Racing flat for base sprint training

as a track athlete and sprinter

I use brooks t7 in the past I thin k they are really good for track work, lets the foot fall and position nicely without too much heal strike and altering my pattern

At the moment, im using a pair of New Balance Fresh foam, and for track these are perfect, though a slight bigger heal, the ride is very good at speed and when doing drills etc

Also a new addition to track trainers are puma faas500 a good alround shoe imo

as for the adidas boost! geeez where to start... for track work I absolutely hate these things, the midsole kills my feet

my .02

Thanks AJ. It's for my kid, and he's worn the Brooks ones before, and they suit his foot ok.

streak lt is 5.6, not 7.4

Wear distance spikes.

Zoom etc wrote:

Wear distance spikes.

They are very light and have little support.

Karma Police wrote:

Zoom etc wrote:

Wear distance spikes.

They are very light and have little support.

Which is exactly what you need.

Zoom etc. wrote:

Karma Police wrote:

They are very light and have little support.

Which is exactly what you need.

Little to no foot support when doing high volume is ideal?

Not according to the coach who no disrespect , I'd wager has more of a clue.

no no no no no.

Let your muscles do the the work for speed.

Karma Police wrote:

Zoom etc. wrote:

Which is exactly what you need.

Little to no foot support when doing high volume is ideal?

Not according to the coach who no disrespect , I'd wager has more of a clue.

Why not support the whole leg then? Knee braces etc.

The foot is self supporting, just like the rest of your body, unless you have boobs.

Karma Police wrote:

Little to no foot support when doing high volume is ideal?

Not according to the coach who no disrespect , I'd wager has more of a clue.

Well go ask your precious little coach then, and stop bothering us. no disrespect.

support? speed work? wrote:

no no no no no.

Let your muscles do the the work for speed.

This is NOT speed work for a sprinter. Not even close.

Try the new balance NB1600. Racing distance flats. I do all my track work in them. It might be a bit more shoe than you want, but try it on before you decide.

What should be obvious by now is that asking distance runners for advice about sprints is not recommended. Now, this is a video showing Yohan Blake and Warren Weir training that letsrun put on youtube a 2 years ago. Notice what they're wearing and what surface they're running on mostly:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9sIPQvGPAEwAlso, this is Dan Pfaff talking about that tempo stuff (which he does NOT do):

Also on block workout days we then go to the Olympic platform and we setup curves of lactate infusion because one of the problems we have in sprinting, at the world class level, is four races in two days at the big championships and so there are huge slopes to these blood lactate levels. The athletes have to learn how to weather very steep lactate introductions into the tissue and then rapid dismissal of it. And that is very different to putting an athlete in tempo training or interval training – during which you would traditionally get an athlete to a certain level of lactate and do work there. Sprinters and Jumpers never encounter that kind of lactate environment in competition so why train them there?

So first of all, I would question the reason for high volume for a sprinter at all. And if you're going to do some volume for conditioning, I would do it on grass like the Jamaicans (we do 3X5X130 track diagonals barefoot on grass until guys coming off football are in shape to do special endurance). As soon as people are in shape, we do 4X30+2X150 indoors then 3X50+2X150 outdoors, in spikes, one day a week, and no tempo at all after November or so.

But if you are going to do stuff like 10X200 or 6X300 intensive tempo, I would do it in regular training shoes, and then do regular sprint training in something better suited to regular sprinting. I would not do 2K of tempo 2-3 times a week in racing flats, nor would I let any kid do workouts like 3X400 full speed special endurance every week in spikes (and then they wonder why all their 400 kids get shin splints, and BTW Clyde Hart never does a workout like this).

Regular shoes let your feet float all over the place. It probably stresses your feet even more to run fast in them.

Thanks for the comments.

When I said sprints, I mean a long sprinter - 400-400 hurdles.

This sort of extensive tempo is only done once a week. Another session on sand dunes once every 1-2 weeks which includes sprints, jumps and longer sand hills.

The other weekly endurance is say 2 x (10 x 100) on short recovery at more like 600 speed, and usually on fake grass rather than track. And 1-2 straight speed development, sleds, plyos etc.

Different seasons so trying to work out what November means, so I guess end of base/transition. Where I'm from at that age we still have 2 comp periods a year - schools and juniors.

I ran for Santa Monica Track Club from 88=92 with Joe Douglas's 400-800 group. We did sprints in flats. I've run in the Nike zoom series for at least 15 years. They have a air pad in the forefoot. I'm a 48 year old masters sprinter and currently train in Nike Men's Air Zoom Fly 2.

Saucony Kinvara may be good for what you want

Karma Police wrote:

Thanks for the comments.

When I said sprints, I mean a long sprinter - 400-400 hurdles.

This sort of extensive tempo is only done once a week. Another session on sand dunes once every 1-2 weeks which includes sprints, jumps and longer sand hills.

The other weekly endurance is say 2 x (10 x 100) on short recovery at more like 600 speed, and usually on fake grass rather than track. And 1-2 straight speed development, sleds, plyos etc.

Different seasons so trying to work out what November means, so I guess end of base/transition. Where I'm from at that age we still have 2 comp periods a year - schools and juniors.

Here's Jeremy Wariner in training a few days before the London Olympics:

I've simply seen or read about way too many kids with shin splits and stress reactions from doing way too much volume on way too hard of surfaces. Also, flats help very little in reducing ground reaction forces. This is a paper that was originally a masters thesis at BYU comparing spikes, flats, and running shoes that got quite a bit of exposure a decade ago:

Now--during competition training--my club and I are doing this:

Sun 3X40 + 3X30fly (60m leadin)

Tue 5X50

Thu 3X50 + 2X150

Sat 5X50

This is what Glen Mills, Bolt, and the Racers Track Club have been observed doing durng comp: Alternating days of 100-150 with days of 40-60. And I do this myself (I'm in my 50s) using the Adidas Accelerator for the 150s and Prime SP for everything else. But this is not what we do during general prep, where everything is on grass or hills from Nov-Jan. I don't care whether you talk to Bolt, Asafa Powell, Kirani James, or any other Caribbean sprinter, they will ALL tell you the advantages of doing high volume prep work on soft surfaces. And if you're not actually sprinting, you don't need to be wearing sprint shoes.