his presentation P-J compiled his collection of data about the abilities of ultimate performance in the 100m and what was needed on average for a sub-10 performance. While I can’t verify those numbers are 100% accurate, I believe these power and speed values are created by the work on the track.

The hardest lesson I have learned is that speed training is activation training at its fullest. I believe sufficient loading and mechanics can create a massive recruitment of HTMUs (high threshold motor units) when sprinters are competing heavy or sprinting fresh.

Individualizing Training and Finding Ways to Improve

One conjecture I looked at was P-J’s explanation of Fasuba’s ankle restriction and how this could be indirectly related to some factors in exercise selection with his squatting. Simply measuring ROM with a goniometer is not going to solve specific metatarsal patterns as well as unbinding of soft tissue problems in lower limb musculature.

During my questions with P-J, it seemed to me that elite sprinters could make big improvements in the later zones. While top speed has improved slightly since Carl and Ben in the 1980s, my interpretation of performance gains is the string of consecutive splits at near-top speed.
With the impressive performances of Powell, Gay, and of course Bolt, I feel the advances reflect whole races being done instead of having the classic good accelerator or top-speed sprinter. My guess is that while many programs differ, the similarities will be closer than we believe. In the original forum review, I coined short to long and long to short when classifying the different approaches between Charlie Francis and Tom Tellez—with grave consequences.

Figure 6. Modern sprinters are now in 9.7 and 9.8 territory, mainly because all phases of the event are solid. No more good starters, no max speed guys, and no closers. This era is characterized by no weaknesses and not relying only on strengths.

For a decade people felt two distinct systems of short to long (S2L) and long to short (L2S), when in reality they are just two examples and most successful programs do something in the middle.

No program is pure, as a long to short program will have episodes of start work with accompanying acceleration regardless of the intent of the phases. Plyometrics and weights may be more intensive, creating a running program with some interesting composites. Even if a program utilizes extensive tempo, a running speed at 75% is getting ground contact times with stiffness qualities that will have indirect maximal elements even if the loading is considered aerobic.

Figure 7. It is interesting to see how Fasuba got faster in each round. Even when athletes are injured or not performing at their best, one can learn how various elements interact with time on the splits.

I don’t know what to use as an example of what humbles me more. One good story is the description of Fasuba’s fourth-place performance in the 100m. While his 10.07 in the final was not earth-shattering, P-J’s true wisdom was that like all outstanding coaches he used his observation skills. After each round Fasuba got up from a seated position from the ground easier and quicker, barely perceivable to the naked eye. This makes me wonder if those who are slaves to fancy gadgets are hopelessly lost in understanding sport performance. I am a huge proponent of technology, but even so I always like beating the computer with the human element. Every coach likes being a “John Henry” and beating the machine.

Closing Thought—Observation Trumps Everything

One of Piasenta’s books on training is titled Aprender a Observar—Atletismo [Learn to Observe—Athletics], a hint to all of us that sometimes it’s better to look a little more closely than to talk. I think those who share their observations are the best coaches, versus the ones who share what they do coaching-wise. Most of the success I have observed is trying to see what others see, and currently I see a rise in people sharing what they know or what they tell their athletes with cues and other coaching-centric approaches. Athletes need a guide or a scout, not a babysitter or overzealous instructor. The less egotistical the coach, the more their words work as each statement is precious, not noise.

Please share so others may benefit.

By Tony Holler

The alactic anaerobic system is the dominant source of muscle energy for high-intensity explosive exercise that lasts for 10 seconds or less. I refer to alactic training as “phosphate training” because the fuel for this first 10 seconds of high-intensity explosive exercise is the ATP (Adenosine Triphosphate) which is readily available in muscles.

The lactic anaerobic system (glycolysis) is recruited after the ATP storage has been depleted (usually after ten seconds in well-trained athletes). We do “lactate workouts” once or twice a week starting February 8th. And, meets are considered lactate workouts.

Over the winter, I believe sprinters should develop a speed base, not an endurance base. We never do lactate workouts or aerobic workouts in the winter. We only do phosphate training (alactic). All training is high intensity for periods of less than ten seconds.

I share what we do for the benefit of others. We do what we do because it works for us.

At Plainfield North High School, we train after school from early December until early February. Our school day goes from 7:05 until 2:10, so we start at 2:30. The workout goes from 2:30 until approximately 4:15.

This year, 130 boys participated in our program at one time or another. The average attendance was typically 80 to 100. The program is non-mandatory and unfunded. I’m the head track coach and freshmen football coach at North. I run the sprint part of the workout. Our football coach, Tim Kane, manages the weight room activities. We’ve done this for ten years without pay, working together for our mutual benefit and the benefit of Plainfield North athletes. Everyone wins.

Tim and I don’t always agree, but we always find common ground. I am often asked how to change the mindset of a football coach. The stereotypical football coach is a paranoid, testosterone-riddled, hard-headed, Type-A personality who measures his life in first downs and turnovers. Transforming the mindset of a football coach is not an easy task.

No driven man hears unwanted counsel. – Janny Wurts

Most head track coaches come from the cross country universe, making the unification of track and football programs nearly impossible. I’m thankful that Coach Kane sees me as a colleague, not an alien. The fact I’ve won 39 consecutive games as his freshmen football coach gives me some street cred.

Distance Runners Build an Aerobic Base

For the distance coaches out there, our 40 distance runners run outside every day in rain, sleet, snow, and ice. High winds and cold temperatures are daily. Coach Andy Derks has created a culture where no culture had previously existed. Our distance runners train aerobically with speed work mixed in. Distance coaches build an aerobic base, sprint coaches build an alactic base (unless you are a disciple of Clyde Hart).

Figure 1. Coach Derks came to Plainfield North in 2012. Last year we had 22 guys run under 5:00 in the 1600. Our distance crew makes up about 40% of our track team. The other 60% percent of our team spend their time sprinting with me and lifting with Tim Kane.

The Winter Speed & Strength Format Nov 30 – Feb 4

In the weight room, we strength train Monday through Thursday. I have expressed my lifting philosophy to Coach Kane and he generally agrees.

Our varsity football players lift first, at 2:30. Fifty guys lift as a team. I would rather have all my sprinters in the 2:30 sprint group, but this is a compromise I make.

Coach Kane compromises too. No lifting is done on legs until Thursday. We take Friday, Saturday, and Sunday off. Some people call it a three-day weekend. I call it supercompensation.

Since the varsity football group does not include seniors who have graduated from the football program, my 2:30 sprint group will have some senior football players. In addition, I have freshmen football players, lacrosse kids, baseball players, and, of course, track athletes.

The first session lasts 45-50 minutes, and then our groups switch. From 3:20 – 4:15, I speed train the varsity football team.

On a given day, only 50% of the kids being trained are track athletes.

Winter Speed Training

We start every day with sprint drills, probably the same drills you’ve seen everywhere. As another coach once told me, “Everyone does speed drills, but your kids do them better.” I believe this to be true. We never go through the motions. I refuse to call our opening session a “warmup.” In 17 years of doing this, I’ve never had an athlete get injured doing speed drills. Never. The speed drills done every day include A-skips, high-knees, butt-kicks, 5 box jumps, bounding, straight-legged bounds x2, butt-kick & reach (retro sprints) x2, and starts (2-point, 3-point, or 4-point hop & go). We are done in about 10 minutes.

On Mondays and Wednesdays, we sprint for time. Our field house has a 180m track with a six-lane straight-a-way. We have enough room to run the 55m in an indoor meet. On Mondays and Wednesdays, our kids run 40-yard dashes with a hand-held time. I’ve been doing this for 17 years and can’t give up on my comparative data. Our times are fast because of hand-timing, 2-point starts, and wearing spikes on a rock-hard track. Here is the kicker … we time the last 10m with Freelap (Pro Coach, 12 FxChips). With every run, I record two types of data, 40-yard dash and 10m fly. We run solo. I don’t believe in racing until track season. I want sprinters focused on their fundamentals and competing against themselves. I record, rank, and publish times.

We have two groups, the non-sprint-slow-guys-who-don’t-wear-spikes group, and the speedy-always-remember-their-spikes group. Group-1 is one and done; then they leave the field house. Group-2 runs three 40s.

When coaches hear that we run only three sprints, they are dumbfounded. What? Then what do you do?

“Hard work beats talent when talent doesn’t work hard.” “Nothing worth having comes easy.” “There’s no substitute for hard work.” Coaches are addicted to quotes about work. If the mission of a coach is to get their athletes tired, fine … but don’t expect speed to improve.

Stupid coaches sometimes have the hardest practices. Focus is the key to speed, not hard work.

Figure 2. Don’t be this coach. Train smarter, not harder.

On Tuesdays and Thursdays, we do X-Factor workouts. On these days, the football coach joins me. Like always, we do 10 minutes of speed drills. After speed drills, we do four different activities in the form of stations, rotating back and forth between the football coach and me. The only thing I’ve asked Coach Kane … please do things at top speed then allow for enough recovery to go top speed again. The easiest thing for any coach is to get their athletes tired and sore. “Any fool can get another fool tired.” Coach Kane will do agility work, multi-directional sprinting, short hurdles, and speed ladders. X-factor is a day to try new things (“x” stands for unknown). I do wickets, hip mobility, plyometrics, lunges, depth jumps, cat jumps, etc. Since football lifts legs on Thursday, X-Factor is a good way to end the week.

Remember, our program at Plainfield North is based on common ground. Would I prefer sprinting before lifting? Of course. Do I agree with training Monday through Thursday? No. I would prefer Monday-Wednesday-Friday. I am fundamentally opposed sprinters training when they are beaten and battered. We all make deals with the devil, and I will always make deals with football coaches.

Statistics, Data, and Teaching to the Test

My data justified my training philosophy a long time ago. I’ve been doing this for 17 years, and my athletes get faster. More important, talented athletes are attracted to my sprint program.

Data drives my athletes. Low-effort never happens in my speed training. No one forgets their spikes. I literally see my sprinters carrying their spike bag with them in the hallways. Backpack, cell phone, and spikes … the necessities.

At Plainfield North football players run track:

• 28 of our 52 sprinters are football players (54%)
• 9 of our 13 throwers are football players (our throws coach is a varsity football coach)
• None of our 40 distance runners played football last fall
• 37 of our 105 track athletes play football

Plainfield North opened its doors in 2005-06 to only freshmen and sophomores. I became the first head track coach at North in 2006-07. Our first senior class graduated in 2008.

The graph below illustrates our ten-year progress towards creating a culture of speed. I brashly tell people that athletes at Plainfield North know their AFT (Average Forty Time) better than their GPA.

Figure 3. Number of athletes that ran sub 4.60 in the 40-yard dash by year.

Oddly enough, we qualified for the state 4×100 in 2007 in spite our overall lack of speed. It only takes four reasonably fast kids with great handoffs to run a decent sprint relay. If you question our impressive speed numbers, remember … we run hand-held 40’s with a 2-point stance with spikes on a hard track. The numbers are legit. If you time your 40s outside on turf without spikes wearing sweat pants and hoodies, your times won’t be as fast. Personally, I like fast.

In addition, the 40s timed in our winter workouts are always done in the same lane and same direction. Wind is never a factor because we run indoors. I’m the only person who times 40s. No manager or assistant coach will be trusted with the stopwatch.

Why Record, Rank, and Publish?

It’s difficult for some people to understand why we post sprint times. The haters of the world will think we are being boastful. This could not be further from the truth. We simply post times to make times meaningful. Athletes crave competition. Athletes are starved for praise. In addition, coaches must demand quality.

Try this sometime. Tell an 8-year-old to run as fast as he can between two Freelap transmitters (yellow cones). Tell him his time. Then tell him that you will give him $10 if he can run faster. Have several kids cheer him on from both sides of his running lane (we call this “the gantlet”). I am 100% certain you will lose $10.

I did this once in speed camp. I had a young boy who ran several times above 2.00 in the 10m fly. Each time I encouraged him to SPRINT, but his times remained slow. When I attached meaning and significance to his sprinting, he ran faster. His best time improved from 2.03 to 1.57. When you record, rank, and publish, kids learn to SPRINT. Otherwise, kids just run.

Attracting Athletes to Track & Field

Good track programs attract athletes. 24 of my 52 sprinters are newcomers. Check out the average 40 time and average 10m fly time for my top 11 newcomers.

• Wallace Thomas, sophomore, no other sports, first-time track athlete, 4.35, 1.05
• Kevin Block, junior, football, baseball defector, 4.44, 1.05
• Ezra Docks, sophomore, football, moved in this year, 4.51, 1.07
• Nick Wood, sophomore, football, volleyball defector, 4.51, 1.07
• Jaylen Watkins, sophomore, football, didn’t do a spring sport last year, 4.62, 1.10
• Angel Guevara, sophomore, didn’t do spring a sport last year, 4.63, 1.09
• Anthony Capezio, freshmen, football, 4.59, 1.08
• J.D. Ekowa, senior, football star quarterback, 4.65, 1.08
• Burhan Cutlerywala, freshmen, 4.72, 1.08
• Shane McGrail, sophomore, football, baseball defector, 4.68, 1.08
• Zach Nadle, sophomore, football, baseball defector, 4.78, 1.12

When you add eleven guys like this to a good track team, the future looks bright. Kids love a speed-based track program.

Returning Sprinters

We’ve had some bad luck with three of our top sprinters. Tim Donnahue was expected to take one of our sprint relay spots but broke his leg in Wrestling. Our two returning all-state athletes have had some senior bad luck as well. One has a hip-flexor injury and hasn’t sprinted since football. The other, our two-time MVP, has struggled on a daily basis to find food, transportation, and shelter. No one said it would be easy.

Figure 4. We return Zach Shelton (left) and DeVaughn Hrobowski (right) from our all-state sprint relay teams. This picture was taken at Sectional when we ran 42.07 in spite of this run-up handoff at the first exchange. Shelton and Hrobowski missed our winter training. Shelton was injured, Hrobowski spent the winter on the wrestling team.

Despite the bumps in the road, we have seen great improvement in most of our core sprinters. The numbers below indicate their average times last year compared to their average times this year.

