Speed Training Questions

Here are the questions:

"I really enjoy reading your training tips. However all of the articles pertain to the younger athletes. What about us old guys who still compete at one level or another. How do we get faster? I have tried some of the techniques you have listed in previous articles and all I do is hurt myself no matter how warmed up I am. I am not a weekend warrior. I bike, run two miles a couple of times a week and I lift three times a week.

What type of speed training should someone in their fifties do? Right now I am running a 7 second 40 - pretty pathetic. In my prime it was sub 5 seconds, not fast but a heck of a lot faster than I am now. I would like to cut a second off of my current time. Any ideas?"
- Dan R.

Dan
Training principles still fundamentally apply to a 50 year oldas they do to a 22 or 12 year old simply because all of thetraining concepts we go over are based soundly on science.

The key, then, is to know your own strengths and weaknessesand modify your workouts accordingly. Older athletes maynot have the same range of motion, ability to workout forextended periods of time or may have back, knee, shoulder problems that limit the types of activities they can perform.

That may mean you can't deadlift heavy weights any more evenif it's a fundamental strength building exercise. However, I see no reason that you would get injured from doing a speedworkout unless you were trying to do too many reps. Perhaps you need to be more active during the rest period to prevent tightening up.

Also, time each run. Once your times fall off, stop the workout.For example, if you're running repeat 40 yard dashes and yourtimes are 7.1, 7.2, 7.1, 7.1, 7.4, 7.5 then it is clear thatthe workout should stop. The 7.4 should be a red flag. That's where knowing yourself (or your athletes) and theart of coaching comes into play. Either give yourself another rep to see if it drops back to the standard range orshut it down. You're reached the point of diminishing returns.

But if you truly want to improve your 40, STOP running distance!!!!

I'm not sure where I heard this, but it's true. Many people, especially very young people or 'old guys' (your words not mine!!) will do something that doesn't work or get the results theywant. Instead of stopping and doing something different, they do the same thing that doesn't work, but just do it harder andmore often. Then they wonder why it still doesn't work!
Running slow for 20 minutes or riding a bike for half an houris the exact opposite of what you should do if you want to run fast.

You told me you want to cut a second off your 40, but whenyou described what you do for workouts, speed work was never mentioned.

You lift three times a week, but what do you do? Most olderguys I see in the weightroom come in and do full body workoutson the Universal. A set of lat pulls, then a set or two ofleg extensions, over to the bench press, then some curls.

That type of training won't make you faster. You have to improve your maximum strength with squats, deadlifts, lunges,Olympic Lifts, etc.

That's how you'll drop your 40 time.


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"I am an assistant coach of an Arizona U11 girls soccer team.We are a very skilled team but overall are slow and smallerthan some of the other teams in the league. How would your speed training program assist me in getting more speed on the team? Also, what is a realistic time level each week to spend on the speed training? We currently practice tues/thurs with conditioning training every other Wed. We are just beginning the second half of the season with our state tournament beginning at the end of March. Because the parents support the team any purchases need to be approved by them. I need something concrete that I can sell. Maybe you can let me use the progam for 30 days and then we could purchase it if we find it useful. Also, since we are part of a larger club (approx 28 teams) any success that we experience would translate in the oter teams having interest in the program. Please let me know you thoughts. "
- Scott M.

Scott
The best way to develop speed, particularly in young athletes, is to develop overall athletic ability. This means focusing on developing the five biomotor abilities that affect athletic performance: speed, strength, coordination, flexibility, endurance. The Complete Speed Training program will assist you in getting more speed with your athletes because it specifically focuses on showing you how to develop these abilities in your athletes. Each of the 5 DVDs in the program focuses on one of the biomotor abilities, with there being some obvious carry over.
For athletes in that age group, I would recommend incorporating some degree of speed and agility/coordination training into their training twice per week. I especially believe that developing your girls' coordination will get you positive results. I find the coordinative abilities of younger athletes to be a major detriment to success and it is often not something that people spend time focusing on. This may mean temporarily cutting back on some of the 'skill' work and focusing more on the speed/agility/coordination component, especially if speed is the clear area of weakness holding your team back.

