5x60m w/ full recovery

Coach wrote:

Texas coach, why plyos with a vertical emphasis if acceleration is primarily horizontal? Would slj type stuff and hip hinging movements not be enough?

The accelerations are just active stretching. Slow to fast type stuff to get ready for full flight.

We do horizontal plyos on our actual accel day when we do sleds or 30m runs.

Since we're talking about grouping here, let me go on a tangent...The one thing I don't necessarily agree with ustfccca on is bleacher runs for max v. I think a steep bleacher for 20m has a foot strike application more similar to the acceleration portion of the sprint. Knee is not fully extended upon contact with ground in accel and it also isn't during a bleacher run. Now if the bleachers weren't steep I could see it being more similar to max v. But if the hip and knee are still significantly flexed, then it more closely mimics accel, right?

One thing I think is important to consider when doing jumping exercises is that at constant running speed only a small amount of ground forces are being applied horizontally. The majority of forces are actually being applied vertically.

http://www.hmmrmedia.com/2016/07/gaincast-episode-21-linear-speed-with-ken-clark/

Also, here is a good resource, not for planning sprint workouts like most of this thread has been focused on but for teaching people who don't know how to sprint how to sprint. Fits really well with what V said before about getting athletes to be movement problem solvers.

http://www.hmmrmedia.com/2016/11/gaincast-episode-39-teaching-speed/

It will benefit your neuromuscular system, and isn't the dumbest idea I've heard on this board.

Sounds like you might have a good coach.

I have a question if someone wants to try and answer.

How would sprinting workouts and frequency of doing them change for athletes who are racing, 5k, 10k, 21k or 42k?

V

Is it possible for you to email me for an off forum question? Won't take any time and much appreciated.

Thank you!

fortysixtyeighty@yahoo.com

Only ever did Mid D wrote:

I have a question if someone wants to try and answer.

How would sprinting workouts and frequency of doing them change for athletes who are racing, 5k, 10k, 21k or 42k?

Good question, I think a similar one was asked for the 8k-10k range earlier but I'll try to address this a little more with the longer distance runners in mind. Full disclosure, I have never trained anyone beyond the 10k at an elite level so when someone more knowledgeable sees your question I hope they answer.

Let me start with the very general answer that applies to most situations. You should have enough speed to be competitive in your event. Most coaches at the collegiate level simply change an athlete's race to something where their speed is more appropriate rather than develop their speed to stay in their current event. Without going off on a huge tangent, I disagree with that method for most athletes. With that being said, you need to provide enough speed development work to an athlete to get them to a level that you think is competitive. For some that might mean 46 second speed in a 400m for others that can mean a 52, we have to recognize that a HS 5k/3200m runner might be just fine with running a 52 to be very competitive within his league, or even an 800m runner running the same time at as a sophomore if he is at a pretty high level for his age. That 52, however, is not sufficient at the division 1 level for a miler or really even a 5k runner at the conference level (even if we're talking about a mid-major conference). So we have to think a little more global.

Training in the US can be a little tricky because you are only coaching an athlete for 2-4 years depending on the level and age of the athlete. But you should have some idea where your athlete needs to stand as they progress. If you have a HS male trying to run the 5k at a high level then as a freshman you see he runs a 60.0. You decide that to be able to run at the national level he needs to be able to run at least a 52.0 (I'm just using numbers as an example, so don't take these as recommendations, just as illustrations). Since he runs a 60.0 right now you know that you need to include speed development; until that 400m time is less than or equal to 52 then you haven't yet reached that goal that you decided on.

Obviously you don't expect him to be at 52 within a year, but you need checkmarks along the way. maybe a 55 as a sophomore is a good step for him, then a 53 as a junior, then 52 or less as a senior. I don't think you can back off of speed development until you see that he reaches those checkmarks each year/season. If he is running a 57 as a sophomore then you are not going to get him the speed necessary to compete with the competition that you have aimed for. If instead the athlete goes 54 his sophomore year then you can start putting speed on the backburner (i.e. maintenance work) and focus more on other areas of fitness.

What I'm trying to drive home here is this. You need to decide what level of sprinting ability is needed for an event and for your competition level (age/gender/competitors). Once that is decided then you need to see how your athlete progresses within that field. If you know that your female 10k runner can run within half a second of the other 10k girls leading the conference in a 400m then speed isn't a massive concern, keep it in there enough to develop it a bit but more importantly to not lose it. She is going to get 90% (probably more) of her fitness improvement from other types of workouts. Conversely if your 800m runner is half a second slower in the 400m compared to other guys in the conference then you might decide that speed still needs to be a very pronounced component.