• Carlos Baggett, junior, football, 4.46 to 4.28, 1.04 to 0.98
• Clay Pasen, senior, lacrosse, 4.50 to 4.40, 1.03 to 0.99
• Tyler Hoosman, junior, football, 4.66 to 4.42, 1.12 to 1.03
• Cory Hrobowski, senior, no other sport, 4.62 to 4.44, 1.07 to 1.03
• Kevin Block, junior, football, 4.65 to 4.44, 1.09 to 1.05
• Joe Stiffend, sophomore, football, 4.60 to 4.45, 1.04 to 1.01
• Jordan Gumila, junior, football, 4.57 to 4.46, 1.07 to 1.04
• Brian Registe, sophomore, football, 4.48 to 4.46, 1.04 to 1.04
• Hunter Houslet, senior, soccer, 4.71 to 4.51, 1.06 to 1.02

2015 Compared to 2016

The numbers also point out that we are an improved sprint group, at least in sprint depth.

• Last year’s average 40-time of our 25 fastest sprinters was 4.51. This year 4.42
• Last year’s average 10-fly time of our 25 fastest sprinters was 1.05. This year 1.01
• Last year we had five athletes averaging sub-4.50 in the 40. This year we had 13.
• Last year we had 15 athletes averaging under 1.08 in the 10m fly. This year we had 25.

What it Takes to Make Our Sprint Team

We have tryouts for three weeks (Jan 19 – Feb 4). This is what it took to make our sprint group (slowest sprinter from each class, average 40-time and average 10-fly time):

• Freshmen 5.08 and 1.19 (football player and high jumper)
• Sophomore 5.12 and 1.18 (5’10” high jumper as a freshman, scissor-kicked 5’8” last weekend)
• Junior 4.90 and 1.13 (220-pound star linebacker, first year of track)
• Senior 4.78 and 1.11 (football player and hurdler, last year’s times 5.04 and 1.19)

Celebrating Improvement

Data allows us to highlight athletes who show incredible improvement. Celebrating these athletes, in turn, promotes track & field.

Tyler Hoosman is pictured below as a freshman B-team running back. Tyler went out for track his freshman year despite being our slowest sprinter. As a freshmen, Tyler ran the 100 in 13.00, the 200 in 27.9 and long jumped 16’8”. As a sophomore, Tyler obliterated those numbers running 11.92 and 24.38 while long jumping 19’10”. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to project amazing things this spring. Oh, and by the way, Tyler was our varsity’s leading rusher in his junior season. He returns next year.

Figure 5. Plainfield North Running Back Tyler Hoosman as a freshman.

Tyler Hoosman no longer looks like a B-team freshman running back. Tyler now looks like a sprinter. Not everyone will experience the incredible improvement of Tyler Hoosman, but if you don’t measure speed, you will never know.

Figure 6. Tyler Hoosman as a junior. Next year Tyler will dominate.

Run fast to get fast.

Train the alactic system (100% intensity, less than 10 seconds in duration).

Train smarter, not harder.

Recruit, Promote, Attract.

Record, Rank, Publish.

It works for us.

Please share so others may benefit.

By Ryan McNamara, 5or6

Over the last few years, I have been in the fortunate position to work with some of the best coaches, therapists, and athletes in the world at ALTIS.

I’m not gonna lie; it’s been fun.

At ALTIS, I deal with all things website related, and I love it. I’m not a coach, and presumably will never be one, yet that doesn’t mean that I can’t pick up a thing or two from everyone there. If you can’t learn from someone who is the best in their field, from who can you learn?

When I started at the center three or so years ago, it was small. There were only a handful of athletes and even few coaches. Yet the center has exploded over the last three years to over 140+ athletes, coaches, and therapists. It’s been a bit of a whirlwind and so much has changed, yet the core beliefs haven’t shifted an inch. The shared culture is intoxicating, and the willingness to help everyone is the main reason I love working there. Plus it turns out if you get to watch the likes of Dan, Stu, and Andreas coach, teach and interact for three plus years you pick up a few things. Who’da thunk it!?!

Become a Student and a Teacher

One thing I immediately picked up was the need to share what you know and listen to what others have to say. That last bit can be harder than it sounds.

I write and try to share my (limited) knowledge within the web and design industry but watching the coaches at ALTIS they view sharing knowledge on their craft as a cornerstone to furthering their learning on the subject. They understand that they don’t have all the answers and that no one does. However, they have surrounded themselves with brilliant individuals from all over the world who can open their eyes to new ideas and theories that can enhance every athlete, coach and therapist around them.

In an article on A List Apart by Jeffery Zeldman (the Godfather of web standards) he translates his thoughts on why he began his blog and what it has brought him in his 15 years online, and it struck a chord with me. Documenting and articulating your ideas and processes helps your communication methods and provides an outlet and base for your knowledge to grow, plus gives others a chance to interact with you.

Fortunately, the web (in my eyes) is certainly one of the most open industries. The likes of Trent Walton, Jeremy Keith, and Scott Jehl are constantly making me feel more than stupid on an almost daily basis, but in doing so renewing my faith in the importance of sharing knowledge.

Keep it Simple, Stupid

I remember talking to Dan one evening while tucking into a plate of ribs and him commenting to me that “training is like medicine,” you don’t want to overdose on it.

Doing so can have some pretty severe repercussions for the athlete and coach. After all, athletes can’t earn a living injured. Yet so many overtrain to gain an ‘edge’, when what they should be asking themselves “What is the minimum effective dose?”

Light bulb moment

On the web, this method also applies. Reducing clutter, providing focus, and creating a clear structure for users is the goal. Doing this is the most effective way to deliver content to users and a return of investment for the clients. I’m always aiming to give the user the best experience on the site without compromising on their end goal.

Why add noise when sometimes silence can add clarity?

You have to Understand the Numbers

At ALTIS, every athlete is expected to document their training progress. This means notes on track sessions, gym workouts, and even sleep patterns.

The information is then used to determine where each athlete is during training blocks and how they have progressed month on month and year on year. Pretty smart right?

Documenting progress allows the athlete and their coach to measure what is working and more importantly, what isn’t.

On the web if you don’t have a grip on the numbers how can you add context to your project? If you don’t know what you have done in the past, how can you plan to go forward?

Monitoring progress through analytical tools can be ongoing. However, this allows me to make informed design decisions when I’m developing web projects. Understanding the stats gives me a greater base to understand what is happening on the website.

Set Goals

Every athlete and coach have a clear set of goals in front of them, something they want to achieve short and long term. Some of the goals might be realistic, and some might not be. Knowing them can help define the training blocks, rest periods and competition schedule for the year.

If you are building a site to achieve something (you most likely are), then the project goals should pave the way for everything that comes after.

Research creates a better understanding of how you are going to achieve the sites goals. Like on the track if you don’t know what you want on the web, and you don’t talk to the client, there is a pretty good chance things could go pretty wrong.

Like most of the topics I have highlighted, having goals allows you to sift through the crap and highlight what is important.

Whatever your job title, level of experience, or position in your organization I hope this helps show you can pick up tips and tricks from anywhere and apply it to your own work. Don’t be afraid to ask questions and test your ideas because you know what, they might just work.

Ryan @ryanfmc @5or6

Please share so others may benefit.

By Carl Valle

Anyone involved in athletics should know how performances improve systematically. I use “systematically” because sometimes a great performance will be attained without knowing why or having the ability to repeat the process. This article has two goals: modeling what it will take to improve the current world record and showing how coaches can develop better training programs using simple time and space. I have spent a year asking some direct questions and finding fewer answers and more questions in return. After several months of digging up details and historical data, I have a useful tool for others to follow.

Why Swimming Rather Than Track?

I was tempted to provide a more popular title and topic by discussing the 60m dash since most sport teams can relate to running more than swimming. The problem is that doing so would hurt coaches’ problem-solving skills by looking at something convenient instead of something that can challenge their thought processes. If one can model an event with the number of variables and complexity of swimming, easier and more straightforward options should be a breeze.

What Can Non-Swimming Coaches Expect?

My premise is simple: teach modeling of absolute performance in something more linear before proceeding to something more complex. If coaches learn how to problem-solve linear and closed sports, they can tackle the more chaotic team sports later. Program design is all about training, but few coaches model things to make their training more effective.

If coaches learn how to problem-solve linear and closed sports, they can tackle chaotic team sports later.
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Sport, strength and conditioning, and high-performance coaches often fall into two categories. Many are stuck in an inbreeding syndrome of cultural dogma or thrown into the fire of an Olympic sport with little to offer team performance. So this article will be more of a middle-ground and vanilla plea to keep what works and adjust what needs to evolve. Coaches open and eager to innovate without being overly radical can use this article as a basic road map to outline modeling for their team or Olympic sport.

Modeling Is Secretly Re-Engineering Success

The direct approach to success is examining existing winning models and seeing their limitations, evolution, and contextual history. One also need not be sucked into my previous problem of being biased from “biography over biology” with mentors and heroes in sport. Everyone should be mentored or have a sounding board, but when mentorship leads to discipleship what makes someone great (unique) is not handed down and mistakes are copied. Rarely do we see assistants who try to mimic their mentors succeed without changing things based on their circumstances and talents. On the other hand, principles of training or important concepts are timeless, so efforts at trying to be cute often backfire.

Looking at world record history, my goal is to see what factors are unique to the individual and those that can be learned or trained for everyone. I also want to see if the coach is simply a pied piper with talent or creating something out of thin air. I believe that working with great talent makes you a better coach, not just making the less talented better. Talented athletes are teachers to coaches, and coaches have always learned from their protégés.

Finally, I’m looking at what is trending and what is becoming obsolete. An example of this is the swimming block start once thought to be abnormal and now commonplace. When Rowdy Gaines won his 100m gold medal in 1984 using his track start, he was an outlier. Now, any swimmer not using a track start is considered dated or overly stubborn.

Getting Started with Modeling for Performance

Figure 1. Swimming velocity modeling is the current standard in understanding performance. As coaches move away from splits to something more granular, expect further improvement in the sport.

Before one starts tinkering with ways to cut time, become more efficient, or add distance to a performance model, some foundational organization is needed. These four areas must be covered to establish a framework.

• Terminology – The first step in modeling is creating definitions and a working language to describe the problem or challenge. When no definitions exist, consider this is an invitation to innovate. When everyone is on the same page organizationally, progress becomes possible.
• Chronology – Logically, the event or performance must be outlined in the order in which things happen. Every movement and nuance should be annotated and recorded to develop a time sequence that is understandable and flows smoothly.
• Constraints – Factors that hamper the event or performance must be declared and defined with models as they can’t be adjusted. Many constraints are based on rules or constants like gravity or distance.
• Variables – Modeling variables are the hardest to define and tend to fall on the opposite spectrum of constraint-like factors. Variables are adjustable elements that can be tweaked and managed realistically. Most variables are teachable and trainable. Those that aren’t
  are usually genetically driven, like an athlete’s talent.

Simply listing 3-5 elements per bullet point, you conclude that there is a lot of room for improvement in most sports. Much of the innovation is likely gone as a result of great minds pondering ways to get an advantage. But don’t lose hope—sport can still evolve.

Key Phases in the 50m Freestyle Long Course

The 50m freestyle has four phases: block start, dive, underwater transition, and the swim itself. Within each phase, sub-phases can be quantified and analyzed. I have used existing metrics to stay with legacy data and then added a few details and caveats for better perspective and stronger comparisons. The key point is that coaches need to look at events or sports and create specific milestones that are clear and impacted by training or teaching.

• Block start – The period when a swimmer is stationary on the starting platform through toe-off. During this phase, the goal is generating horizontal velocity with the right body position—one that maintains speed from an efficient entry.
• Dive – Limited from the pre-existing contributions of the block start phase, the strategy is using the momentum of the horizontal forces and transferring it to an effective underwater trajectory and the eventual swim.
• Underwater transition – From the moment the body is completely submerged to resurfacing is an opportunity to maintain the speed from the dive.
• Swim – The phase after breaking out of the underwater transition into full swimming and ending at the far wall. Most of the effort naturally is in improving swimming performance, and you need to focus on the less-developed areas.

Using Modeling to Find Opportunities for Improvement

Figure 2. Companies like 1080 Motion are leading the charge in getting the right data and precise training for athletes looking for that meaningful change.

Opportunities for improvement involve looking at different areas of performance and asking what possible changes can be done to get a little benefit without using too many resources. I often tell my colleagues that most of us need to move away from out-coaching our counterparts to thinking about out-winning the competition. I sometimes lost against teams less prepared in sport but which saw the advantages of recruiting and program development. If you want to win and improve athlete performance you can’t just look at the research. You must study “winning coaches,” not just “great coaches.” If you are trying to improve performance you need to look for ways to get faster, not just areas to train or teach. Coaches are very egotistical sometimes, and the best approach is to try to have fun and allow athletes to compete better.

The next step after identifying the four phases is looking at the contributions of time and velocity to each one. Great research is already here on the history of the 50m and how athletes perform. When looking at the 50m and sprint/power events, think the three “E’s.”

• Effectiveness – Being effective is simply augmenting output. For example, maximal swimming speed is unknown, since—unlike track—blocks make the early part of the race the fastest. Swimmers gradually slow down because of fatigue. They can produce speeds over 2 meters per second from a dead start, and the key is to conserve the greatest amount of speed. Wired magazine made the critical mistake of using average speed as an oversimplified part of the race here, but I like the idea of what the author is modeling for swimming velocity.
• Efficiency – The need to perform at submaximal or maximal output with fewer body resources is the name of the game with physiological and biomechanical efficiency. The balance between efficiency and effectiveness is important because most events in sport favor who is first. The winner of the marathon is the athlete who runs the fastest, not who burns the most fat or stays below their lactate threshold. Efficiency should be thought as being lean with time and power, not simply anatomical and cellular adaptations. A common approach to performing faster is finding a pace that can be increased and maintained for the duration of the event.
• Execution – The final area where athletes need to tie everything together is race modeling, not to be confused with performance modeling. Race modeling looks at the athlete’s current abilities and maximizes what they have to create their best performance. Performance modeling should be thought of as improving the all-time maximal capability of the event, based on known and future variables. Many times athletes outperform better talents because they executed the race properly or more consistently. The goal for athletes and coaches is developing a strategy based on their talents and training, and being faithful and unswerving to the plan or tactics.

Innovating the Block Start Phase

Figure 3. Neuromuscular power on the blocks have been tested with force plates for over a decade, and the key is finding the right balance of power and coordination.