We generally don't give away or loan out free copies of our programs. First, people don't return them. Second, we know the program works. You can read the countless testimonials from satisfied customers at the program website. That's why we offer an unconditional 365 day money back guarantee if you try the program and don't believe the price has provided an equal exchange of value . As a coach, parent, athlete, etc. if you're not willing to invest in yourself, your team or your child's success unless someone else gives it to you for free, then Complete Speed Training may not be the program for you. I don't believe in getting something for nothing whichis one of the many reasons why we can not just give it away.


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"Its too cold outside to train. Not to mention the daylight savings time has hurt. Any suggestions on training for the next 3 months at the gym? Running outdoors is impossible, and I don't want to lose what progess I've made."- Stephen S.


Stephen
Coming from a cold weather environment, I understand all to well the limitations that come with being forced to train athletes indoors. As a very general rule of thumb, I don't like to do any speed work outside if it's less than 50 degrees out. I'm not saying I always follow that rule, but in my experience the quality of work you can do in those temperatures is limited. Ultimately if you want to continue to improve speed while training indoors you have to be able to find a place where you can do some degree of acceleration development and speed work.

If you're in a school setting you need to get in the hallways. Because the hallways in the school I coach at are fairly short, I lean a high jump mat as a 'crash mat' against the wall for athletes to run into so I can extend the distance they run by a few meters. Believe me when I tell you that your athletes will love this workout. For you cold weather track coaches you can set up mats on both ends of the hall and now you can do speed endurance workouts by having them run, crash, turn around and start sprinting again.

If you don't have a hallway, you can use a basketball court. I have athletes run on the diagonal since that provides moreroom to run. Of course, from an agility training standpoint, a basketball court provides infinite options.

Sometimes we'll do stair work as well. It gets the feet moving quickly and teaches athletes to apply force to the ground to get their bodies moving. However, stair work is very hard on the legs and should be done in moderation. I have seen athletes develop severe shin splints and even stress fractures from doing excessive stair workouts. Coaches simply need to be more creative in their training. It's harder to develop speed indoors then outdoors with limited space. But then again that's a major reason why athletes who live in predominately warm weather climates run considerably faster, on the average, than their cold weather peers.

But as I will cover later in this section, speed gains are in large part determined by strength. So if you're in a traditional gym setting where, at best, you might have an aerobics studio to do a warmup in, you're going to have to focus on getting stronger and make due until it gets warm again, then get back into your traditional speed work. You'll find that even without running real workouts all winter, you can get faster just by getting stronger.



Click here to get the most effective speed training program available no matter the age, sport or gender:
http://www.CompleteSpeedTraining.com

Explosive Strength and Power for All Athletes

In today's Q & A one of the themes that I covered was the importance of developing strength in your overall speed development program.

One of the most effective methods for developing this strength and power is with the Olympic Lifts.

Today we will go over how to perform progressions of one of the absolute, most effective lifts that every high level athlete regularly uses in their training program: the Power Clean.

This exercise is fundamental for creating explosive power. It is also an exercise that many athletes do incorrectly so, when performing or teaching this exercise, if athletes are not performing all the actions as they are described, then need to back off the weight and continue to follow the progressions. Here are some great progressions tostart with before you introduce the entire Clean:

Clean RDL:
Stand with barbell in hands, feet at hip width, shoulders back and chest up. Keeping arms straight and eyes fixed straight ahead, lower bar by moving the hips backwards while maintaining a slight but fixed bend in the knees. Stop once the bar reaches the top of the knees or when the flexibility in the hams runs out. Quickly return to startingposition by moving hips forward and standing up straight.