We love having concrete numbers but you know when your guy runs a 52 but 10 guys in his heat can run 50.X or faster then your athlete needs speed development to be more pronounced.

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5k

Onto the specifics of your question. The 5k has too many milers who run that as their second event, if speed isn't seen in your program once every 10-14 days then you had better have an athlete who is already one of the fastest guys in the field over 400m. There are so many more guys running the 5k that can break 4:00 in a full mile that you just can't muscle it out like in the good ol' days. A great place to put a lot of this work is early winter. They just came out of a long peak from cross and shouldn't be taking their indoor season hard either way. But you have to still maintain this year round. Like I've said before, its a small investment for a pretty big return.

10k and Half-marathon

Even though the distances seem pretty different (especially since one is a track event and the other is distinctly on the roads) they are energetically very similar. I would bet that the best shape I could have been in for a half marathon was right after a cross country season. Finishes are a much less important factor, even in the 10k. Fields tend to break eventually so great speed (in the most obvious cases of a kick) might meant the difference between a place or two but it isn't what separates a great 10k runner from a good one, or a good one to an average. Get their speed to a point that is acceptable and won't in any way limit them, but worry about other areas of fitness more so than speed development. In your off season you can hit it pretty often but once its established don't waste time on developing it at the expense of your other workouts. Maintenance is the name of the game there. Once a cycle as with the 5k but once its established just pepper it in at the start of a workout here and there and as a dedicated workout every 2-3 weeks on top of that. Don't, however, look at the results of your conference meet and see that one guy who got 2nd one year could only run a 52 while the rest of the top 5 were running 50.X and decide that 52 was sufficient for your athlete. Probability is your friend and that guy who got second that one time, he is an outlier.

Marathon

This is just such a different animal that I don't feel at all qualified to give you advise at the elite level and I have no qualms admitting that. To me if the person could use a more efficient stride or learn better force application, or was simply one of the stereotypical Long Slow Distance guys then I would do speed development just to make them more well rounded and iron out some imperfections. This does mean you need some good coaching and cueing to get them into those proper mechanics but some folks posted some good information earlier about some of that. As a small caveat, if you have someone who isn't at the higher level for the marathon I think they would do better to have regular speed dev workouts in there. For them it'll be a bit of an easy day and making them better athletes will go a long way

I'll encourage you to post your question here, as I did with someone earlier. But since I've been asked a few times I'll post an email address that I'll use for this site but forgive me if I'm slow to respond through it. At least this way you'll know if someone responding to your question is actually me.

V

After my most recent 5x60m workout, I experienced a pain in my right hip at the hip joint itself. It does not feel like a glute or hamstring pull, it's deeper and almost right at the socket. I'm going to avoid 5x60m until it heals. It doesn't seem to impact my normal interval workout.

What happened here? Did I do something wrong, form-wise? I did what I thought was a pretty thorough warm up, including strides.

It's hard to say off of just that. Did you notice pain during the workout or after? Could you tell what you were doing while it happened (ie. foot landing, hip extension, knee drive, etc)? Is the pain sharp or dull?

It could be some ligament damage, those can be quick to atrophy and, similar to things like squats, these sprints are different enough in mechanics and muscular demand that you're likely recruiting some fibers that have been neglected for a bit. (muscles fire from small to large, our bodies don't want to expend a lot of energy recruiting a more powerful fiber when a smaller one will do the job so you're likely getting into a slightly broader set of muscles than before).

It could be as extreme as a femoral fracture on the neck or ball of the femur near the insertion to the hip, but that's kind of a big jump to make unless you have a history or chronic pain from it beyond that of a muscle strain. So I don't mean to scare you, but with older runners its not impossible (I've had some even as a much younger athlete so I'm not trying to single out age).

If it happened in the acceleration phase or the deceleration phase then my money is on a muscle or ligament getting tweaked. If you're up north getting warm enough can be tough and strides aren't always intense enough to really activate (I mainly mean heat here) those fibers in that weather.

If you do have any details to add I'll see if I can give you a better answer, hopefully by now its feeling a bit better. When it does heal keep a mesocycle on the hills. I'd start steep and move toward more gradual in the next mesocycle. That will keep the velocity down and use a good range of motion to still activate what you need. It sets up speed development well later too

Thanks. I noticed it after the 3rd rep while walking around. I couldn't say I noticed it at all while running.

The pain was very low, so I did one more rep after that with no increase in pain, but to be safe, I stopped the workout then.

