Let’s clear up one point: Sport is about acceleration, not speed.
We have a problem in sports. Coaches consistently use the wrong term when discussing the quality they covet most. Tests such as the 10-, 20-, and 40-yard dash are actually tests of acceleration not speed. You need only look at world-class sprinters to realize that top speed is not achieved until approximately 60 meters. As coaches our interest is not in top speed but rather in acceleration, the zero to sixty of the auto world. How rapidly an athlete accelerates will determine success in team sports, not what her absolute speed is.
Why does this matter? A great deal of the research on speed development focuses on speed in a track and field context and not in a sport context. In track the shortest event is the 55 meters. In sport the long event is a 40-yard dash (although baseball will go to 60). The track influence may in fact have limited application to sport because of sport’s frequent use of acceleration mechanics versus speed mechanics. In training for track, coaches frequently make reference to the pulling action in running and work on drills to develop a pawing action against the ground. In sport the action is primarily pushing with the center of gravity slightly ahead of the feet, kind of a reverse Michael Johnson. This may mean that much of what we currently view as speed development work may have limited application to team sport athletes. In truth little can be said about speed development that has not already been said by respected coaches in their videos and lectures over the past 20 years. Information on the technical aspects of speed development is readily available from a number of different sources.
Coaches are increasingly aware that athletes need to train for strength and power to improve speed. Many coaches use resisted methods of speed development. Numerous companies provide coaches with commercial tools for speed development, such as sleds. One thing we do know is that if an athlete wants to be fast over short distances, she had better be running fast over short distances.
Another thing we know is that putting force into the ground matters. There is a strong correlation between speed and vertical jump and a pretty good correlation between vertical jump and lower body strength. In a sense, getting fast is simple and hard at the same time. The concept is simple. The execution can be hard.
I propose a system of speed development, or more aptly acceleration development, with an emphasis on injury prevention for team sports and large or small groups. This system of linear speed improvement is simple and easy to implement. The majority of speed work in this system is done over less than 10 yards or meters and is actually acceleration work. Acceleration is of much greater importance in team sports than speed; however, coaches often use the words interchangeably. Coaches often express a desire for greater speed when, in fact, most sports favor athletes with greater acceleration, not necessarily the fastest athletes. The simplest analogy to describe the difference between speed and acceleration is to look at automobiles. Every car can go 60 miles per hour. What separates a Porsche from a Yugo is how fast it can get from 0 to 60. An unnecessary concern with speed rather than acceleration is the pitfall of many treadmill-oriented speed development programs and many track-and-field-based programs.
The big questions in designing a speed development program involve which drills to perform, how far to perform them, and how often to perform them. The proposed system was initially field- tested with 400 athletes in the summer of 2000 in approximately 19,000 workouts (400 athletes working out four days per week for 12 weeks) and yielded fewer than 10 groin and hamstring strains.
The keys to the system are as follows:
Every speed workout is preceded by at least 15 minutes of dynamic warm-up and agility work. Plyometrics are done after warm-up and before sprinting. This seems to provide a good speed- of-contraction bridge to sprinting.
The program is broken down into three three-week phases based on simple concepts.
Weeks 1 to 3: Noncompetitive Speed
In the noncompetitive speed phase, simple drills work on the first three to five steps. Emphasis is on starting technique and first-step quickness. Athletes execute three to five hard pushes and then coast. At first, encourage them to run at slightly less than full speed to facilitate gradual muscular adaptation to sprinting. At no time should athletes race or compete in any form in this noncompetitive phase. The primary drills used in this phase are the lean, fall, and run (figure 5.34) and the 90-degree lean, fall, and run from Vern Gambetta’s Straight Ahead Speed video (1995). Generally only six 10- yard sprints are done each day.
Figure 5.34 The lean, fall, and run.
Weeks 4 to 6: Short Competitive Speed
The second phase introduces a series of competitive drills, but the distance is limited. The intensity of the sprint work increases while the distance (volume) is maintained. One of the difficulties of speed development programs is that coaches often cannot control or discern whether athletes are actually attempting to reach top speed during speed development sessions. The introduction of a competitive incentive ensures that athletes attempt to accelerate. The competitive incentive is simply a tennis ball. The short competitive speed phase consists of ball-drop sprints from various double- and single-leg start positions (see figure 5.35). Ball-drop sprints ensure that athletes accelerate for a short burst of speed. Even gifted athletes do not generally exceed 7 yards. Athletes frequently lay out to get the ball, although this is discouraged. Ball-drop sprints create a competitive environment that encourages acceleration without excessively stressing the hamstrings or hip flexors.
Figure 5.35 Ball-drop sprints.
Weeks 7 to 9: Long Competitive Speed
In the third phase athletes sprint against a partner from many different start positions. Chase sprints and breakaway-belt sprints are done from standing and lying starting positions. At this point, sprint workouts become tag games, with athletes alternating as the chaser or the chased. Athletes’ accelerative abilities are challenged in a competitive atmosphere that guarantees maximum effort. In this phase, athletes are limited to a 10- to 20-yard tag zone.