Clean RDL to Power Shrug:
Stand with barbell in hand, feet at hip width, shoulders back and chest up. Keeping arms straight and eyes fixed straight ahead, lower bar by moving the hips backwards while maintaining a slight but fixed bend in the knees. Stop once the bar reaches the top of the knees or when the flexibilityin the hams runs out. Quickly move the hips forward, as the hips extend explosively shrug shoulders and rise on toes.

Clean RDL to High Pull:
Stand with barbell in hands, feet at hip width, shoulders back and chest up. Keeping arms straight and eyes fixed straight ahead, lower bar by moving the hips backwards while maintaining a slight but fixed bend in the knees. Stop once the bar reaches the top of the knees or when the flexibility in the hams runs out. Quickly move the hips forward, as the hips extend explosively shrug shoulders and rise on toes. Continue to elevate the bar to mid-chest height by bending elbows and continuing the upward movement of the bar. Be sure to lift elbows up and keep the bar close to the body.

Muscle Clean:
Standing erect with barbell in hands with a clean grip and feet at hip width, slide bar upwards almost along the body to near shoulder height. Once at shoulder height rotate elbows underneath the bar, releasing the hook grip and letting the bar fall onto the shelf created by the shoulders. Return bar to starting position the same way it got there.

Power Clean:
Stand with barbell in hand, feet at hip width, shoulders back and chest up. Keeping arms straight and eyes fixed straight ahead, lower bar by moving the hips backwards while maintaining a slight but fixed bend in the knees. Stop once the bar reaches the top of the knees or when the flexibility in the hams runs out.

Quickly move the hips forward, as the hips extend explosively shrug shoulders and rise on toes. Continue to elevate the bar to mid-chest height by bending elbows and continuing the upward movement of the bar. Be sure to lift elbows up and keep the bar close to the body. Once at shoulder height simultaneously rotate elbows underneath the bar, releasing the hook grip and letting the bar fall onto the shelf created by the shoulders while falling into a quarter squat. The quarter squat should be reached at the same time the barbell is received on the shoulders.

Teaching Olympic lifitng is much easier if you first break down each of the movements. Once your athlete has perfected each individual movement, they will find performing the whole clean a much simpler task. Also, if you have an athlete struggling with a particular stage of the lift, you can use these exercises to 'Clean Up' their form.

For more details on how to incorporate and properly teach the Olympic Lifts with your athletes, visit:

http://www.CompleteOlympicLifting.com

How to Develop Speed and Quickness on the Basketball Court

Teaching and practicing the fundamental skills of basketball is crucial to success.

But at the end of the day, if your athletes don't have the speed and quickness to beat the defender to the basket or prevent them from getting there, then success will not come easy.

Fortunately, this type of speed and quickness can be taught.

And there is noone better at teaching the change of direction quickness required for basketball than Lee Taft.

In case you haven't heard about Lee already, he is the Executive vice President and Contributor of the certification resource book for the International Youth Conditioning Association (IYCA).

Over the past 16 years, Lee has worked with many athletes of all ages and abilities. His major focus and passion has been on the development of young athletes. Nationally known as an expert in multi-directional speed techniques, Lee's innovative technique to improve multi-directional speed is the up and coming teaching methods of many professionals.

In fact, I use many of the techniques I have learned from Lee with my own athletes.

If you deal with basketball players in any way, I strongly recommend you check out Lee's product on Basketball Speed Progressions.

Learn more about it here:
Basketball Speed Training

More Answers to Your Questions About Speed Training

This is a great mix of Q & A about many different topics under the speed training umbrella. Let us know if you likethis type of format and we can continue it in future newsletters.

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Thanks for your suggestions about speed training programs. I am very much pleased to read about your ideas. I want totry these fantastic skills on my own kids, one of whom is about 11 years old and another one is 14 years old. Both of them are tennis enthusiasts and are good at tennis but their coaches often complains regarding their poor footwork, movements, speed, agility and endurance. Perturbed by their poor speed and endurance, I consulted many physical education experts and there by i found that different coaches have different opinions. Some are in favour of putting the kids into speed training programs at this age of my kids. While others warns to avoid such speed training programes.