It bothered me a little the next day, but after an easy recovery run, it completely went away.

I'm just paranoid about injuries. Thanks for the response. Fortunately, I have access to a 300m indoor track so I don't have to do these outdoors.

V - thanks for your insight in this thread. I'm curious what you recommend the day before a meet for relatively beginner high school 800-3200 meter runners.? Meets are generally Thursday. My current plan for the meet weeks:

Monday - some combination of 400-1000 meters reps., with a couple of longer reps at 5Kish pace with 3:00 rest, then 400 reps (likely 4-6 depending on skill) at mile pace with 2:00-3:00 rest. Then a short body weight circuit for general body strength.

Tuesday - easy distance, then 10 minutes of hurdle drills.

Wednesday - shorter aerobic run, followed by some short speed with long rest. I'm thinking 3*200 at 800 pace with longer rest or 5*100 at 400 speed with 100 walk-back.

Thursday - meet

Friday - easy distance, then 10 minutes of hurdle drills.

Saturday - Cut-down 3 mile tempo run, followed by strides.

Sunday - off

Every Thursday is generally a meet. I would like to provide some stimulus on Wednesday's to maintain resistance, but without producing significant fatigue for the meet.

I didn't think this thread was active anymore so I'm glad I checked an old link.

It is going to depend a lot on what they are racing, what time of year it is, and what your goals are for them. Since you're working with high school athletes odds are they need these races more for their development than anyone else. If it were me I would just hit Monday hard, let Tuesday be a longer aerobic run then Wednesday be a short aerobic run and 4-6 strides in the 40-80m ballpark.

It wouldn't be wrong per se to have Tuesday be an acceleration or speed dev. day but those aren't always as efficient the day after a workout; any amount of fatigue thats still there can force you out of hitting true top speed which can really limit the purpose of the workout.

Just keep in mind you have 3 workouts in there already without trying to add more to Wednesday. Those reps you have down for it are very considerate to not overwork them but on the other side of the coin, are they enough to provide them enough of a stimulus to make them improve or is it just to do them?

Thanks V. This is for early-to-mid season, but really my goals are to have the kids get used to training consistently six days a week, and slowly start bumping up the length of the aerobic runs. This has historically been a Monday-Thursday program, with speed on Monday and Tuesday, very easy (1-2 miles) on Wednesday, meet on Thursday. Most of these kids will focus 800-1600.

My reasoning for the short speed on Wednesday is to touch 800 meter speed without significant fatigue to maintain tension. Looking back at my college logs and thinking about what I would have changed, I think we tended to rest a little too much before certain meets without enough stimulus. I was principally a 1500-5000 guy, so the training at that level was of course entirely different from beginner high school kids. We rarely did anything between 100-400 with long rest (over 1:00), generally 300's or 400's/w 100 jog or 200's with 200/jog or 30/30's. The really fast rep would of course come at the end.

What do you currently do the day before a meet (early-to-mid season) with your 800-1500 group?

Hi V,

I’m so glad I came across this thread, your training philosophy completely matches mine (or at least what coach I hope/aspire to be), I have far less experience and knowledge which I hope to get over the years and upskill via coaches like you!

Bit of background:

Not the states, where I’m from Indoors Jan – March, Outdoors May-July/Aug. Cross country is not that strong and lots won’t do it (also it’s wet here so mud fest).

I train sprinters 100m-400m as there was no sprint coach for older athletes in my entire region. I train 18+ with majority being 18-23 but have Over 35s too. All standards with a couple close to making International competition at U20 age group and I’d bet money will be at European competitions this summer. My background was endurance as an athlete (Looking back I should have been a 400m runner but trained like a 8/15) but transitioned to coaching sprints 2 years ago as I hated seeing all the young athletes quit for nowhere to go (I’m early 30s). Developed group from 1-2 athletes to up to 40 athletes over the couple years. There is a decent Distance coach in the area who has produced very good long distance runners. However speed is very lacking in these athletes ( Distance idea of speed here is at end of a really hard session doing 4x200m with 200m jog recovery!?) and in the training so the faster type athletes tend to not do well unless they transition to 1500m+ distances.