This speed development program yields excellent results when combined with a proper warm-up, a proper lower body strength program, and a progressive plyometric program. Athletes progress gradually from individually paced starting and first-step drills to highly competitive tag races over a nine-week period to ensure proper muscular adaptation. Either volume or intensity is increased in each phase, but never both. In the lower body strength program, exercises are performed twice weekly for both knee extension (split squat versus front squat and single-leg variations) and hip extension (straight-leg and bent-leg variations that emphasize glutes and hamstrings). The combination of progressive speed, progressive plyometrics, and progressive strength training has resulted in an injury rate of less than 1 per 1,000 workouts at our training facility.
Sled Training
There is nothing better than a weighted sled to help an athlete improve his speed. In fact, if I had limited time and could do only one exercise, it might be a sled push. Numerous studies have attempted to discredit the use of a weighted sled as a tool for speed development, citing the weighted sleds’ limited effect on top speed.
In truth, the evidence that weighted sleds may not improve top-speed running does not apply to acceleration and may have led coaches to undervalue a potentially valuable piece of equipment. In fact, many authors who stated that the weighted sled did not improve speed indicated that it improved acceleration. Our problem, as is often the case, was that we misinterpreted the results of the research. Most coaches spend time working on form running and technique to improve speed. These same coaches also include lower body strength workouts to improve strength. Although these are both obviously important, there may be a missing link—the development of specific strength. How often have we seen athletes who run “pretty” but not fast? In my opinion, many coaches attempting to
develop speed spend far too much time on technique drills and far too little time on developing the specific power and specific strength necessary to run faster.
In 2000 the Journal of Applied Physiology published an article called “Mechanical Basis of Human Running Speed.” The article synopsis begins with the line “Faster top running speeds are achieved with greater ground forces, not more rapid leg movements.” This has become known as the Weyland study after lead researcher Peter Weyland. Weighted sled drills target the specific muscles used in sprinting and help bridge the gap between form-running drills and weight room exercises such as squats and Olympic lifts.
Many athletes can squat large amounts of weight. Far fewer athletes seem to be able to run fast. Any student of speed will tell you that many of the strength exercises commonly recommended for speed development work hip extension but not hip hyperextension. In running speed, all of the force production is from hip hyperextension. The ability to apply force to the ground and create forward movement can occur only when the foot is placed under the center of mass and pushed back. Although squats and other exercises will train the muscles involved, the training is not specific to the act of sprinting. This may be one reason we see a higher correlation to vertical jump improvement than to speed improvement through strength training. A weighted sled teaches strong athletes how to produce the type of force that moves them forward. The sports scientists like to break this down into special strength and specific strength. Although I believe the difference is minimal, it is important to understand the difference between the two.
Special strength is produced by movements with resistance that incorporate the joint dynamics of the skill. Sled marching would fall into the special strength category. I believe sled marching may be the best tool available for speed development. An athlete’s inability to produce force in the action of sprinting becomes glaringly obvious in sled marching.
Specific strength is produced by movements with resistance that are imitative of the joint action. I would place sled running in the specific strength category.
At MBSC we like to do sled marching with heavy loads for the first 6 weeks of a 12-week training cycle and then do 6 weeks of sled sprints with lighter loads.
In the past coaches have recommended that resisted speed development work must not slow the athlete down more than 10 percent or must not involve more than 10 percent of the athlete’s body weight. These recommendations seem to be based on motor learning research indicating that excessive loads would alter the motor patterns of activities such as sprinting and throwing. I have always felt there was a missing link to speed development, but until a few years ago this so-called 10 percent rule kept me from aggressively pursuing my gut feeling. Presently, my feeling is that loads up to and exceeding the athlete’s body weight can be used for special strength work as long as the athlete exhibits a motor pattern similar to the acceleration phase of sprinting. Think of sled marching as a special type of leg press. Athletes incorporate the joint dynamics of sprinting through hip hyperextension against resistance. This can be an extremely heavy movement as long as we get a technically sound march action (perfect posture).
With sled running, the approach moves toward specific strength. In sled running the loads will obviously be lighter, but I still do not follow the 10 percent rule. The main variable in sled training is not the weight on the sled but the motor pattern. If an athlete can hold an acceleration position and run without altering mechanics, then this is a specific strength exercise for sprinting. Why should we be limited by arbitrary guidelines like a 10 percent load or a 10 percent decrease in speed? Over 20
yards, 10 percent is two one-hundredths of a second. The key should be to look at the athlete’s posture and motor pattern. If the athlete has to alter the mechanics to produce the desired action, then the load is too heavy. The 10 percent rule does not allow us to apply progressive resistance concepts to this form of training.
Another obvious but overlooked variable that alters the 10 percent rule is the surface being run on. Loads used on the sled need to be lighter on grass and heavier on AstroTurf. This simply relates to coefficient of friction. Less weight produces a large amount of friction as the sled moves through grass. On AstroTurf or a similar surface, the same weight would be too light. Another variable is a flat sled versus a double-runner sled. A flat sled will produce greater friction and as a result will necessitate a lighter load on the sled to get a similar effect.
The reality is that we may have misinterpreted the message when it comes to resistance training for sprints. Although research shows that sled training may not improve the athlete’s ability to run at top speed, it will help the athlete get faster. Remember, sport is about acceleration, not top speed. Very few team sport athletes ever get to what track coaches like to call absolute speed mechanics. The weighted sled may be the most underrated tool for speed development because of our misinterpretation and misunderstanding of the research and terminology surrounding speed development.