Kindly help me to come out of this phobia because some experts says that it will directly hinder their physical growth. ( height etc).
- Digvijay N.


No matter what decision you make you'll always find an equal number of people who disagree with it. Certainly putting your kids into a speed training program will not 'directly hinder their physical growth.' The only exception to the long standing myth that strength training stunts growth plate development comes from overuse of load bearing exercises.

For example, if you have your 12 year old doing high load barbell squats on a regular basis then you run the risk of a potential problem. However, other than this extreme, I wouldn't worry about it. Further, in discussing a speed development program such an idea makes little sense.
All things being equal, athletes at the age of your kids will suffer no physical development delays or issues by engaging in a well structured, scientifically based, age appropriate training program.

The problem comes in finding a reputable trainer. There are many so called speed coaches out there that are simply not good coaches. In fact I am always amazed at how little *some* Division I Track and Field Sprint coaches actually know about their events after watching athletes get slower and slower in their programs. So you can imagine what a lesser trained trainer may believe is appropriate. Find a reputable program, ask questions, ask for results, watch some of their training sessions, etc. before sending your athletes.

Otherwise, taking control of their training with a program like Complete Speed Training is the best way to guarantee both safety and results. Further, by using Complete Speed Trainingyou won't see a regression in skills that comes after the program ends and athletes forget what they were taught and how to perform those skills and drills.



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Interesting view points.. but you still give nothing in (in your emails) concrete as for drills or workouts. You seem to keep trying to justify your ideas as oppose to 'old school' or what most coaches do. Why is that?
- Robert Y.


I justify what I do compared to what others do to point out that 'old school' training doesn't work and is not safe.

One of the biggest problems I find with some coaches and athletes is the need (and sometimes demand) for workouts. However, every program, sport, athlete and age group has different demands and so there is no 'one size fits all' workout or program. In the 7 part series I sent you, I tried to provide a foundation of information for you to develop your particular program around. To throw in cookie cutter workouts in many ways could do more harm than good.

A truly involved coach, parent or trainer is going to take the information contained in Complete Speed Training and build a program around the concepts, drills, cues and progressions that I lay out. This program is going to fit the specific needs of their particular team, son, daughter or group. Because I know you'll have questions about how to do this, I give you a free 30 minute consultation with me so that you can ask absolutely any questions that you come up with while watching the videos.

Taking advantage of that phone consult is highly recommended and is always a valuable learning experience for anyone who does use it. This is the best way to guarantee that your athletes get faster, more explosive and stay healthy.


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Hi my name is Mariette M. I have a quick question to ask you. I love to run and since track and feild is only in the spring in my school is it okay if I am in cross country over the fall. I am worried that if I get used to a slow pace I won't be able to run as fast as I usually can. Also can I play other sports like soccer, basketball, volleyball, softball, and other sports like that. If not what can I do other than that? Please try to write back when and if you get the time.
- Mariette M.


That's a very complicated question as you presented it. If you run the mile or 2 mile than cross country is great. If you run the100 and 200 then cross country is not what you're looking for. At the high school level of track and field, both coaches and athletes get quite confused about what being 'in shape' means. Being in shape to run a fast 200 and being in shape to run a fast mile are two wildly different things. The most important thing to think about when answering this question is simply to look at the demands of the events you compete in. If you run events that require a great deal of speed, then competing in a sport that involves a great deal of endurance is only going to limit your speed. You can't get fast by running slow.

If you're playing all those other sports, then you don't really have the time to train specifically for track. Remember practices and competitions in other sports still count as training and will get you in shape. If you are a sprinter and/or jumper, I'd say that those other sports will help you get into 'track shape' much better than running cross country.

If you really want to maximize your success at any sport, you need to develop your overall athletic ability. In particular this means specifically training and developing your speed, strength, flexibility, coordination and conditioning. You can play different sports all day and all night, but unless you develop the overall athletic ability that facilitates improvements in your ability to run faster, jump higher, and hit harder, then you have a very limited opportunity to improve.