Athlete in question: Female age 19. PBs at 16/17. 400m 57.0 800m 2.11 1500m 4.38 transitioned from Juvenile to senior distance coach for last 2 years. Last 12 months times (off running 45miles a week for last couple years) 200m 29.8 400m 65.6 800m 2.27 5km 18:45

The 200m & 400m were a time trail with me recently (I wanted to see where she was at so I could tailor paces etc in training) and the 800m was the week I took her over, I believe she ran 2seconds faster for 800m in long time which I put down to her being excited about starting new training plus I gave her a race plan, which previously was to try and run as fast as possible! I want to get her back to her previous form. For me her absolute speed and speed reserve are shocking and need massive improvement. In a way I’ve decided to train her with 400m group, with slight adjustments for rest of this season and see how much speed we can get back (just joined and target would be July).

I’ve put her in my 400m group, want her as part of a team and group as much as possible and working off:

Mon: Session (pending on phase but Extensive/Intensive tempo in base transition to faster end intensive/speed endurance and few special endurance later season. Unless in comp phase, I do hurdle mobility at start of this session too)

Tue AM : Lifting class (pending on phase again but Squats/Olympic lifts/ballistic lifts etc with a S&C coach). PM (just to keep her in touch) 30mins lift jog with a few 10sec pick ups to bring back good form)

Wed PM: Speed development – working short to long so starting at acceleration runs (eg 8x30m with 3min recovery) progressing to Max Velocity, (fly 30ms, 60m etc) and finishing with 80ms late season (100% 50m, float 30m at float 400/200 pace).

Thurs: Session, same Monday).

Fri: Lifting class (see Tue). If feeling good 30mins or 4 miles steady, whichever is shorter.

Sat: Off

Sun: 4-6 x 6 sec Altaic hills and plyometric session (pylo start about 80 jumps up to 150 approx)

I’m hoping by July to have her back to 28 200m and 60ish 400m which I hope will translate into a much faster 800m. Am I way off? With me for a few weeks right now and is able to handle the work load. With me Mon/Wed/Thur/Sun and an S&C coach Tue/Fri so I know the training is being done!

Would love your thoughts and recommendations – I love ideas and I know I make mistakes with training – I’m a monitor and test type coach so fact I’m only coaching 2 years has me worried that what I think works might not be best for athletes.

I’m kinda flying solo here as Athletics is bottom of barrel where I’m from and doing my best to change that via first of all trying to improve standard of athletes, trying to build a team so we can retain and everyone has fun and also doing lots of PR so producing some videos on training/competitions etc (I coach sprints but drive all track and field if I can). I research online all the time, monitor and assess as discussed, go to all the coaching courses when I can (I work, coaching is my passion not job). I’d really love a mentor if it was something that interests you!? Just someone to bounce things off – ok 15 year old girl fan moment over :D

I'm going to go off on a slight tangent. I'm big on trying to get coaches to all speak the same language for training. I know that when I walk into our weight room I call things by a certain name and our strength coaches use another term and since I'm in their house I need to speak their language. When I read part of your post:

or

I'm a little worried that we might be speaking a different dialect here. When I see "speed," especially in a thread like this, I assume you are talking about 40m-80m reps that are done all-out and have a LONG recovery (3 minutes or more). And the part about "Tension" I can only really guess at. I assume you meant that you felt like your athletes had too many times that they were recovered from the previous workout before doing another, but you'll need to correct me if I'm wrong.

Getting back to your question of what to do before meets, I don't advocate "training through" meets unless you have very elite high school runners or college and older. Younger athletes really need races to get themselves in shape and to just figure out the events themselves. Last thing you need is an athlete that is always tired before races and either gets discouraged or hits the championship season better rested and not know what to do with him/herself.

I'd rather have my athletes get a few miles in then do through some strides and potentially some light plyometric work if they haven't done any neuromuscular work recently. This might be some hurdle hops, light box jumps into a sand pit, or even skipping. Enough to get their legs to fire but no where near the point that they think they might get any soreness. If its before a championship meet they will go through their dynamic warm-up which takes maybe 35-40 minutes if you include running. But its familiar for them so I have no worries that they'll be tired considering they do it several times a week all season.

I'm really not big on throwing on little reps each day. I know of programs that are very successful doing things like that but I also know many that aren't. If I don't think the stimulus is strong enough for us to see changes or they don't need basic maintenance work then I won't bother doing it.

Does that answer your question a little better?

Hi Ashaman,

I'm glad you're finding this helpful. I really get a lot of value having to put myself in other coach's/runner's shoes. It's a great exercise to make sure that my ideas are well fleshed out which always makes me look at my own program as well. So if you do ever want to ask something outside of the message boards I have an email address linked to my username. I don't check it often but I'd be happy to help where I can.

Getting to your athlete and training I don't think you're far off at all. I'm going to rewrite the plan below and try to elaborate on parts of it.

