Inexperienced over 40's sprinter wants to achieve maximum potential - LOG

"Great forum and lots of good advice shared which is why I'm here so I can learn from the experience of the members here."

Did you accidentally post this here instead of on this "great forum" you mention?

I don't know much about sprinting other than it's really taxing on your body for older people.

I've seen people improve in the marathon in their 40's, so you might be able to. But there's a reason why older people take up longer distance - as Bolt demonstrated recently, muscle strains are extremely common once you get older, over the faster stuff especially.

It's not that you can't train and improve VO2Max, it's just that you might have an impossible time avoiding injury with hard strenuous activity.

I have no advice as I know nothing. But I'd be interested to follow your progress. Never heard of someone in your position decide to start sprinting. sounds cool! I'm impressed!

Good luck!!!

It's never too late to start, and 40 and up is still an age range where you can maintain a great level of speed.

Kim Collins holds the master record for the 40-44 age group, at 9.93

The Masters record for the age group 70-75 is 12.77. You currently run 12 flat, so at the age of 40 you can have a great sprinting experience all the way up to the age of 70. However, that will all depend on your health and training, but it is more than possible.

Particularly, this is a forum for long distance running, so there aren't going to be a lot of coaches or runners who are going to provide you with any advice. They simply do not have any knowledge or experience with that form of running.

However, there are some who train like a sprinter as distance runners. I fall in the group, slightly. In the words of Alberto Salazar, distance runners should train like sprinters to really become fast distance runners. So I do a lot of sprint running drills and sprint form drills....One thing I will not be able to provide any information on is starting out of the blocks, or jumping out of the blocks.

Weight Training

Everything in sprinting is about powerful, fast movement, so fast twitch muscles need to be strong and fast. Weight training is mandatory, where you are going to have to lift weights at least twice a week. Squats, leg lifts, lunges, box jumping, rope jumping, chest presses, lateral pull downs, military presses, and core work are the exercises that you want to focus on. A lot of concentration is going to be placed on your glutes and hamstrings, because that is where most of your running firepower comes from. Those muscles must work as a unit so that you can really push through with good force as a sprinter.

Sprinting Drills

This is really the meat of sprinting. This is where a sprinter develops his form and structure, and drills must be performed with speed and precision. With sprinters, just like with a cheetah, the feet must grab and pull through so that the sprinter can propel forward with a lot of power, thus generating a lot of speed. Sprinting drills will train the body to do just that.

A skips

B skips

C skips

Cycling

Ankling

High Knees

Butt Kicks

Those are the main drills that are exercised. There are others, as well as variations of those drills, but I'm not familiar with them.

Make sure that you are performing those drills before every sprint session, and those drills should be performed on your weight training days as well.

Now, when performing those drills, they must be done in a fast, whipping action. You're training those fast twitch muscles to be explosive ( fast and powerful), as well as developing great technique as a sprinter.

Here is one of the best videos on the planet regarding speed drills and how to perform them properly. You will not be disappointed.

good luck.

How about the 400m instead, OP?

Absolutely nothing wrong with taking up the 100m as a masters athlete, IMO.

My advice would be that you will need more recovery days between workouts than younger athletes. Keep that in mind when looking at training logs.

After you have conditioned yourself well, you can probably do as much volume and intensity within a single day as you would have been able to when younger, just with the extra recovery days in between.

I would recommend one day off each week.

I would also spend more time on low intensity work like rhythm and form drills. This will help to offset the fact that you'll have fewer high intensity days per mini cycle than a younger athlete.

My last advice is do not gain any more weight. That is the killer of master's athletes, it is generally the joints and tendons that take you out of your training, and keeping your bodyweight down is the best way to minimize that.

Live to run wrote:

I don't know much about sprinting other than it's really taxing on your body for older people.

I've seen people improve in the marathon in their 40's, so you might be able to. But there's a reason why older people take up longer distance - as Bolt demonstrated recently, muscle strains are extremely common once you get older, over the faster stuff especially.