There isn’t much room in swimming for innovating the start, as blocks leave few options besides trying to improve consistency—hence the commitment to the track start. If one was to summarize the needs analysis of the start, it’s a little more complicated than overcoming inertia but not as complicated as building a stealth fighter plane. Middle ground is setting up the swimmer’s body and total body starting strength to a modern Omega starting block.

Track coaches tend to oversimplify or overcomplicate block starts, so being more vanilla helps here. Swimming has some less concrete factors, such as the specs of the blocks and FINA rules. Like defining a catch in the NFL, some simple starting criteria in swimming are not clear. For example, using “reaction time” in research is wrong since many scientists use the total time from sound to takeoff to describe how quickly someone “reacts” to a sound/visual stimulus.

Also, a lot is going on within the time interval between responding to the sound of the start and pushing off. The entire body is coordinated into an orchestrated extension forward and slightly upward within half a second. Each joint and body segment is wonderfully coordinated as one functional unit, and they all have room to be adjusted for better performance.

A strength coach is tempted to add more strength or power for better blocks. But the influence would be small since many swimmers are already lifting legs and such increases of forces may not show up in departure speed. Teaching more starts with a finite amount of time and energy may not be ideal either, since fighting for .01 instead of .1 is always a math choice of needs versus wants.

Solution: The rear foot wedge and front foot being nearly vertical create a delay in propulsion because the shin angles are not parallel, as in track starts. A solution of adjusting the hip height and rear leg, along with the center of mass, can help reduce time on the block and still sustain horizontal power by improving temporal sequencing of the summation of forces. This means the time on the block will not drop significantly, but it will have a faster departure velocity and projection angle.

Remember that swimmers are basically falling on their faces to use gravity, while track sprinters must overcome vertical forces of gravity. Such tweaking will improve horizontal speed by roughly .1 meters per second or 10 centimeters. I highly recommend that any international 50m swimmer use high-speed cameras to analyze the duration (block time) and angle of departure. (Note: A “smart block” loaded with force plates was used to study swimming starts. Information on the researcher’s findings can be found here.)

Innovating the Dive Phase

Figure 4. Dive technique can reduce block departure velocity if not practiced, and simple video analysis can show why athletes are losing or gaining speed.

Due to the constraints of gravity and the projection angle of the blocks, there’s hardly any margin for adjustment besides preparing for a streamlined entry. Some research has examined various styles of entry to see how they conserve speed, but none convinces me of a repeatable or adjustable strategy that is coachable. What athletes instinctively do on their own is the majority of the technique, and coaching can only result in small changes.

One interesting study was done in Europe on “air profile” revealed very little information on the advantages or disadvantages of the different techniques. The paper summarized the wrong conclusion because researchers looked at the 15m time, something I made the mistake of looking at instead of seeing the middle underwater transition or earlier benchmark. Another problem is that measuring an effective entry is hard to do with the complications of hydrodynamic calculations. Researchers are left to see entry points and angles and using a chronometer of the video to estimate velocity. I have looked at various speed models. The key element is a dive angled shallow enough to maintain horizontal velocity needs, yet steep enough to prevent loss of momentum due to the surface tension of the water.

The entry for practical purposes is included in the dive since a swimmer can technically be in the water and still be in the air. Instead of creating a very short phase, the dive is completed when the toes are underwater.

Solution: The common practice of diving and gliding (remaining streamlined) for distance is a good start, but one must account for the maximal apex depth to ensure that the rise to the surface is evaluated fairly. Elite swimmers create a rainbow curve from entry to surfacing, and maintaining speed is complicated. One clever option likely not used enough is accelerating the velocity of the pool deck with an approach run, or using a longer and taller dive to expose the athlete to self-organized motor acquisition. Providing the athlete has feedback to that ensure the sensations and self-selected adjustments are working, “aerial athleticism” from coaching can enhance the task-acquired skills even more. While accelerometers are not the end solution for changes in body velocity in swimming, video can help reveal what adjustments are made to create cause and effect.

Innovating the Underwater Transition Phase

Figure 5. The German company Contemplas is a top option for swimming kinematic data in Europe, and is growing in popularity in the US.

The underwater transition starts when the toe—the last part of the body to enter the water—is submerged. At this point, the entire body speed loss from the dive can’t be changed, since the time loss after entry is limited according to body type and streamlining. What can be changed is the timing of sub-phases by using the speed from the dive more effectively. Major champions have added time from unreliable underwater transitions they never even rehearsed.

While gliding is a period of deceleration, underwater streamlining is still a better option until underwater kicking improves. The difficulty is the swimmer knowing when to start kicking versus holding patient for fractions of a second. Sprinters in track know how to be patient at much higher limb and body velocities, so swimmers have no excuse but to evolve. Also, the faster speed and transition to the first stroke means maximizing the underwater rule limit of 15m.

I believe the shrewdest innovation is polishing the phase between dive and breakout because it’s the one with the hardest coaching demands. I love the idea of navigating to the hardest areas because they are likely uncharted and more inclined to be improved. The focus for ultimate performance in sprint freestyle is to create a series of small benchmarks with underwater video, then try to be more consistent with great rehearsals.

Solution: The most unheralded area of improvement can be done with attention to timing and development of breaking out after the right streamline and kick. The 15m mark needs to be always taken advantage of and has more velocity than the peak swim speed. A fast transition requires looking at decay rates and timing based on maintaining established velocities. Based on the data, taking a stroke or two less will matter, provided all else is equal with regards to conditioning and power.

Innovating the Swim Phase

Figure 6. Underwater video is no longer a big expense as technology improves and becomes more affordable. The science of the swimming stroke is still evolving to this day.

Little can be changed here as I see only small refinements in stroke development and evolution. What must be worked on is swimmers’ ability to maintain their rhythm of output. The challenge of swimming, unlike track, is that stroke length and frequency have some merit to performance. In track, stride length and frequency are more an outcome, while swimming is more style-based on skill and talent. While a longer athlete in the pool will likely have longer strokes, their frequency is often a choice of style.

Swimming has changed its rules based on either cheating (breaststroke pullouts) or innovation (underwater kicking). Not much has evolved in freestyle because the very nature and name of the event already opened up the floodgates to innovation. What remains are just refinements of earlier progress to stroke mechanics and power management, but swimmers need to execute their pacing and awareness of fatigue better. I have looked at the results of swimmers in the sprint events. While tapering matters more than in track and field, race execution, for the most part, is far more variable with swimmers.

Solution: Swimmers in short sprints may need either rehearsal work or training that is stroke- and velocity-based rather than interval-based. Like hurdlers, swimmers simply can’t model their events because of the rhythm demands. Hurdlers adjust the height and spacing of the barriers to imprint rhythms they need to execute; swimmers tend to lose out here. Innovation will come from how programs develop consistent racing with data of practices and annual program design records. Coaches must address reducing variability that is unproductive in stroke rhythm and ensures that the fatigue of racing and practicing is congruent. The key metric here is the most economical pattern with conservation of speed from the start and managing the highest mean speed of the swimmers near maximal above-water velocity.

What 50m Swimmers Can Glean from 100m Track Sprinters

Before coaches and athletes in the aquatic world model the 50m, track and field can teach them a lesson or two. Specifically, how the phases of the race evolve and how modern 100m sprinters are better because they are well-rounded. Usually, the event is separated into five distinct phases: start, acceleration, maximal velocity, deceleration zone, and finish. I used the term deceleration zone after peak velocity because the timing of the event is based on rules that the chest is the point of measurement for crossing the line. Sprinters usually dip to get the last fraction of a second, but technically running through the line can eliminate that option.

The reason 50m swimmers can learn from elite sprinters is that the modern 100m athlete is no longer a specialist or gifted in one area, reminding us that the sum of the phases must be carefully balanced instead of just riding talent or skill in one area. Many 50m swimmers are not reaching their potential because they barely address basic areas of the race and remain far from maximized. All the top performances have already been researched, and progress results mainly from suit technology and slight evolutions in strength training.

What’s the Limit or Projection of the 50m Free?

I don’t know what the future holds, but we can still improve the overall speed of the race without resorting to rule changes or going back to the high-tech suit era. Alex Popov achieved his amazing times without a modern suit (and cap!) and used a grab start. We still can learn a lot from his modeling if we rethink little details while trying to increase top speed with an emphasis on hand velocity without increases in drag. We already have some event time projections for Rio, and based on estimates the 50m free world record of 20.91 seems safe.

Note: In 1996 I had a Snooper Cam connected to a VCR, so don’t complain about technology when solutions are cheaper and better now.

Please share so others may benefit.

ALTIS and Freelap — two of the biggest names in T&F — have come together to celebrate progress in our sport. We hope you enjoy this week’s blog post. Share if you enjoy it!

By Laurier Primeau

As track and field coaches we’ve often heard that the best learning takes place not in formal educational settings nor coaching clinics but in the opportunities one takes to sit down over coffee with a coach who has demonstrated success at the highest level. I’ve found this to be true. While the quest for continual learning and reshaping of ideas through online research, classroom lectures, track-side observation, and a myriad of other mediums is extremely valuable, I’ve gotten incredible nuggets of information that have shaped my philosophy, programming, and relational approach by working up the courage to ask people with more experience than me to spend a few minutes over a beverage. In many cases, this has been track and field specific, but in others, I have been able to solicit advice from people outside the world of athletics.

The key for me has been to value learning, to understand that track and field coaches are not the experts in everything, and to find people who may have the information I want. Kevin Tyler once described a coach that he knew by saying about him, “If he thinks you have a piece of knowledge that he wants, you’d better get a restraining order or acquiesce and meet up with him because he’s going to harass you until you do.” It is this commitment to learning that seems to be common among great coaches, and I’m sure that the now-famous Altis Pool-Side Chats were born out of the recognition that being in an environment in which no question is too stupid or irrelevant facilitates an invaluable learning experience. What follows is a short post referencing specific examples of meetings with people who know vastly more than me, and who’ve influenced my coaching through their wisdom. These musing are not highly bio-technical but rather emphatic on foundation and approach.

Coach versus Personal Trainer

In 1997, I was on a charter bus between Phoenix and Flagstaff, Arizona, where Athletics Canada was putting on a series of sprint competitions. I was still an athlete, but I had also been coaching since I was 21 when my high school coach suddenly passed. I was asked to take over the team so my interest in athlete development had been sparked when I was fairly young. I found myself sitting in front of Charlie Francis on the bus, and the barrage of questions befell him. Most meaningful to me was his riddle: ‘Q: What’s the difference between a personal trainer and a coach? A: The personal trainer is the fit one with all the fat clients, and the coach is the fat one with all the fit clients’. His point, of course, was that if you are truly doing your job as a coach you are observing athletes in all of their movements. If you are training beside them, your ability to provide technical feedback is so greatly reduced that everything is stunted – your athletes’ improvement curve, your ability to detect fatigue and make training adjustments, and your own observational skills. One of a personal trainer’s primary roles is to motivate and doing an exercise with a client can inspire ‘one more rep.’ However, coaches don’t find themselves trying to motivate great athletes very often because high-level competitors are so intrinsically wired that the role of inspirer is significantly limited. The role of technical observer is paramount, and as such, my focus on personal health has always taken place outside of the training session.

In a practical sense, this has meant that I spend a lot more time at the track. I can’t coach high jumpers at one end of the facility and long jumpers at the other simultaneously. To give athletes the personalized attention they deserve and require, I’ve had to stagger practice times. High jumpers come to the track at 12:00 pm, javelin throwers at 1:30 pm, long / triple jumpers at 3:00 pm and sprints / hurdles at 5:00 pm. I have qualified coaches working the disciplines of circle throws, long sprints and endurance, largely operating under the same premise that individual training observations are foundational to detecting and implementing strategies for improvement.

Emphasize Strengths, Develop Weaknesses

Before moving to the United Kingdom to take on the Head Coach position for Scotland in 2009, I had an opportunity to visit with Mike Gillis, who was incredibly generous with his time. Gillis had been in his post as General Manager of the Vancouver Canucks for about 18 months, and he told me a story about the two most prolific goal scorers that have ever donned a Canucks jersey. In previous years and under a different staff it had been recognized that in relative terms the Sedin twins (Henrik and Daniel) were defensive liabilities. It had been resolved that they would spend the off-season working on their defensive skills to plug that weakness. The following season the Canucks had their lowest offensive production in years, and the Sedins’ defensive skills had improved only marginally. The one thing they were good at – scoring goals – was significantly reduced so that they could get a little bit better on the defensive side of the puck. Mike Gillis had a different approach – he felt that it was his job to figure out how to acquire and develop strong defensive players, but that the Sedins, who were natural goal scorers, should be left to focus on offensive output. The following year the Canucks’ overall goals statistic improved significantly, and two seasons later they were in the Stanley Cup final.

This philosophy of allowing athletes to explore their strengths has been woven into the fabric of my coaching perspective. My work with 400m runners is a good example of this. With much talk in recent years about the merits of ‘short-to-long’ versus ‘long-to-short’, I’ve always taken the approach that the determination on programming should be athlete-dependent. Specifically, with athletes who have good neural qualities and strong 200 meter times, I emphasize this in training prescriptions by hypothesizing that we want to get this performer as far down the track in 40 seconds as possible. Then I tack on just enough specific / special endurance to get them across the finish line (which is congruent with a ‘short-to-long’ approach). For athletes who do not have exceptional maximal velocities but who can hold on to the speed that they do have for a relatively long time, we engage a different tactic – one that begins at the outer reaches of the special endurance spectrum and gradually observes a reduction in load coming into the competitive period (it should be emphasized that even with this approach there is a good amount of front loading speed en route to special and specific endurance repetitions within individual sessions).

This notion that an athlete is only as strong as the weakest link in the chain seems to be only partially true. Of course, there are limitations that can’t be ignored – mobility, minimum strength requirements, and tissue health among them. But more often than not, my own observations have been that emphasizing the predominant training stimulus to parallel athlete strengths has led to greater performance improvements than a focus on what an athlete might not be as good at.