Monday - Intensive/Extensive tempo

Tuesday - AM: Lift (Olympic or static)

PM: run with 10s pickups

Wednesday - Acceleration/Speed Dev.

Thursday - Intensive/Extensive tempo

Friday - Lift (Olympic or Static) + Run (if applicable)

Saturday - Off

Sunday - 4-6x6s hills + Plyometrics

Hopefully that's a fair translation. I would consider pairing things up a little differently. Right now you have 4 neuromuscular days (Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday, and Sunday). That's a lot even for sprinters, but if there are sprint coaches here that have had success with it I hope they correct me. Its hard to get the power out-put that you want from acceleration/speed development doing it after a lift but it would be more ideal to have them on the same day.

You want your work in the weight room to reinforce what you're doing on the track. I see a lot of programs put hard/heavy lifts after longer aerobic days and I think it just confuses the body. You're telling it that it needs to be efficient and aerobic on the run then wait, you also need to be very explosive and powerful. Our bodies aren't clever enough to make adjustments in both areas as efficiently as if there was just one clear stimulus being addressed in each session. Depending on how early her lifting class is it might be worth getting her on the track for some acceleration/speed development on Monday before that class starts.

Your girl has some aptitude in the mile as well. While I understand the allure of going for more of a 400/800m plan the reality is that you might never find a true 400/800m girl who can run a 4:38 in the 1500m or an 18:45 5k for that matter. Now if she ran those times when she was 15/16 then those days might be past her given how girls develop. But I think its work considering a continuous tempo in place of the second intensive/extensive tempo day. For a 2:27 girl she's probably be looking at 6:49 pace for 10 minutes, 6:57 for 15 minutes, or 7:05 for 20 minutes. Those numbers are from a chart that I use for my 400/800m runners, your girl might find that pretty easy given her endurance, but it has been very good to me for my 800m runners.

On a more general note, I don't disagree with going for more of a 400m slant to get her speed back where it needs to be. To run 2:11 she probably needs to be in the 58 low ball park. I think you can still have a day in there that is on the long side. Our sprint coach does something similar to me where he works short and long at the same time and gradually moves each toward race specific work.

Ron Grigg over at Jacksonville University does the same thing and I've borrowed a lot of his work in my early days of coaching. Ever since I came across his stuff I really haven't had to change a whole lot to our program. He has some good stuff posted on completetrackandfield:

His PowerPoints are pretty helpful but basically say that your "speed" should progress like this:

1. Acceleration development

2. Speed Development

3. 100m race pace

4. 200m race pace (speed endurance)

5. 400m race pace (SE1)

6. 800m pace

And that your "endurance" components should progress like this:

1. Easy runs

2. Continuous tempos

3. 10k pace

4. VO2max (3k pace/ extensive tempo)

5. 1500m pace (intensive tempo)

6.800m pace

Basically they both meet up at the 800m with some overlap with the 400m.

I don't use all of those steps but the progression will give you a pretty good idea of what's going on. I like this because it generally balances itself out the whole season while making sure that you start out with very little lactate production and lets you gradually let athletes get used to workouts with a little more acidity and a little more similar to their eventual race. It also gives you a pretty good feel for phases, in a 6 month progression you can basically allocate a month for each and you'll probably already have a more sound program than many other coaches.

Is there any ability for her to workout before her lifting class? I think you can do a lot if that is the case. But otherwise you have a pretty good grasp on it, I'd just try to drop a neuromuscular day and have one longer day in there. Her endurance is a great tool that a lot of 400m runners will never have, don't let it go to waste.

Yes, thank you. I wasn't involved historically, so I should have used a more generic phrase "intervals on the track" for what I understand was going on Monday and Tuesday. Likely not speed as you define "speed development" earlier in this thread, but a hodgepodge of 200 to 1600 meter reps.

Back to the title of this thread, we have performed 6 * 50 meter hill reps on the 2:00 the last three weeks after an easy run. I've periodically performed these reps the last few years as a broken-down middle-age runner, and I've found I feel different the next day, definitely springier. You made a great point earlier in this thread that is often overlooked, we spend so much time focused on aerobic development for 800+ that we forget speed development.

Calling something "speed" is definitely an easy habit to fall back to; I'm probably still guilty of it from time to time. Most coaches certainly understand the difference but its also a little too easy to find people who call 1k reps "speed work" simply because its faster than their current race pace. Especially in forums like this, where people don't speak in real-time to clear things up, I think that being specific with what you're talking about makes a big difference.