Multisport athletes need to focus on becoming a better overall athlete. Developing your all around skill will carry over to every sport. That's why the best athletes usually excel at multiple sports.


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Thank you for the tips! I used to think body circuits is onlyused for persons who want to lose weight, and that it had no genuine value to sports people. My back muscles are very weak - do you perhaps have some advice for me on how to strengthen my back muscles?
- Monique


Not at all! I love to use bodyweight circuits with young athletes who aren't ready for the weightroom, as recovery work between speed days, as strength and conditioning workouts for in season and athletes who only have time to work out a couple of days a week. I also use them as endocrine system development, overall work and aerobic capacity work for athletes (particularly track and field athletes) at the High School level when I don't have time for a long Preparation Period due to the short high school season. Circuits are a jack of all trades workout and a great substitute for boring low intensity running workouts.

To strengthen your back there are many things you can do. Stationary exercises while in the prone position such as cobras (picking just your upper body off the floor) and supermans (picking up torso and lifting thighs off the floor at the same time) will isolate the muscles of the lower back.

On top of that, participating in a well designed strength training program will also improve back strength. Foundational exercises like squats and deadlifts develop great lower back strength and I traditionally use chin ups and pull ups as a supplemental exercise as well.



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If 2 sprinters with the same technique ran a race then the stronger sprinter would always win. He would be able to apply more force to the ground thus winning the race.
Somehow / somewhere there's a missing ingredient becausethe stronger runner isn't always winning the race. Case in point Randy Moss verses Terrell Owens, muscular structure indicates that Owen should be much faster than Moss but he isn't, it's quite the opposite. There's somethingmissing in all this. What could be that missing link?
- Reggie F


First, your statement is only true if the 2 sprinters are clonesof each other, where all other componants outside of strengthare equal.

Second, we shouldn't confuse musculature with strength. A body builder mentality still reigns supreme in American sports even though such mass is not necessarily required for athletic success. Former 100m world record holder Tim Montgomery never had a particularly impressive physique, but still ran under 9.8 seconds for 100 meters. In these cases it is often about such variables as the amount of fast twitch muscle fiber a particular athlete has as well as the innate ability to provide large amplitudes of force over an extremely small period of time. Remember, the more mass specific force you apply to the ground, the less your ground contact time. Therefore, you must be able to deliver that payload of force in an increasingly smaller amount of time. Athletes who have the ability to do so will, all other things being equal (and even not equal) will run faster.

Bigger doesn't necessarily mean stronger from the standpoint of recruitment and firing of motor units within the 'running muscles' in the legs and glutes. So Randy Moss may have a greater innate ability to apply larger amounts of mass specific force to the ground in X amount of ground contact time than TO even if TO is bigger and potentially stronger. But just because TO looks bigger in no way means his strength levels are appreciably greater than Randy Moss. It's just the body builder mindset that trick people into believing that has to be the case.

For more information on mass specific force and the 'missing link' on the relationship between speed, size and strength,check out this great article from speed expert Barry Ross.
Barry Ross is the former strength coach of Alison Felix, USHigh School National Record Holder and Olympic Silver Medalistat 200 meters:
http://www.completespeedtraining.com/cmd.php?ad=275997


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What type of warm ups should be done daily?
-Dale and Fatima W.


A dynamic warmup should be the foundation of your daily warm up. This means progressing from low intensity movements to higher intensity drills and active stretches.

However, don't do the same thing every day. On speed days, our warmups are much longer, more intense and 'speed drill' focused than on our recovery days and conditioning days whereoften times the warmup is a major part of the workout itself.

The most effective means of warming up on your speed and recovery days is, of course, covered in detail in the first DVD of the Complete Speed Training Program, Pre-Competition.

For more information about our Complete Speed Training program, click the link below:
http://www.completespeedtraining.com

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