Excuses Are the Nails that Build the House of Failure

Paul Proznick is the Head of Physical Education at a prestigious boys’ school on the west side of Vancouver and was my direct line manager in my teaching role at the school. While he certainly did not coin the phrase, ‘Excuses are the nails that build the house of failure,’ he’s taken the opportunity to overuse it. But the simplicity in the message hits home – we can use energy to demonstrate why things are not possible, or we can figure out ways to make them work. Paul talked about this idea with his basketball teams, his staff, and presumably at home. Why couldn’t perceived soft, rich kids win basketball games? Does wealth somehow limit one’s innate desires to succeed? Why can’t I resonate with a ‘difficult’ student? Had I tried creatively to connect, or was I giving up because it was easier to blame bad behavior on the pupil than use imaginative methods in dealing with the issue?

In track and field terms I’ve observed my mentors and colleagues produce incredible performers in sub-optimal environments. It’s well-documented that Derek Evely has developed some of the world’s best athletes out of Kamloops, BC – a town of 85,000. Shane Niemi (44.86 400 meters), Dylan Armstrong (22.21 shot put), and Gary Reed (1:43.68 800 meters) all hail from this small town in the interior of British Columbia where winter temperatures reach -20 Celsius regularly and, when these three were growing up, there was no indoor facility. While I’m sure that Derek would want me to emphasize that these athletes’ lifetime bests were all set after he moved them to other coaches, the fact remains that they were remarkable junior athletes under his tutelage. Derek acquired an old World War II bunker, cleaned out the rat feces, hung nets, built a wooden throwing circle, and voila – an indoor shot put / hammer training facility. It was still -20 degrees but the implements didn’t get lost in the snow. Next he brokered an arrangement with the City of Kamloops to use a 60-meter-long hallway above the local hockey rink. This became his sprint straight, and at a balmy -5 Celsius he could focus on acceleration mechanics with his athletes all winter.

With a little ingenuity and a lot of elbow grease remarkable things can happen in training grounds that might be perceived as inadequate. As I’ve transitioned into a new coaching role at the University of British Columbia and simultaneously developed the Altis Canada concept, I’ve found myself confronted with challenges – some facility, some budget, some staffing, and some climate. But if Derek Evely can cultivate excellence in the face of much harsher odds on all of these fronts, surely Vancouver’s riches, the incredible training ground that is the University Endowment Lands, some good coaching, and a little creative decision-making can go a long way to developing some of the nation’s – and indeed the world’s – best.

After all – excuses are the nails that build the house of failure.

By Joel Smith

When Donald Thomas waltzed off a basketball court in 2006 into his first track meet, with only one high jump practice under his belt, he shocked the nation by high jumping 2.22m (7’3”) wearing Nike Shox basketball shoes. The highest jumpers in the world come from basketball and volleyball courts, but most coaches don’t consider the scientific and motor learning reasons behind this phenomenon.

Video 1. Donald Thomas clears 2.22m in Nike Shox after one high jump practice.

I love anecdotes from the world of slam-dunk specialists largely because many coaches who are well versed in structured regiments and periodization schemes would laugh at the “training” in this hoops subculture. And yet social media is becoming more and more buzzed with gravity defying exploits of street dunkers. Many of these athletes haven’t touched a weight, heard a single cue from an experienced coach, or read a word about how to plan training.

How do these athletes manage such ridiculous jumps? Here are some hints. First, they are highly motivated and have a passion for jumping. Distinguished USSR high jump coach Victor Lonsky described this as “an itch in the soles of the feet.” Second, when they jump, they don’t just dunk on a 10-foot rim the exact same way each time. They twist, they spin, they might do cartwheels and back handsprings, and they have a lot of fun. All of these jumps yield different plant rhythms and sequences as well as outcome goals. Here are two of my favorite videos highlighting these ideas.

Video 2. Justin Darlington doesn’t lift weights or have a “training program,” but he can do this.

Video 3. Here is another great athletic dunk.

To help vertical jump athletes reach their highest potential, a variety of specific strength, power, and coordinative training is essential to maximize performance gains. There is an important aspect of motor learning that has a massive impact on the way we understand programming and athletic adaptation to training as we know it.

This aspect encompasses the subtle, and not so subtle, variations of key athletic movements, in this case jumping, that allow athletes to respond better to training over a period of time and acquire a higher performance level. With this in mind, we’ll jump into the idea I call specific power variability.

Specific Power Variability

Doing the exact same jump over and over, without adequate variation, is the “silencer” of vertical gains. This concept isn’t only true in athletic performance but also life in general. Nature itself is a balance between order and chaos. Without some level of chaos, or randomness, life ceases to exist.

I recently read Frans Bosch’s latest book on strength training and coordination, Strength Training and Coordination: An Integrative Approach. Bosch states that movement must have degrees of freedom to promote learning and progression. In other words, there must be some level of chaos, or room for the CNS to self-organize movement, to reach a goal. When exercises offer no degrees of freedom (such as a heavy barbell lunge), the athlete’s CNS is in a “straightjacket,” and no motor learning is possible.

John Keily describes training a skill as a trek through a densely undergrown path. The more you train the skill, the more you narrow the path, making it harder to keep walking along it. The more variable you train that skill, the wider you keep the path. The wider the path, the more easily you can move through it, but if it becomes too narrow, continued progress is difficult. Hence, a certain level of variability is vital to continue to make training progress and stay injury free.

As coaches, we are guides to the athletes’ subconscious systems. The athletes cannot consciously control how their brains shuffle through the adaptive systems of training nor can coaches control the exact way in which their nervous systems process stimuli and the exact mechanical manifestations from that process. The best we can do is to put an athlete in an environment that helps to promote the way we want them to adapt.

Applying Variability

In this article, I talk about four types of variability coaches can use to guide a jump athlete’s speed, power, and technical ability down the correct path. These are listed in order of their use, from beginner through advanced athletes. The beginning of the list is more useful for beginners while the end has more application for advanced trainees. This isn’t to say that beginners can’t benefit from #4 or advanced athletes can’t improve with #1 or #2; these are general guidelines. Four ways to induce specific power variability into jump training are:

1. Complex training
2. Fatigue induced learning
3. Same but Different
4. Induced randomness/chaos

Complex Training

Vertical jump training can become more robust through variability with both a mixed attempt format and the compounded effect exercises have on each other in a complex format.

Complex training is largely applicable to the widest spectrum of athletes in respect to potentiation. Dr. Bondarchuk has said, “In the future, in the track and field speed-strength events, we will see the complex method of constructing separate training sessions.” I was fortunate to hear Dr. B talk about complex methods in the weight room for advanced athletes at the 2014 Central Virginia Sports Performance Seminar, and potentiation exercises were a big part of his lecture. From a purely motor learning perspective, complex training is most applicable to beginners, but potentiation is useful for all levels.

Unfortunately, most coaches think of complex training only in terms of potentiation and, although this is an important aspect of stringing together a series of jumping, lifting, and throwing exercises, it is critical to also look at a series of exercises as a motor learning tool. Performing an exercise directly before another influences the mechanics of the second exercise in either a coordinative or fatiguing manner. For now, I’ll talk about the coordination aspects and cover fatigue in the next section.

Looking at the coordination effects of complex training, strength coach legend Dan John has some wonderful, insightful training methods using a kettlebell in the throwing ring. He uses various kettlebell drills, such as swings, goblet squats, single arm presses, and snatches, to settle his body into the rhythm he is trying to accomplish technically in the throws. He calls this “reflexive training”; using an exercise to “trick” an athlete into acquiring the desired body position while sparing willpower.

By alternating kettlebell work and throwing, Dan creates a powerful motor stimulus that teaches technique without spending an athlete’s mental forebrain energy on each throw, enhancing the workout and retention of technique. Complex training teaches motor patterns more effectively than simply potentiating prime movers haphazardly.

To this end, we must look at every movement complex from not only a potentiation standpoint but also a coordinative one. Better than simply aiming for gross potentiation, such as performing a heavy back squat followed by a vertical jump, it is much more useful to build complexes where specific skills are targeted, potentiated, and repeated. On simple terms, we can utilize movements like basic barbell lifts, medicine ball throws, and depth jumps to provide a coordinative transfer to subsequent jump attempts. French Contrast is one of the best ways to do this. A French Contrast circuit utilizes two strength exercises and two speed exercises in alternating circuit fashion.

A good coach can steer the nature of the French Contrast towards the specific technical output desired. The French Contrast’s total effect is not just potentiation but also a heavy coordination boost. In the video below, specific skills from a two-foot vertical jump are trained in a French Contrast format. Regarding what the coaching world has found to improve an athlete’s coordination and power in vertical jumping, the French Contrast offers one of the best training layouts.

Online client Noah Plener rips through a French Contrast squat complex. Follow him at 40at35 on his quest to dunk. #legendaryathleticism #verticaljump #frenchcontrast #verticalignition #plyometrics #sportscience

A video posted by Joel Smith (@justflysports) on Feb 14, 2016 at 3:05pm PST

Complex training concepts are important for motor learning in track and field jumpers. Alternating a drill such as the box takeoff below with actual long jump takeoffs is a useful method to “trick” an athlete into the proper takeoff rhythm, similar to Dan John’s kettlebell work for the throws. Once the rhythm is established, it becomes ingrained in the nervous system for future efforts.

Video 4. Long jump technique.

In my time working with swim athletes, I’ve learned that swim coaches use lots of variation through fins, paddles, socks, chutes, and simply heavy kick cues, to create the motor change they want to accomplish in the water. These movements are often complexed to create a better technical response. Track coaches can often get away with leaving technique alone in simple blocked training patterns because running is more instinctive, and thus less trainable, than swimming, but they can certainly learn from the motor learning ideals of aquatics and create faster sprinters and higher jumpers in the process.

The Role of Fatigue in Variability

In Strength Training and Coordination, Bosch mentions that fatigue can play an important role when building better motor patterns in sport. As speed and power coaches, we often look at anything fatigue-inducing with disdain, saying “look how technique fell off.” Bosch teaches us that fatigue causes the body to formulate a new recruitment pattern to deal with the building level of muscle fatigue. Clearly, this is only beneficial to a point. Fatigue is useful only as long as technique remains somewhat close to optimal.

When muscle fatigue rises, the body relies more on elastic elements to continue designated movement patterns. An example would be performing a set of squats and then immediately performing a round of eight consecutive hurdle hops. The muscle fatigue (contractile elements) from the squats force the body to formulate a greater contribution of elastic elements in the hurdle hops, which magnifies the purpose of the hurdle hops.

Some time ago, my college jumps coach was in contact with a Russian jumps coach, Egor. My coach received all sorts of interesting information which he shared and implemented with me. I hung on to every word and found the training advice more than helpful. As a coach, I used his advice on distance flops and scissors over a low bar with great success.

In my later coaching years, I contacted Egor and learned an interesting practice where you place the high jump bar to 6’-6’4” and jump it 50 times with a full approach, jogging back to the start mark after each landing.

This sounds crazy, but this type of practice is more common than you may think and, as we have just seen, has a plausible motor learning rationale. The two-minute drill, used by triple jumpers such as Christian Taylor, involves the following sequence: perform a triple jump from a short approach, about five strides; jog back to the starting mark, and repeat. Perform this for two minutes, trying to maintain technique under fatigue.

We tend to get stuck thinking that only maximal efforts count toward building competition technique, but a small percentage of training effort can be used to use fatigue when building a better motor program in the jump. Fatiguing efforts in jumping offer a unique motor stimulus that improves the interaction of muscle and tendon in conjunction with maintaining an athlete’s optimal jump technique.

Again, this tactic is only effective within reason. I don’t believe in regularly allowing athletes to sprint or jump with poor technique. Fatigue training generally bodes well as a finisher of typical workloads that are done with relatively good momentary technical accuracy.

When applying French Contrast work, we can assume that the relatively short rest breaks between exercises in French Contrast yield small fatigue elements that may force the body to increase elastic contribution in the workout’s speed-strength elements.

Same but Different

I first learned of the Same but Different idea while reading the book, Easy Strength by Dan John and Pavel Tsatsouline. Suddenly many ideas in the world of training made sense.

In Supertraining, Siff and Verkhoshansky state, “The competitive action executed with maximal physical exertion represents the most specific of all the special training means.” Athletes have only a certain amount of stored energy when it comes to maximal efforts in their primary directive. This idea represents much of what is utilized in the “Westside” powerlifting program, where the competitive lifts are sparsely addressed in their intense and competitive state, and large amounts of lift variations performed with high intent are prescribed during the rest of the training week.

The essence of Same but Different retains specificity under new biomechanical, environmental, and psychological constraints. The psychological constraints may be the most underrated and often are not considered when creating training variation. Basic examples from the weightlifting world are alternating a sixteen-week powerlifting program with three or four weeks of bodybuilding training or going from a competition low-bar squat to a few weeks of high rep high bar Olympic squats. A swimmer might take two or three weeks after the end of the season to play water polo, and so on.

Within the scope of jumping, complicated and environmentally different versions of movement offer a gold mine of options for helping the nervous system to form a better training pattern over time. Continually training the same exact skill and motor enneagram doesn’t give an athlete’s nervous system room to create improvement and leads to burnout. Training a skill properly requires a very high volume of specific training, but with an activity as physiologically demanding as jumping, it is very important that much of this specific training be performed under subtly different biomechanical and emotional constraints.

In Easy Strength, Tsatsouline shares a Vladimir Issurin (Block Periodization) anecdote about a coach who decided to get rid of all general exercises and make the preparation of his athletes exclusively sport specific. Many months later, none of the athletes had set a PR and many had regressed in performance. So much for the sport-specific approach to training that is so overbearing in our private sector sport-performance culture.

In the high jump world, high school basketball players make up a huge portion of the talent pool. There are loads of high school stories regarding jumpers coming straight off the basketball court clearing personal best heights and then floundering to sub-par jumping as they move away from basketball and start an extensive amount of specific high jump training and heavy weightlifting. In these scenarios, the specific high jump training is too monochromatic, and the heavy weightlifting is poorly designed, and the two combine to “straightjacket” the nervous system. The result: lousy jumps that the coach blames on the athlete’s lack of focus.

Back in my NCAA DIII coaching days, I saw college basketball players waltz off the basketball court in late February and win NCAA indoor national track meets in the high jump, who then stagnated in the outdoor campaign once they began to train specifically. Wouldn’t the specific high jump training in the outdoor campaign help their high jump technique and precision jumping ability? Not as much as we might think.