It's not that you can't train and improve VO2Max, it's just that you might have an impossible time avoiding injury with hard strenuous activity.

Yes, it has been taxing on my body, but I feel good for my age and am mentally tough, which will hopefully help me a lot.

I've also worked really hard in the past 10 years in my business and also have a school age child, but recently sold the business and started working 3 days per week for the last few weeks in the hand over period. In another 10 weeks I won't have to work at all and am financially free so can train and rest as much as I want, which I've wanted to do do so long, but have been restricted by working in my business.

Already feel so much more recovery ability dropping down to 3 days a week for work.

you're cool!!! wrote:

I have no advice as I know nothing. But I'd be interested to follow your progress. Never heard of someone in your position decide to start sprinting. sounds cool! I'm impressed!

Good luck!!!

Thanks, I'll be sure to update.

Been persisting with this for 18 months already with quite a few injuries, but feel I've gotten past the initial break in period, so plan to keep improving for at least another few years and want to peak when I reach the 45-49 age group bracket.

scorpion_runner thanks for such an informative and supportive post.

Kim Collins is a stand out and everyone below him in his age bracket seems so far behind and human.

I only do a small amount of weight training these days, 2 x 30 min sessions with my trainer via Skype.

I'm trying to focus more on my running workouts which is what I really need to catch up on.

My glutes and hamstrings always get sore after running, especially my glutes, they get worked hard.

Once I am able to recover better from my running workouts I can introduce some more strength training, but if I try to add more in now, it really hurts my recovery abilities.

I'll watch that video on drills later, thanks.

Mustache ride wrote:

How about the 400m instead, OP?

I want to try it but my speed endurance is terrible.

Even 300m runs kill me.

I will work up to it though and want to time my 400 in the next few weeks.

I'm guessing it will be around 60s.

Thanks.

Recovery is definitely one of my high priorities learned over time.

The body weight is a weird thing.

In the past I've always struggled to gain muscle when I intentionally trained and ate specifically for bodybuilding type looks only.

Now, I eat very little but have increased about 3kg in the past 6 months.

I look more like a bodybuilder now that I've been sprinting than I ever did when I specifically ate and trained for it....

I'd say I'm below 10% body fat right now.

I'd like to be lighter for more strength to weight ratio, but don't know how I can get any lighter as I'm eating very minimal amount.

Maybe I just need to get stronger instead.

Fast after Forty wrote:

Mustache ride wrote:

How about the 400m instead, OP?

I want to try it but my speed endurance is terrible.

Even 300m runs kill me.

I will work up to it though and want to time my 400 in the next few weeks.

I'm guessing it will be around 60s.

Nice! I'm 44 (not overweight, I promise) and have a current 400m PR of :72s lol! And I'm pretty happy with that lol. (Competitive distance for me starts at the mile tho), I am an ex-swimmer/started running after 40 :D

Went out to the track today with focus on speed.

I haven't done any top speed work for a few months now as I've been working on building a good base.

I think it's going to take me a few top speed sprint sessions to get some faster times going.

I timed my 30m starts from 4 point start, no blocks.

Best time I could get was 4.33s, timed with FreeLap, no reaction time.

Also took video of myself and I look so slow watching back.

It really feels faster than it looks, need to move quicker.

Hope to improve on this next time I try these.

Thanks for sharing! I'm 41.

If you want u want your muscles to be functional, just do this 1 thing, nothing and I mean NOTHING else....... Listen carefully,. Think hard about this..... Ready? Ok...... Do this: Just RUN..... No gym, no weight lifting, just... R.U.N! Now, instead of going to the gym, take your gym to the track. Resistance training IS impor5ant, but here's the golden ruke..... If you can't run with it, DON'T use it. So if ur resistance training uses weights, can you run with it? If no, then put it aside. Can u run with barbells? Can you run with Huge dumbbells? No.... I'll let u think about this. Do Cheetahs train with heavy weights? What's the PRIMARY thing that it does to maintain its speed and how does it train? Keep the main thing the MAIN thing. You'll recover faster and see gains faster. Your training will be 100% functional and youll Focus! You body will be Balanced the way it's SUPPOSED TO BE....

