Anatomy of a sprint workout to develop raw speed?

Just saw this sorry. I'm 23 and my grandfather was an elite cycler back in the day. Dad didn't pursue sports and i grew up sedentary up until 2 years ago. Picked up running early last year and have only ran a 10k and 2 half marathons topping at 48 mpw for my last half and now trying to stabilize at 55-60 flr my first marathon which i have no idea when i'm going to run at this point. So i've decided to go back to the core of running which is sprinting and utilize this extra time i have. In doing so i hope to extract more raw speed which i have never trained for before. I've had good personal trainers help fix my mechanics and posture over the past year now i want to use it to sprint to fix my running form and economy to make it more optimal and so ultimately my other paces are easier and i don't have to strain to hit them. I don't want to get into the argument of whether or not speed is inherited or not i personally believe it's bullshit. If you want to achieve something and are willing to make the necessary sacrifices you will be able to do it. I personally am not completely invested in sprint training to achieve my genetic potential whatever thats supposed to mean. I just want to use the extra time i have wisely in order to, like i said, improve at all distances. I'd rather work on multiple variables rather than different ones in isolation.

A debate we can determine a winner tonight. You probably are slow even though you may not be as slow of a 200m sprinter as O.P. Since we cannot make either one of you start playing T-ball/baseball at age five, soccer at age 5, flag football at age 5 and basketball at age 7, you are allowed to wallow in the myth of slow twitch at birth without any proof. No one has ever done a muscle biopsy on infants so bros like you can say the same bro science with no evidence.

Actually, muscle fiber composition is set in stone and does not varies after the age of 1 year old.

genetic wrote:

Sprint speed is purely genetic. Once you are in good general shape so that you aren't carrying around extra weight, there's really nothing you can do to improve. Just hope you picked the right parents.

BS. Even when an athlete reaches an international mark they still have just under 9 years before they reach their carrer best.

Also, find a fairly steep hill. Use it a couple of times a week. Don’t do it for speed, rather focus on bringing you thighs up close to parallel with the ground. Keep you weight over the balls of your feet rather than your heels (you can’t really lean back on a hill). Focus on minimizing ground contact time and maximizing spring in your step. Do this for a maximum of 40 yards and walk back for recovery.

Finally, look up some of Jay Johnson’s stuff. Try googling “lunge matrix”

Do not listen to LateRunnerPhil he is still at the stage where he knows it better than others.

There were really good advices in the thread and the shared threads so just be patient and slowly introduce those into your routine. Keep in mind that just like ramping up high volume, ramping up high intensity too quickly might lead to injuries so take time.

At the first few months I would suggest starting from hill sprints instead of flat sprints as those have lower injury risk. Few pointers would be more does not equal better, ie it’s perfectly good to do 4 sprints and there might be no benefit to do 6. Just make sure that those are of high quality. Rest as much as needed, take time 3,4,5, 10 minutes, whatever. Stay relaxed, if you are tying up quickly either increase rest or just end the workout. You want to promote good relaxed form.

In terms of incorporating sprints into schedule that very much varies between coaches. I personally like to have two days where some focus is is speed aspect. But that very much depends on what do you do in the other days. For me, on Mondays I feel pretty good, because Sundays are usually off. So I do easy warm up and then 4-6 pretty much all out hill sprints in 8-12 seconds with full (untimed) recovery. Going into season this session might turn into 3-4 60m flys + 1-2 relaxed but fast 200m always full recovery, usually running start but for explosiveness you can start from standing start as well. On Tuesdays I have threshold session or something similar, doing sprints the day before only helps for me. If you are doing hills first time in a while, you might feel it for a few days, thats normal.

The second session where I touch some faster running is usually Thursday for me. I do something like 12-15 times 30s hills with 75-90sec recovery at probably around mile effort. This is obviously not max speed development session but works on leg strentgh and stride length as well as probably does some maintenance on anaerobic capacity without going lactic as 30 sec with 3x recovery is pretty light. I usually do a short 10-20 min tempo @ marathon or slighltly slower but you might switch those places. Again thats not speed but a light session that later makes you feel more comfortable at any speed above your mile pace.

Great stuff guys thank you! I did my first set of hill sprints yesterday. Felf good, followed it up with some bodyweight strength training after and today i was supposed to do some 400m repeats but woke up achy. I guess i'll have to ease into the new load. The sprints themselves felt good at the time!