Athletes in weaker physical states will benefit from training that resembles a higher order of chaos to broaden the path of their nervous systems. Sometimes the best thing you can tell a jumper who is weary from the wear and tear of depth jumps, bounds, sprints, throws, and hops, is to simply go play soccer or ultimate Frisbee for a few days to help widen their path. Just hope they don’t twist an ankle.

In 2000, Matt Hemingway, who had walked away from high jumping two years earlier, found redemption through slam dunking during pickup games at work. His dunking exploits fueled his return to high jump, and his 2000 result of 2.38 was a PR and the highest jump Americans had seen in some time.

This type of story epitomizes Same but Different.

Here are a few practical examples for jumpers.

Video 5. Stefan Holm and 6 Degrees of Jumping

I love, and regularly make use of, these jump variations with my youth high jumpers. Even with collegiate and elite level athletes, practicing more than one style can yield solid benefits. I think it’s accurate to say that this type of work helped Holm with his career.

Video 6. Stephan Holm Hurdles Training.

Holm hurdles are another great way to train jumping under different environmental constraints while building takeoff rhythm. For complicated jumping patterns, I enjoy using hurdles. They force a higher rate of power development in a shorter time frame and provide agility that helps athletes to continually develop well-rounded athletic performance.

Video 7. Low-Rim Dunking.

This is an example of jumping with a dunker who is pretty famous now. Did you see his dunk in jeans at halftime of the NBA All-Star game? Many internet sensation slam-dunkers do a good amount of work on lower rims and many will tell you that it builds their jumping height. In reality, low-rim dunks likely offer a mental break from typical 10-foot rims and allows more focus on some of the fluctuators in common jump movements. This gives the CNS continual puzzles to solve and keeps the width of the path at an appropriate level.

Induced Randomness (Chaos)

An athlete must train specifically to improve vertical jumps, but that specificity can become more effective with an element of induced randomness. Induced randomness is a sound method of adding variability into a more specific skill path and works by making a movement subtly different while maintaining most other competitive constraints. In other words, you give an athlete a small error in the movement to provide the nervous system a chance to correct it. It has been postulated that motor learning is actually more about fixing errors than perfecting technique.

As far as track and field go, one way to implement induced randomness is to have athletes pulled in an overspeed setting and, while in route, attempt to stride on a few small pieces of track laid out on their course. I learned of this idea from Chris Korfist, who is doing some great things with the 1080 sprint trainer.

Other coaches have their athletes sprint onto irregularly spaced chalk or tape marks during their sprints. This plays with the rhythm of the movement and creates an error to be organized by the nervous system. Athletes must solve, on the fly, movement puzzles which optimize their technique on the fastest and most specific level.

Induced randomness training, however, isn’t completely new. Twenty years ago, Polish jumps coach Tadeusz Starzynski sent jump athletes on 200m repeats over uneven terrain as a means of general preparation. Distance coaches in the past have had athletes run on different terrains such as rocky trails and sand dunes. This also falls under the realm of Same but Different. Some forward-thinking coaches have intuitively understood these concepts for some time, but the methods are now coming full circle with more purpose, intent, and intensity.

There is a famous study of long jumpers conducted by Rewzon which appeared in Science of Sports Training by Thomas Kurz. In this study, long jumpers performed one of two training programs.

• Program One was simply to practice long jumping and “jump as far as you can each jump” in every training attempt.
• Program Two was “jump a different distance with each jump, and be accurate with the landing.”

The Program Two athletes, who jumped different distances, were able to best their max-only counterparts when it came time to jump all-out for distance at the end of the training study. These jumpers, who fed their nervous system more randomness, created a more robust overall system for the one important big jump attempt. Giving the CNS more possibilities of movement allows the creation of a better program compared to providing only one possibility.

Looking back at the example of high-level slam-dunk athletes, the induced randomness of dunk training is perfect for vertical jump athletes who already have high skill levels. At the higher performance levels, athletes are stable in the fundamental points (attractors) of their jump technique, and rightly so. At this point, complex training for skill acquisition is less important than fine-tuning existing qualities. The same principles will ring true for high-level sprinters and jumpers. They will benefit more from solving a motor puzzle via induced randomness within their event type than performing a series of fundamentally different jumps or sprints to improve technique.

Below are some examples of using induced randomness/chaos with jumpers.

For High Jump:

I enjoy the Swedish technique for training jumpers, and Stefan Holm’s various training schemes are no exception. I particularly like his high jump run-up drills, as they include elements of fatigue, rhythm, and randomness, but are all high velocity and specific enough to apply to all levels of jumpers. In this video, Holm does a run-up with a random single leg bound leading into the penultimate series.

Video 8. Stephan Holm’s High Jump.

Holm also performs a version of this drill with a long series of single leg bounds leading into his penultimate takeoff series. The long series drives an even greater rhythm and fatigue element which leads to a strong, unique motor learning effect in the takeoff.

For Triple Jump and General Posterior Chain Power:

Variable bounding is a simple and extremely effective way to induce subtle randomness into an explosive sequence. This type of bounding, where cones are set at intervals up to 20% difference on each stride, also causes a more “reflexive” feeling from the athlete in many cases.

Video 9. Joel Smith Variable Bounding

Final Summary and Training Suggestions

To help coaches and jumpers build a more effective total program, I’ve included a master list of ways to apply the four forms of variability. Remember, these methods should not compromise the entire program, but should comprise enough of a portion to ensure that the motor pattern of and athlete is continually fresh and improving. For some athletes, this might mean 10-20% of the program is based on some form of variability. For other athletes, at least 50% of the program might revolve around a chaotic and complex system. Different athletes have different needs for training variation.

• A variety of high jump takeoffs, not just the flop style (straddle, scissors, western roll, head on hurdling, various clearances off of two feet)
• A variety of long jump takeoffs over hurdles or barriers or with various small box constraints around the penultimate steps
• Hurdling movements and jumps
• Bounding combinations
• Variable bounding
• Parcour style jumps, that can be performed safely, or safe recreations of parcour style jumps
• Run, or at least practice, the hurdle events
• Slam dunks as well as creative low-rim slam dunks
• Play basketball or volleyball, at least as a shakeout or cooldown
• Complex lifting and jumping exercises
• French Contrast training
• Complexing bounding with jumping
• Complexing depth jumping with specific jumping

Variability can also be used in a practical, rotating manner on the workout-to-workout level. I make use of this format in my book, Vertical Ignition, which has yielded some great vertical gains, particularly in track and field athletes.

When it comes to vertical jumping, particularly skilled versions such as running jumps in track and field, training variation and coordination is a critical aspect of improvement. Funneling all training into rigid buckets can have drawbacks. Sprinting, jumping, and all movements in between, can and do work synergistically to create a stronger jumping technique.

Please share so others may benefit.

By Carl Valle

Editor’s Note: This is part of a series of articles showing how deeper metrics of bar tracking technology can improve the quality of training in the weight room.

We have witnessed more investment into bar tracking technology during the past two years than the previous two decades. While this may seem like progress, many coaches have not progressed with the technology. Investing into bar tracking comes with a cost beyond the financial side. It requires coaches education and appreciating what the technologies are trying to do. Coaches who jump on the bandwagon to be relevant will be frustrated because they have not prepared their athletes to be aware of the importance of simply following directions and the difficulty of getting measurements on things as complex as weight training, jumping, and throwing.

As a coach, you should consider the following three questions before proceeding with adopting any VBT technology.

• Do you have a training environment in which athletes follow directions in your training environment, respect the training process, and pay attention to it? Any technology requires that everyone take at least some measure of responsibility for it to work well.
• If the information or data isn’t what you want to hear, will you make adjustments or continue doing what you like doing?
• Do you have a clear plan or a realistic goal for implementing barbell tracking technology, or do you feel pressured to adopt it to keep up with the data or technology arms race?

These questions are honest ones, so by all means step right ahead if you are confident that barbell tracking will add value to what you are doing. If you are new to VBT or want to take things to the next level, we will dive into the realities of what is required to work maturely with the technology and methodology.

Measuring mean velocity or peak velocity alone has great value, but if you want to truly gauge barbell performance, you must look at all the numbers to draw better conclusions. Treat each data point like a dot of paint in an Impressionist painting—the more dots, the better the image. In this article, I will review what we have learned from Rate of Force Development (RFD), introduce Mean Propulsive Velocity (MPV), and highlight other common measures of bar tracking to fine-tune workouts for a better transfer. The heart and soul of this article are not just zooming into bar performance, but also stepping back and focusing on the big picture: how barbell performance helps with on-field performance. In sports performance, transfer is king.

Strength coaches have valued bar speed measurements for decades. Now it’s appropriate to see how biofeedback and analysis work together to get better results. The next evolution is understanding how weight training transfers with more concrete numbers, not just past dogma and current fads. Bar speed is an excellent dipstick to test what is going on in the athlete’s muscular engine, and now it’s time to maximize the human machine.

Connecting Bar Speed with Body and Bar Speed—Paydirt

Over a year ago I strongly advocated that the purpose of barbell speed with Velocity Based Training (VBT) was improving ball and body speed. Strength coaches use barbell indices to improve how fast an athlete can displace (locomotion) or how powerfully they can propel balls, competitors, and other implements. Even the Olympics and powerlifting care about the weight outcome, not bar speed, and VBT is a way to help get higher success rates. Coaches and athletes are pursuing propulsion to perform better. Sport success is based on having leg and (at times) upper extremity power to propel a body mass or another mass (large or small) faster or with a higher force. Weight training is a major player in developing this propulsive quality, and the refinement of weight training programming (enter VBT) continues to offer us small yet valuable gains.

A word of caution here. Overreliance on weight lifting as a solution can create problems. While weight training is a great way to gain confidence and create discipline, it’s mainly used to solve three needs and not much else: reduce injuries, get larger, and produce more specific force. Currently, coaches create a lot of misdirection on small nuances like “stimulating” or “potentiation.”

These are fine additions, but without raw strength and power, the athlete misses the primary reasons to lift. The goal when a coach commits to using VBT is to create small and targeted gains that show up outside the weight room. Countless coaches have successfully improved squat and clean numbers in the weight room, but fewer have proven the transference toward improved on-field performance or injury reduction. General weight numbers or data create a case for possible transfer; better numbers seal the deal.

The influx of “evidence-based programs” and various technology measurement options have created a bit of a conflict to training balance. Coaches must be careful not simply to chase numbers. The solution is to understand how and when to use those numbers and make sure they are related to the performance goal. Abstract and sometimes inappropriately positioned sport science may not help a team, and a coach without access to good research is equally ineffective. Instead of seeing science and art as oppositional, why not make the discussion a healthy perspective of how they work collectively?

The good news is the strength game is getting easier to measure and support. With more affordable measurement tools now on the market, you do not need to be a high-profile program to afford the technology to make more informed decisions. In fact, we see that affordable products do the same job (in some cases maybe even better) as more expensive and cost-prohibitive options. Since the conversation is shifting beyond concentric peak and average, coaches fresh to the analytics side may offer an improved approach to outcomes versus those who are static on legacy “norms” from the technology they have used for ten or more years.

Practical Sport Science Is Now Part of the War Room, Not the Ivory Tower

Coaches of any good strength program run solid training sessions while their athletes reflect the results of that training. As more programs transition into information-based training, there will be a phase of frustration resulting from the extra time and technical difficulties in making this adjustment. You need to understand the change (performance improvements) you are seeking when you purchase measurement tools will to some extent disrupt your daily workflow. You cannot expect the tools to fit perfectly into how you like to do things. There is a balance of what you are getting and the adjustments you need to consider to use it effectively.

Since sport science is now part of the war room, coaches are in the trenches making more informed training decisions. Being in the trenches is indeed a cliché, and the image is vivid for pointing out the very real need for something to withstand the challenge of working with a lot of bodies under pressure and time limitations. Coaches need to use every minute properly, and fumbling around with electronics is not something they can afford to do. However, planning is the best way to use time effectively in the long run, as the right direction or strategy maximizes the tactical time. The war room and trenches are complementary, not oppositional if correctly done. Two simple mantras make sense when coaches want to make VBT fit both during training and planning workouts.

• Instant feedback adjusts a good workout plan if needed, but the magnitude is less as coaches increase their experience. Constant adjusting and reaction to planned workouts are a sign of poor program design and analysis.
• Repeated testing of key tests and training exercises shows a cause and effect to the plan over time. As the training data increases, a training program can predict and model better workouts in advance with fewer adjustments.

A simple summary is that as the plan improves, the need for adjustments decrease. But anyone who studies the economy and chaos theory understands that perfect prediction is an illusion. All one can hope truly to get from VBT is higher precision in training and moving the needle by making fewer mistakes.

What Most Articles Miss with Barbell Performance

Figure 1. Lighter loads have decelerating phases, but most maximal strength and power programs do not have to worry about them.

My friend Bryan Mann has helped our profession understand the value of VBT. But for every smart guy like Bryan, we have some less-than-brilliant minds sharing their opinions. In several roundtable-like interviews, some of the thought leaders share some great advice here and here, but my concern is that it takes a few more reviews before coaches fully grasp the concept. Summing up this article, this is a fair conclusion: Coaches are looking to evaluate barbell performance as a way to acutely gauge athletes and indirectly help improvement to the sport the athlete participates in.

Most articles that beat around the bush simply describe what is happening at one point in time with a barbell, something that goes directly with the Impressionist painting analogy. To put it bluntly, most approaches to barbell tracking skim the surface and don’t hammer out what can be fully extracted. Perhaps a better way to explain comprehensive VBT is the idea that the numbers on the barbell plates are not the only numbers happening while lifting

Why We Need to Think Propulsion Instead of Just Bar Velocity

Mean and peak velocity are either slivers of time or artificial summaries of the time the bar is moving. The mean is a rough summary of the barbell stoke. Peak provides a narrow snapshot. While valuable, it is flawed without context. Looking at either one is great for adjusting loads and demanding efforts live, but after the workout is done coaches need more analysis to understand fully what happened.

Athletes either create propulsion (including starting RFD considerations) to project their own body or to propel another body (heavy) or object (lighter). Barbell information can show success later by relating to the athlete’s size and the demands of his/her sport. One can’t simply look at relative and absolute numbers anymore, as sports are becoming more and more competitive. Dissecting the repetition to more data points is valuable and worth the time.