Hope this helps and sorry if this means some BIG Changes for yiu, but that's how we leaen.

All the best. See you on the other side!

Eben Burger

Fast after Forty wrote:

Went out to the track today with focus on speed.

I haven't done any top speed work for a few months now as I've been working on building a good base.

I think it's going to take me a few top speed sprint sessions to get some faster times going.

I timed my 30m starts from 4 point start, no blocks.

Best time I could get was 4.33s, timed with FreeLap, no reaction time.

Also took video of myself and I look so slow watching back.

It really feels faster than it looks, need to move quicker.

Hope to improve on this next time I try these.

WHAT HAPPENED?

UPDATE NEEDED!

Hello Fast after Forty,

I am 41 and have recurrent Achilles issues after sprinting. After reading, "The Achilles always the worst lasting almost 12 months, but it finally disappeared for good about 6 months ago," I am extremely interested to know how you managed to overcome your Achilles issues!

I’m still trying to get faster and I’m 46 now.

I ran 100m in 11.86 PB +0.3w

and 200m in 23.92 PB +0.6w this past weekend at our Masters State Champs.

I’m more a 400 runner but focused on the short sprints to get my speed up a bit more this season. Will probably run some 400’s next season.

Still looking to improve a reasonable amount as the 200m time was a 0.42s PB. I’ve run 24.4x about 5 times and 24.34 once, then yesterday finally broke through 24.

I’ll need to get my 200m close to 23 flat to be competitive with the rest of the world and also get me closer to 50 flat for the 400.

Planning to get there when I reach 50 and move up to the next age group.

11.8 & 23.9 at aged 46 is really good, especially if you are now aiming for the 400m!

I'm actually quite jealous; I'm 48, and my decision to sprint again happened in 2020. Stupidly went hell for leather doing hill sprints with no warm-up (what was I thinking?) and straight away strained my groin before I'd even begun. Next to go was the left achilles. So winter of 2020-2021 was jogging on grass, just once a week, with 2 sessions on the exercise bike. I started to pick it up a little in 2020, then strained my left hamstring. That's all healed now, and managed to get on a track once a week, with another session on grass. Now my other achilles is giving me pain!

I was never fast as a youth (12.4 & 25.2 as a 14 yr old) just ok. My aim was always to come back & do the 200m, because the 100 is just so bloody tough, but I'm debating between the 200 or 400 now. Initially I wanted to start at 27 for my first few races and get down to 25 again (and around 56-57 for 400m). With all my injuries I will be happy to break 30 secs!

I'm 181cm tall and 85.5 kg. Despite hitting PBs in the gym, it isn't translating to the track, and I agree with the other poster that if you want to run fast you have to...run! Sounds obvious, but in my head, with my squat PBs, and my power on the bike, I just assumed running would be fine. Nada. Nope. Nah. Nein. Non.

I'm currently on the cusp of "do I stick with this and see it through?" vs "this is battering my body like nothing else, is it worth it?". If I don't see some improvements soon, I'm throwing in the towel. It's a fine balance between enjoying it, and being frustrated (due to injury).

I ran yesterday (speed endurance sesh, 8 x 150m with 2.5min rest) and I have a slight limp today with the sore achilles.

"There is nothing in training that is going to replace natural ability in terms of what you can do. You can minimize-or you can attempt to minimize some of the weaknesses and to enhance some of the strengths, but if you are not naturally a good sprinter, you can make some training schedules, you can improve leg action. You can improve muscle quality, you can do all sorts things in the weight room, you can do speed drills, but you cannot actually physiologically put in what is not there. So, of course, talent is a very important natural ability, actually it more important than anything else." Seb Coe