These three simple examples should be familiar in any strength and conditioning setting.

• Body stature considerations – Peak velocity for a tall offensive lineman is much different than for a shorter and stockier defensive tackle. For example, Jonathan Ogden at a looming 6-9 has more time to produce a peak velocity as his limbs are long. Anthony “Booger” McFarland is reportedly 6 feet even, thus has less time to work with but likely has a great mechanical advantage for RFD. In view of their respective roles on the field, coaches want to preserve what makes them special and not expect everyone to have the same barbell performances.
• Load considerations – The 225-pound bench press for reps in the NFL may be outdated, but athletes are still expected to show up and perform. Because athletes are likely to score double digits, mean propulsion velocity matters because much of the rep is braking. With more maximal strength movements, mean velocity is just as valuable because maximal strength lifts are so slow throughout the repetition.
• Technique considerations – In my article about Barbell Displacement, I outlined how fundamental and sometimes advanced metrics can polish a great strength and conditioning program. Teaching someone full range or analyzing smaller ranges (competitive-style weightlifting versus power options) is a starting point, not a nice-to-have feature. A simple change in stance or grip can mislead progress or falsely show regression, so displacement adds perspective to peak and mean values.

More examples exist, but the point of the propulsion angle is to think about how athletes create forces with their bodies, style of technique, and use of time and space. RFD and peak velocity are likely the two best starting metrics while the mean velocity family and distance of the exercise connect the dots.

Does Mean Propulsive Velocity Deserve Discussion?

Unfortunately, most coaches are unaware of how both mean velocity and mean propulsive velocity are measured and why it’s important to know. If you are serious about weight training and utilizing VBT approaches, you need to know how mean and peak velocities are measured and why they are valuable. Some authors have questioned the value of peak power and force, but output is important in quantifying work done. Remember:

• MPV cuts out the deceleration or braking phase from light-speed lifts, a part that can distort the performance measurement of some lifts.
• MPV can be a part of both ballistic or non-ballistic exercises, but provide the most benefit to light strength exercises where nobody or bar projection takes place. When the load is heavier with strength exercises, mean velocity is still relevant.
• MPV is a great complement to specific RFD measurements if interpreted with great care.* MPV is also a great term to use while talking about barbell tracking because only the concentric action of the lift is measured and vividly illustrates how the measurement is taken.

* RFD is a general term describing the production of force from the first effort to peak muscular effort, and it is a wide territory for analysis. The time frames and how they are assessed are extremely important. RFD is a strong factor in performance but like any individual metric, the entire picture is needed for comprehensive evaluation.

How Mean Velocity and MPV Are Measured Scientifically

Figure 2. Coaches should look at wattage for power and spot check the velocities to ensure the exercises are done with the appropriate bar speed.

At first glance, it’s convenient to reduce an exercise to concentric or eccentric phases. The summary one sees in some texts of a weight picked up and dropped, pushed and lowered, is okay for explaining to the layperson what happens, but not enough to help athletes. Exercises have similarities and general commonalities, as well as unique differences. Most devices that measure barbell performance will record the concentric and eccentric motion, but the primary scores displayed are the concentric output only.

A velocity score on a tablet or smartphone shows a summary (average) or single (peak) velocity measurement. The problem with mean or average scores is that the sample range could include numbers that mislead or poorly represent what the user wants to know.

Concentric phases of strength lifts include a period of technique that doesn’t represent propulsive force—simply finishing the rep—and that is braking or decelerating. Mean propulsive velocity responsibly cleaves the deceleration component in strength exercises that is subject to possible technique discrepancies. By focusing on force production, coaches know what neuromuscular adaptations are happening versus what small nuances could be blinding the training scores. The researchers from Spain looked at light loads and found that Mean Propulsive Velocity has value with some instances, but the future will be still focused on minimum values as well as peak velocities.

In summary, the findings of the present study show the importance of referring the mean mechanical values to the propulsive phase of a lift rather than to the whole concentric portion of the movement, especially when assessing strength and muscle power using light and medium loads. We advocate for the preferential use of mean propulsive parameters since they seem to be a better indicative of an individual’s true neuromuscular potential. (Sanchez-Medina et al.)

The Spanish studies usually showcase higher rep ranges and this is why MPV is great for light or medium loads, but the study on strength assessment and the propulsive phase explains the pattern of how braking becomes less involved with heavier loads. Looking at MPV with high repetition strength exercises (10 reps or higher) is very limited, but could be something used with jump squats according to Loturco and colleagues.

Since jump squats technically require one’s entire body mass (including weight) to be displaced in the air, takeoff velocity and peak velocity can be confused. I have not seen how using an optimum power load is superior to a comprehensive program that holistically increases maximum strength and RFD concurrently, but the study authors make an interesting suggestion. Perhaps the newer metrics are not the end game in VBT but rather a hint that we still have a lot to explore and should measure as much as sanely possible to uncover what is driving what in sport performance.

Juggling Multiple Variables for Full Analysis of Barbell Performance

Bryan Mann’s book on VBT (Elitefts.com) outlines velocities of successive zones to create guidance within those zones. Mean and peak velocity are the two pillars to American coaches in general because of the Tendo system. But those are training metrics, not planning numbers. The purpose of the article was to ensure that the workouts performed meet the expectations of the exercises, not replace designing a good workout program.

Force, power, velocity, and even displacement are extremely useful variables but most coaches are familiar with the speed zones, and that is fine. If athletes perform the exercises in the vicinity of the intended velocities, the training plan has a chance. Force and power—be they peak or mean—have less connection to coaches because most relate to total weight on the bar, and speeds ranging from .3 to 2.2 meters per second. Coaches know when the weight is heavy, and athletes are battling in a squat, and when athletes are snatching fast when the reading is above 2.0 or similar. Barbell speed tracking is comfortable, but bar velocity is very much in exile unless the coach has other contextual numbers.

Here are some takeaway suggestions I have struggled with so you don’t have to waste time:

• Measure body composition as much as possible. Strength and any other ratios to bodyweight are never as valuable as getting the contributions of lean mass as well. Two 75-kilo athletes may perform similarly but succeed much differently. I like the direction of the concept of bodyweight percentage that Sparta shared in the article from Bryce, but they are only the middle point. Many athletes can squat 2 times bodyweight or snatch their bodyweight, but no magic coefficient shows up to explain why some outperform others with speed and jumping.
• Never isolate power numbers if conditioning matters in your sport. So many athletes look great in combine testing but for some reason struggle when aerobic factors are mixed in. Don’t compromise too much and learn how to balance both so performance is maximized on both ends. Conditioning or displacement rates in field tests should be combined with body mass and stature measurements. It’s fine to test speed and power separately, but watch how power fluctuates when practice and/or conditioning are added.
• Most coaches ignore power and force metrics, but it’s important to add those scores to the database of training records. Peak and mean values add more landmarks to what is going on, especially when the lift displacements are accurate. Instead of tossing the numbers out, watch how they trend over time. RFD, time to peak, and other metrics will give immediate and long-term guidance if analyzed and interpreted correctly.
• Again, make sure to perform speed and other field tests. If you have more weight training metrics than speed metrics, rethink the purpose of your training. I am amazed how many coaches will inventory massive lists of barbell outputs but barely hand-time sprints—if at all. I suggest making sure you record other field tests in jump performances with vertical and horizontal movements. The wider the range of tests, the less likely bias or style will hurt your program. Most coaches with distinct styles who showcase their programs are least likely to succeed because they should be reflecting athlete needs. If a colleague can read your workouts and easily see your fingerprints, it’s likely you are lost internally with a philosophy rather than what your athletes are showing physically.

Suggested Reading

If you don’t own Paavo Komi’s classic Strength and Power in Sport, I highly recommend getting it. Other texts such as Strength and Conditioning: Biological Principles and Practical Applications and Neuromechanics of Human Movement are gold as well.

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By Dominique Stasulli

Given the inconclusive evidence surrounding the use of caffeine as a performance-enhancing supplement and the significant metabolic consequences on glucose disposal in a sedentary state, athletes should use caution and consume caffeine in moderation.

Researchers continue to study caffeine, which is allowed by the NCAA and US Olympic Committee, to determine its enhancement effects on athletic performance in training and competition. Caffeine is rapidly absorbed by the body within five to fifteen minutes of ingestion. Peak levels in the blood occur between forty and eighty minutes, making it ideal for immediate training benefit (Spriet, 2014). With a half-life of three to five hours, caffeine’s effects can last for the better part of a day.

Low doses of caffeine, 3mg/kg body weight or less, improve vigilance, alertness, mood, and cognitive abilities without negative side effects (Spriet, 2014). Higher doses often result in gastrointestinal upset, dizziness, nervousness, insomnia, confusion, tachycardia (rapid heart rate), and the inability to focus (Spriet, 2014).

Endurance Exercise

The first dose-response study, performed in 1995, involved a cycling time trial performance test. Cyclists ingested 3, 6, and 9mg/kg of caffeine sixty minutes before the time trial (Spriet, 2014). The cyclists who took the 3 and 6mg/kg doses showed a 22% increase in time trial performance while the high-dose group demonstrated only an 11% non-significant increase (Spriet, 2014).

Another study, where well-trained cyclists ingested low-dose caffeine late in an endurance race, showed that both 1.5 and 3mg/kg were ergogenic when ingested late in an exhaustive ride (Spriet, 2014). Caffeine intake pre-workout showed 4.2% and 2.9% improvement in cycling performance when 3 and 6mg/kg were consumed, respectively, indicating a decrease in dose-response efficacy similar to the first two studies mentioned (Spriet, 2014).

In running performance, the evidence is a bit less consistent. Some researchers found that 150-200mg of caffeine improved 1500m performance by 4.2s in well-trained males, whereas another study involving a longer distance event (3 x 18km in 8 days) showed no performance effect of low-dose (90mg or ~1.3mg/kg) (Spriet, 2014). In an 8K time trial involving well-trained male runners, a 24-second, or 1.8%, improvement was observed with 3mg/kg caffeine ingested sixty minutes before the event (Spriet, 2014). An average of 3.6% performance improvement across multiple endurance sports was collected from studies with ingestion amounts ranging from a 2-5mg/kg (mean = 3% enhancement) and >5mg/kg loading dose (mean = 7% enhancement) (Shearer & Graham, 2014).

Anaerobic Exercise

In power-based sports requiring short, anaerobic bursts of activity, the evidence of caffeine’s ergogenic effect on performance is conflicting. An increasing number of studies have been published involving HIIT training, resistance training, and force-production activity. Studies observed improvements in peak power (Wingate test) and absolute strength when consuming 5 and 7mg/kg body mass, respectively.

Few studies exist on the effect of low-dose supplementation (Spriet, 2014). One study by Lorino, Lloyd, Crixell, and Walker (2006) examined caffeine’s effect on agility performance in the Proagility run and 30-second Wingate test. Sixteen recreationally active males, who were in a two-hour fasted state, received a dose of 3mg/kg of body weight an hour before testing (Lorino et al., 2006). Researchers based the dosage on the midpoint of the commonly tested range of 3-9mg/kg bodyweight (Lorino et al., 2006). There was no significant change in peak power, mean power, percent power decrease, and proagility performance (Lorino et al., 2006). The study concluded that caffeine ingested at this dosage did not enhance performance in recreationally active males, but that the results could not be extrapolated to anaerobically trained athletes (Lorino et al., 2006).

Metabolic Effects

Popular theory states that caffeine produces positive effects on fatty acid metabolism and carbohydrate utilization in the tissue, but these metabolic changes are unlikely to occur in exercise lasting less than thirty to forty minutes (Shearer & Graham, 2014). The mechanism by which caffeine affects skeletal muscle metabolism involves its interaction with ryanodine calcium receptors. Specifically, caffeine augments the release of intracellular calcium for increased force production and the shortening of muscle fiber (Shearer & Graham, 2014). Of course, the positive effects are extremely time- and temperature-sensitive and largely dependent on fiber type due to the differences in calcium kinetics, with a greater benefit in slow-twitch than fast-twitch fibers (Shearer & Graham, 2014).

Caffeine’s use as a performance-enhancing supplement should be carefully restricted to athletes. The consumption of caffeine and caffeinated beverages has significant metabolic consequences on glucose disposal in a sedentary state (Shearer & Graham, 2014). Administering caffeine before a glucose tolerance test or an insulin clamp (the gold standard for measuring insulin resistance) resulted in a 30% disposal rate in both tests, creating a hyperinsulinemic and hyperlipidemic state of metabolism (Shearer & Graham, 2014). This means that less than one-third of the glucose is taken up into the cells, and even less makes it to skeletal muscle for glycogen storage (Shearer & Graham, 2014).

Given the half-life of caffeine, its effects on insulin resistance may last through several meals of the day. The consequences of this have implications in the development and progression of chronic diseases, even in previously healthy individuals (Shearer & Graham, 2014). An analysis of healthy subjects showed that caffeine impairs glucose uptake by 26% (Shearer & Graham, 2014). Importantly, a decrease in insulin sensitivity under similar testing conditions was not improved with exercise in another experimental study (Shearer & Graham, 2014). Because caffeine’s benefits are not conclusively supported, from the standpoint of both performance and metabolic physiology, athletes should take caution and supplement with caffeine in moderation.

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References

Spiret, L. L. (2014). “Exercise and sport performance with low doses of caffeine.” Sports Medicine. 44(Suppl 2) (2014): S175-S184.

Lorino, A. J., L. K. Lloyd, S. H. Crixell, and J.L. Walker. “The effects of caffeine and athletic agility.” Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research. 20(4) (2016): 851-854.

Shearer, J., and T. E. Graham. “Performance effects and metabolic consequences of caffeine and caffeinated energy drink consumption on glucose disposal.” Nutrition Reviews. 72(S1) (2014): 121-136.

By Carl Valle

When I saw the 1080 Sprint on video, I wanted to be among the first to test it. For many years, swimming performance was reduced to splits in races, and now the future is maximizing swimming velocity with smarter approaches and using the right technology.

Figure 1. 1080 Sprint at pool side.

Time for a change from Pace clocks

I love pace clocks. They formed the backbone of swim training for decades. I see some today that are older than I am and still function perfectly. Every time I am in the pool they remind me how efficient coaching swimming is because everyone is synchronized to the near second. Pace clocks are perfect for intervals but they are not the end game. The problem with pace clocks, though, is that they show time but don’t get time. A pace clock is often used to eyeball a split in training, or coaches do a half-hearted time trial with a one-off hand-time measurement with a stopwatch. In order for the sport to improve, innovation is going to come from having a better reading on problems and challenges of improving mean swimming velocity, not just if an athlete is making the workout intervals.

More Precision, More Possibilities

Coaches ask me about the key benefit of moving from interval timing, or send-off times with pace clocks, to getting velocities. The answer is precision. When training, athletes and coaches want improvements in mean swimming velocity, not just an indication they are “making the times” or even getting a time. The main point of this article is to value mean velocity, measure it, and then improve it. Just getting the total duration of the swim distance isn’t going to work anymore.

An increase in mean velocity is about training better, not about race analysis. I will review the differences later. The different phases of the race make mean velocity inappropriate for evaluation, but it does matter for global or raw training, day in and day out. For the sake of simplicity, I will focus on the core of swimming: the ability to maneuver above the water in a more efficient and effective way.

The ability to time each length to fractions of a second opens doors to countless opportunities. By adding heart rate or physiological effort, even a simple workout now gives information that in the past was too much of a burden to worry about. Coaches and athletes can get valuable insights into training—far more than just a random assessment—and every interval is now captured.

History of Velocity Concepts and Swimming

Figure 2. In 1985 Bill Boomer was already focusing on body velocity with his his educational resources, and really got people thinking about improving swimming speed with stroke characteristics.

History, if properly documented and recorded, is part of the proxy to truth like science. After using the video camera become widespread, history became more and more real because it could document what others could not be present to see.

In swimming, important history lies in the American Swim Coaches Association (ASCA) World Books. They provide my favorite reading because they are transcribed manuals of presentations from some of the masters. I say this over and over: to become a better coach, buy a few their world books and expand your knowledge. For 50 years, ASCA has made coaching a true art form with science as a beacon of light.

In 1985, pioneering swim coach Bill Boomer presented velocity concepts. He did an amazing job of getting everyone exposed to the underlying factors of distance per stroke and cycle count. Swimming is more technique and artificial compared to sprinting, an event that is very reflexive. He showed how teaching and training improve mean velocity. In 1995, ten years after Bill’s presentation, my thoughts started migrating to body speed, since most measurements are about rate, not total times. It wasn’t until 2000 that I actually used velocities in training after seeing Inge de Bruijn dominate the Olympics.

Parametrix Race Analysis and Software

Figure 3. This chart of former world record holder Inge de Bruijn was instrumental to me to think smarter about metrics that were root causes of surface level analysis.

After the 2000 Olympics, a few smart coaches started talking about race evaluation beyond splits. Soon race modeling became far more powerful with software that could measure the metrics behind the race. Instead of looking at splits every 50m, the new normal was looking at details such as how they swam every length versus what they swam velocity wise. I was coaching both high school swimming and track and wanted something that could help me get into root speed development versus just conditioning athletes with “hard workouts”.

My assistant, a genius in business intelligence and deep knowledge of sport, started pushing me to see more granularity behind why some people are fast and what can be done with their slower counterparts. My assistant to this day is my biggest influence when an innovation drought occurs and I need growth in areas most are not even aware of. His mantra of always breaking new ground when the rest feel like they reached pay dirt or rock bottom is my new guiding principle. Dig deeper.

The early 2000s was a perfect evolutionary caldron of brains and ideas that produced some state and school records over a 10-year span. I wasn’t so much of a coaching mind but was clever enough to find innovation outside my own limited abilities. My core belief with long-term development is the following:

Many athletes get better from any training with just time alone, but the name of the game is knowing the best way to maximize the probability of having athletes reach their full potential.

I have been gifted with talented kids who got better because they got older and didn’t get hurt along the way, but that is a waiting game, not coaching. I am not too big to admit that winning the genetic lottery a few times and that attracted more talent, but getting better is getting grounded truth or deep insight.

As sport science moved from the 1990s to the early 2000s, so did the rise of data in sport. Moneyball was part of the evolution, not its cause. Since the dawn of time, recordkeeping—be it tally marks on a bone or the best database in the Australian Institute of Sport—data and analysis have always been there. Coaches must know that the human element is a starting point, not something to be proud of.

Current Swimming Performance Methodology and Evaluation

As we approach the 2016 Rio Olympics, the margins among swimmers internationally are narrowing. Every inhabited continent is now a player, and the US and Australia are not the only powerhouses. After a disappointing 2015, the US needs a wake-up call. Some are saying that the results were a fluke, or that people are waiting for 2016. Time will tell, but the truth is that US swimming needs to innovate or find itself—like the early 1990s—in a period of transition.

With Europe using better swimming technology than the US and most of North America, the consumer sports tech is throwing a hat into the equation with data and sport science. Coaches must start doing the following:

• Gather novel data that is valid, precise, and accurate
• Create key performance indicators for their athletes
• Create benchmarks and milestones for their program
• Monitor and manage training daily and weekly
• Evaluate the training system annually

Many possible avenues coaches can take, but a straightforward and more probable approach is to assess velocity components. A smart perspective in modeling is measuring simple qualities and see what can be done to improve the components, and see if the transfer happens when athletes are racing and training.

What the 1080 Sprint Measures and What it Trains

Several coaches asked in swimming if the 1080 Sprint could be used for aquatic sports, and the news was clear. The overspeed and resistance of their speed trainer is not thing new, but the real evolution was the concurrent sampling of stroke-by-stroke data live during training. In the past giant elastic cords or old selectorized weight stacks would create assistance and resistance, now a high precision motor could dial up to any velocity one needs. While buckets and other options have been around for decades, coaches are looking for “precision medicine” and not dated solutions. Simply summarized the 1080 Sprint offers the following training benefits:

Resistance Loading — Most coaches are comfortable adding drag or resisted load in swimming. Just like coaches on land adding resistance to sprints, swimming has always been about the dichotomy of adding resistance and increasing efficiency. The unique and differentiating aspect of the 1080 is the smooth resistance can be variable during the swim and instantly change from a tablet. Those doing rep after rep sprints can throttle up or down the resistance to fine tune the training stimulus.

Assisted Pacing — A less commonly known benefit is going at a high velocity with a lowered effort to learn rhythm and relaxation at demanding speeds. The velocity is not faster than normal, it’s just fast but easier than normal and this can be an opportunity for some intriguing motor learning changes.

Overspeed Options — Some interesting theories exist with greater than volitional speeds and how that transfers without the assisted towing, but the reality is we don’t know the exact science behind it. Anyone with enough towing force can swim faster than world record pace, so the true winning formula is to see why less than world beating swimmers are not hitting specific velocity. Many near elite swimming athletes may learn to accommodate the speed by exposure, but the key is that the coach must decide this process with care and experimentation.

In addition to the training features, the 1080 Sprint system is a mini-sports lab, designed to be very practical and extremely portable. While training the athletes, data from every surge or propulsive stroke is captured with tension sensors to collect the essential (and elusive) power readings. Coaches are always tinkering with stroke technique, and the idea is to see how power surges can create a mean velocity that is higher and more efficient for races.

At this point some coaches are already ahead of the curve and have the advantage of what is possible, but expect a Cambrian explosion soon as the instrument grows in adoption.

Modeling and Improving Velocities with the 1080 Sprint

Table 1. The swimming research is always interesting and enlightening when they present underlying performance data. Note the focus meters per second, and not splits. In this study the researchers looked at the four strokes in the 200m and analyzed their walls and free swimming velocity to extract patterns in performance. (Source Veiga 2015)

Distance and sprint swimmers, serious triathletes, and recreational fitness enthusiasts can learn a lot about the relationship between velocity and the physiological response from the strain of it. Using time, distance, and cardiovascular response are a direct way to get answers to basic questions. I’ve already discussed modeling in an earlier blog, so I will be brief here.

Coaches need to know how quickly swimmers can reach maximal speed above the water and how to conserve it over time. Some are blessed with faster speeds, some with better endurance, and both can be improved with better swimming practices.

Michael Phelps is probably the best example of long-term development. Since he was a child, he has worked with the same coach. The combination of his innate talents and consistent coaching direction from his coach explains why he is the most decorated Olympian.

No one may ever replicate those feats, but we need to do things a bit better by obtaining pertinent information. If you ask your average swim coaches how fast their swimmers are, most rattle off an event time. Down the road I think people will get velocities and show how they are improving both the peak and mean outputs.

A simple step of knowing basic peak and mean velocities, along with the counterpart heart rate metrics, can go a long way. Familiar workouts with the same speed but higher effort hint at fatigue, so decide if you are pushing for deeper adaptations. Lower velocities with higher efforts can mean overreaching. Chronic poor velocities and inability to bring about effort could reflect overtraining.

Kick Velocity and Upper-body Contributions in Sprint Freestyle

An article by Hall of Famer Gary Hall Sr. about baseline kicking speed and swimming performance captivated me. Since Olympic champions Alex Popov and Michael Phelps can kick 27 seconds or faster in 50m, the anatomical and genetic gifts that make superior kicking are interesting. Underwater kicking is faster than above-water swimming on average—hence the rule change—but the relative contributions of the upper body and lower body are somewhat murky.

Many theories and ideas have been expressed with regards to improving kicking, but time and talent represent most of the equation. Some changes are possible with ankle range going beyond 90 degrees of plantar flexion, but I don’t know any good clinical studies that discuss whether manipulating this joint is good or bad in the long run. The USOC has a lot of this information, and a great resource is Dr. Nabhan who is arguably a secret weapon in Olympic sport. Some areas of the body, like the knee, don’t change from any intervention period, but all of this is still early.

A good protocol is to test kicking speed in a long course since the push off from walls taints the scores. This test should gauge how swimmers are improving. If they don’t improve kicking velocity over a career, how are they getting better? If you don’t know absolute kicking metrics, why are we focused on volume as a way to improve faster velocities? Upper-body power and the resulting speed should be manifest with adding speed to a great kick. Some athletes have had average kicks and amazing performances, but the requirements in the upper body can contribute to added speed only to a point. Both qualities are necessary to reach ultimate performance and the research isn’t very conclusive on how the great ones put every thing together.

The raw upper-body contribution can be calculated by getting the entire swim speed and seeing the contribution, and getting basic weight performances. I have seen a variety of swimming devices attempt to get power, but speed is the ultimate goal and getting meters per second on both kicking, and total body swimming is far more valid. Swimming needs to add resistance (drag, not weight room training) to get more propulsion. It’s a Catch-22. Upper-body mechanics has been always an educated guess of why things work and why things don’t change, and much of the science is hard to measure without some heavy math. The solution is measuring what can be done in practice and creating models by looking at all of contributing variables and structuring metrics that should be feeding higher speeds.

Merging Velocity Training and Conventional Interval Training

Figure 4. 1080 Sprint with 90 meter cable attached to swimmer.

Jumping away from the traditional approach of distances and rest periods is not going to happen, and isn’t necessary. Velocity metrics adds granularity and clarity, meaning the data is more detailed and more insightful. Someone able to complete 20x100m on a typical send-off is helpful, as it’s likely the entire lane can do the session, but it’s better to know how they are making the interval. An athlete making an honest effort and pushing hard may start out fast and slow down during each send-off. An athlete may game the interval and go just fast enough to get a 5-second rest. What is important is that coaches get velocities and time intervals since small changes in speed are hard to eyeball, and intervals are going to be able to tease out the information requested.

A good perspective is to look at year-versus-career on core metrics like kick velocity, maximal short speed velocity, decay rates, and recovery indices. I have already explained kicking speed and maximal race speeds so I will get into the decay of speed, pacing, recovery, and adaption.

Managing Velocity and Decay Rates

Stamina is a little vague, as most people think about the duration of work versus conservation of speed. Most endurance athletes can’t achieve sprint speeds because they are not designed genetically to do so. Their training isn’t about achieving maximal speed, but maximal mean velocity instead. While strategy with a kick at the end is pacing and racing, endurance events involve a conditioning strategy. Even the 50m requires conditioning, so every event needs to conserve a percentage of someone’s speed.

An example in track is the 400m and mile (1600m for convenience). An athlete who runs 50 point-something in the 400 and holds 85% speed for four laps is much more interesting than one who runs 49.5 and holds 80%. Holding 95% of 60 seconds isn’t helpful unless you are trying to run for hours. Swimming works similarly. How fast can someone swim and how much speed can they hold, based on longer distances?

What makes this more complicated is the obvious need to know how much resources are being put into getting faster presently and in the long run, and how much into holding the existing velocity. Using velocity concepts is a management of decay and trying to find a combination that works both acutely and in the long run. Several past endurance swimmers had lousy strokes because they could get away with their superior fitness. Sloppy mechanics is nearly obsolete now because everyone has the ability for maximal conditioning.

Getting Started Means Getting Measured and Profiled

Coaches need to dive in and test one athlete with the 1080 Sprint before moving toward the entire team. Adding a few hours a year in number-crunching means the difference between making the finals versus being on the podium. I have used this approach in sprinting on land with similar success. Every athlete has improved by being aware of what matters: improving velocity.

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By Chris Korfist

In this world of Instagram, YouTube, and all other media that show us how to do something, we strive to get our athletes to look the part. Sometimes, however, it’s better to understand your athlete’s individual challenges than to force them to look like the picture you’ve seen on the Internet or Twitter.

Case in point is my junior sprinter who was fourth in the state of Illinois for the class of 2A in the 100m Dash. I have been haunted by a picture of him in the finals on his second step of the race.

Figure 1. 100m Dash Finals. Photo by Tony Holler.

My sprinter had a habit of picking his head up in his start. More specifically, he looked at the gun when it fired and then he stood and ran. In this case, it cost him a step in the finals of a race where athletes cannot afford to give up a step.

Video 1. Losing a step in the start.

I decided to spend the summer and winter working on his start (I lose him in the fall to football) after studying perfect starts on Altis.world and reading that, if an athlete can’t get the start of the race correct, he can’t finish properly. My sprinter studied video on YouTube and ALTIS, and we tried to break down his starts to perfect the technique; to look perfect.

To check if he increased speed, I placed timers at 5, 10, 20, 30 and 40m. I also filmed his starts to see how his technique looked and to match starts with times.

To train to the perfect position, I suspended his body with jump stretch bands so he could get used to moving into position by unweighting his torso without feeling the urge to break at the waist. Then we went out and drilled.

As his position started to look better, his times did not improve; they stayed about the same. But he looked like he was supposed to look. Once he mastered the move, he cut his speed to sub 3.9 30’s in flats in a hallway. He was moving for a 16-year-old athlete. (I’m sure the 1080 Sprint had a lot to do with his drop).

In the finals of his first meet after beginning the training, at Plainfield North Invitational, my sprinter heard the bang, looked up to find the gun, stood up, and ran just like he did before the new training. The guy who beat him already had a step on him at this point–the first step of the race. It didn’t help that he pulled up early as well. In practice, someone says “set go” or “go,” there is no gunshot. We learned it was the intensity of a meet or the bang from a gun that seems to instantly change him neurologically.

My job as a coach is to make decisions to position my athletes to accomplish their goals. My sprinter’s goal was to not lose, and I tried to force him to be something that he was not. So we made more changes.

First, I broke out my old FinishLynx ReacTime. It measures power output and reaction time from the blocks. With the ALTIS start, my sprinter’s reaction time was over 0.23 (under 0.15 is good) and his power was low. The ReacTime also plays a recording of a gun going off. Because I couldn’t neurologically stop him from “peeking,” I tried to activate him in positions of power and positions of transition. I activated his vision, which was weak when he looked up, by training him with colored glasses.

Eventually, I ran out of bullets and used that to our advantage and went Ben Johnson, but without the drugs. We pulled his blocks back and let him look up at the gun. This eliminated his desire to snap his head up and pop up or stand.

What happened? In practice, he reduced his reaction time to 0.15. His power in the blocks skyrocketed from 3400 to 27000. What happened in his next race? He ran 6.88 in the 60, FAT. The previous week, he was 6.2 in the 55, handheld.

Figure 2. Sprinter looking at start gun.

For three hours, he was the fastest man in Illinois, until another athlete ran a 6.85 somewhere in Southern Illinois.

While a photo perfect start may be great, sometimes you have to go with what you have. The body’s immediate reaction is to protect and defend. My sprinter was a very visual person and I took that away from him, subconsciously placing him in a fight or flight mode which delayed reaction time and decreased power output and relaxation.

Although I would love to have picture perfect starts with my athlete, I think he liked winning a little bit better.

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By Roger White

Imagine your first day of practice. More than a foot of snow on your track and temperatures below 30. You have 3 weeks to prepare for your first meet, and likely won’t even see the track for the first week. You pray for warm weather and it finally arrives. The snow melts and now you have less than 10 practice days to get your team ready. Who do you put in the relays? What order? What takeoff marks will they use? This is the situation nearly every high school coach in the northern US faces, including me here in Metro Detroit.

In 2012, I had a great group of boys, all juniors, who had shown the potential to do big things. In previous years, when it came time for relay handoffs, I backed a kid up a distance that “looked” right, told the outgoing runner where to start and made a takeoff mark, and used trial and error to determine what worked. Sometimes it quickly came together, other times we needed dozens of exchanges. Being particular about training and taking into consideration how many fast runs kids can do in a given practice, this lack of consistency irritated me. I’d often stop a session if the marks were not correct because the runners had already done half a dozen attempts.

I tweeted a US 4×100 member about how he figured out steps on short notice (I believe right after a relay in Monaco). He replied something to the effect of just knowing where to stand and when to go. I felt there had to be a better way, but what? And what happens if someone gets hurt and I need to either change the order or substitute another guy? This would require additional practice and additional fast runs that might—or might not—be helpful. Also, when our team attends weekend relay meets with odd distance combinations, we have to practice all those different exchanges too.

That 2012 season ended with my juniors missing state finals qualifying by a few tenths of a second in both the 4×100 and 4×200. I was ready to figure something out to get them there the next season.

Help from the GDR

In the off-season, I always read new books and re-read old ones. One of my all-time favorites is Track and Field: Athletics Training in the G.D.R. (East Germany) by chief editor Gerhardt Schmolinsky. Schmolinsky was the best hurdler of the newborn GDR during the 50s. He later became one of the leaders in sport education. The chapter on relays included a table to determine relay takeoff marks. Maybe the scarcity of training information from the DDR made it exciting, I’m not sure, but it was the best I had my hands on. So I decided to give the table a try.

Figure 1. Track and Field: Athletics Training in GDR

The book credits the table to Tom Ecker in Der Leichtathletik, no 13, 1969. (I consulted Pierre-Jean Vazel for assistance, given his incredible knowledge of the history of track and field.) Der Leichtathletik was the official GDR track and field magazine. It included two pages of one or two articles about training, usually German translations of foreign papers. Ecker was the coach at Western Kentucky University and also a successful writer.

In the 60s, he was a part of the American Specialist Program, doing clinics in Finland, Sweden, and Iceland. He impressed the Swedes, who later named him national team coach. He went on to write Basic Track and Field Biomechanics. In a conversation with Coach Ecker regarding relays, he felt the fastest runners should go first and the slower ones last to take advantage of the free distance in the first leg and the shorter anchor distance in the anchor leg. In the book, he adds that consideration should also be given to those who are great starters and curve runners.

Figure 2. Basic Track and Field Biomechanics

The table in the GDR book was part of Ecker’s formula for calculating the “go distance.” His formula showed takeoff distances based on the incoming runner’s last 25m speed (A) and the outgoing runner’s 26m acceleration time (B). From those times, a go distance (G) could be marked and used for 4x100m relay exchanges.

The Ecker equation for aggressive exchanges is

G = 75(B – A) / A

For safe exchanges, 75 becomes 60, B is 21m, and A is 20m.

G = 60(B – A) / A

How did I use these tables?

I teach math and anything number-related excites me. Early in the season every year, I do time trials of 30m, 60m, and 80m (I don’t like timing actual race distances, as some kids freak out when times aren’t near their race performances). I decided to use the data from these runs, find the table values, and see what happened in our first relay practice. I know studying elite athlete training theory and applying it to high school kids can be tricky. I knew there had to be some factor to account for in these numbers. So I timed the first 26m of their 30m and the last 25m of their 80m.

Originally I used hand times. Here is how things worked out. Runner “E” ran a 3.25 26m and a 2.63 25m fly time. Runner “A” ran 3.22 and 2.53. “A” handed to “E,” so I took A’s 2.53 seconds and E’s 3.25 seconds, added .24 for the hand-time factor, and that gave me 2.77 and 3.49 (rounded to 2.8 and 3.5 on the table). That gives a go distance of 6.3m (20.66 feet, or 22 shoe counts). I now use a Freelap timing system, so data is very easy to collect during these trials.

In practice for baton passes, I start the incoming runner approximately 30-40 meters away, as I feel this resembles the speed toward the end of the leg based on some hypothetical velocity curves. On our first attempt, timing was pretty much dead on in the exchange at full sprint and full reach. This worked for the other runners as well. Our kids started at the back of the acceleration zone, used the full 10 meters to accelerate into the exchange zone, and the exchange took place in the middle of the zone (after about a 20-meter sprint by the outgoing runner.)

Sometimes in the season, we run in relay-type meets that combine odd distances are run together. Often there are 100-100 exchanges and interchanging guys is relatively easy using these marks. Once the meets get going, I still use these original time trial times because I don’t have to re-run a guy or continue to update marks.It gets me within 1-2 shoes using the full zone, and that is what I’m after in exchanges—get the kids running as fast as they can with a nice reach to exchange the baton.

Since utilizing this formula, my kids have broken three school records (both boys’ relays, and girls’ 4×200). Our boys recorded the fastest 400 meter relay time in county history, the first team under 43 seconds. In preparation for big-meet environments, we practice exchanges while other kids run next to each other in other lanes at various speeds to combat the chaos of the race and pressure of all the fast teams. For example, we practice situations with other runners in front of us to simulate being behind and not wanting to take off too soon in a panic.

What about the tables for 4×200?

I have used the equations for the 4×200 as well. In races, I record each runner’s last 20 meters using video software. I find a place near one exchange zone and have another coach/athlete stand at the other side and we get video of the exchanges. Using the 20-meter mark is often easy because of the existing relay marks on the track. Since it’s easier to get the outgoing times, we time those in practice. With both numbers now calculated, I determine precise go distances and rehearse them in practice.

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By Rohsaan Griffin

Planning a long-range training scheme is a complex task involving multiple layers of progressions, plans, and contingencies. When considered carefully, long range plans can serve as blueprints to mold and direct athletic potential, similar to a roadmap to provide direction between a start and end point. The exact route and speed of travel, however, is something we must be prepared to adjust along the way.

This is the art of coaching. We create the blueprint, or roadmap, while using our judgment to make adjustments to maximize the athlete’s chance to reach planned goals. Nothing is set in stone so firmly that we can project future development of a human being with 100% accuracy.

Figure 1. ALTIS Coach Rohsaan Griffin

From my perspective, we have three key objectives when thinking about a plan:

1. Preparation for optimal improvement and performance
2. Preparation for a competition peak
3. Preparation for the major competition within that peak

There are many possible approaches that could achieve these three outcomes, but I believe we need to be very intrinsic with our approach. In other words, keep everything very related and specific to the goal we are trying to achieve. There is no room for nonessential elements in any training program.

Many coaches, however, believe they must build a base into the training process. This results in lost months of specific skill training. When following these paradigms, are coaches are using common sense in the training process or are they blinded by “book sense”? Too many coaches are married to the paper in this respect. We have to plan our work and work our plan. If something isn’t working well, plan B or plan C should be implemented. We should not only collect the greatest training logs and articles written and try to liberally apply them out of context and think they’re going to work for an individual athlete.

Coaches should tailor training plans unique to each individual with progressions and contingencies.
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During my time as a competitor some years ago, I was part of one of the greatest training groups ever assembled. It included Donovan Bailey, Obadele Thompson, Bruny Surin, Glenroy Gilbert, Kareem Streete-Thompson, Donovan Powell, Vincent Henderson, and myself. On any given day, each of us trained differently because each of us was catered to individually. I firmly believe a coach should plan this way. Whitewashing a one size fits all plan onto athletes, just because they are training for the same event, is not logical.

Instead, I suggest that plan individualization should be based on the following:

1. Analysis of the previous year
2. Preparing the body for the imposed training demands
3. Global body conditioning using strength, mobility, and endurance
4. Modification or consolidation of technique

First, an analysis of the previous year’s performances is critical. This allows us to gauge which elements should remain and which should be removed from the proposed year’s training plan. Since my current group of athletes began their training, I have both added and taken away from their training loads and training menus. This rolling fluctuation occurs because their stages of development have changed. In the two-and-a-half years I’ve been coaching in China, our training has evolved immensely as mastery of landmark skillsets occur.

Second, getting an athlete fit to train at the required intensity is one of the most important factors in the process. And rightly so for many reasons, including the impact on injury prevention. As coaches, we must be both cognizant and respectful of individual timelines rather than blindly push the limits of getting them “there” faster. This process has a very delicate tipping point, and mismanagement and overtraining can lead to unsatisfactory outcomes.

If an athlete is not hitting the times required in training, either adjust the time or adjust the rest interval. If the athlete is laid out on the track after the workout because we did not see indications of an immediate downward spiral during the session, we’ve lost on both ends. We haven’t achieved the objectives of the day’s training and we’ve destroyed the chances of having more productive workouts during the remainder of the week.

Third, considering the body’s conditioning and strengthening in its totality is very important. We can’t overemphasize the training of one group of muscles and neglect the others. A well thought out approach should include every major muscle group in a manner that’s specific to the event’s demands.

When I first arrived in China for ALTIS, I was abruptly thrown into a situation where I had to evaluate a new group of athletes. I had not selected or recruited them. They came from many different groups, bringing with them varying skill sets and exposure to a multitude of coaching philosophies. Needless to say, I had to start from ground zero. My first priority was to start with the most basic, generic training protocols possible so I could determine each athlete’s skill sets and deficiencies.

For example in China, they live and die by the squat, but that’s all they can do. Moreover, poor technical form in the lift often bleeds over to poor posture and form on the track. This leads to injury over the long run. My approach to developing global conditioning is very different. I started the athletes with simple explosive movements such as box jumps, standing bounds, medicine ball throws, kettlebell squats, goblet squats, and hurdle hops for two solid years. This fall was the first time any of my athletes put a bar on their back, and I’m proud to say they remained injury free. They were also much stronger than their counterparts who spent the last two years squatting.

Figure 2. ALTIS Coach Rohsaan Griffin training athletes in China.

Technique, another essential element, requires monitoring and adaptation to maximize performance potential. It’s as essential in the weight room as it is on the track. Poor form in any exercise infects other movement patterns, leading to poor habits, substandard performance, and increased incidences of injury.

I am very particular about this because of my personal experience. I was mentored and trained by coaches with an incredible eye who learned to dissect movement to its most intricate level. We have to be careful to not overcoach and over cue in our quest for movement utopia. The true sign of a great coach is that all of their athletes look essentially the same while running. There will be slight variations, but overall, they look the same.

Three coaches who I highly regard are Tom Tellez, Dan Pfaff, and John Smith. Every athlete coached by these guys looked technically the same. They were clones of each other with different ability levels. The athletes’ movement expression demonstrated a clear coaching system.

How do we get athletes to do this? We can’t just be the coach with the watch that says “Go run” and expect things to magically fall into place. It won’t happen. If it takes breaking down the simplest movement and drilling it repeatedly every day until we see a change, then do so. Once that movement is mastered, move to the next deficiency and work that. Never try to fix everything at once. When a few things click at the same time, mesh them together and reevaluate what’s next.

Finally, the plan must include competition specific conditioning. This is totally different from the general training regimen. In this phase, we have to train for a competitive peak and make any necessary last minute adjustments. After all is said and done, we debrief our athlete, implement an active rest and recovery plan, and start the process again for the following year.

Unfortunately, many coaches don’t treat athletes as individuals and assume they can train every athlete the same. Nothing is further from the truth. Think outside that little piece of paper, don’t get married to the plan, and make time to look up and see the people behind the paper.

Follow these guidelines when you’re planning the training, and I’m certain you will find success along the way.

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