Elitetrack: Sport Training & Conditioning

Background info:

Age- 25
Weight- 180 lbs
Height- 6ft even

I live and train in Wisconsin, which creates some interesting training problems when it comes to working speed through the winter. I’m hoping that I can continue using the track at my former college, but am also looking at the possibilities of training at a closer high school’s indoor track that is actually bigger and would be easier on my body.

Track PR’s updated 7/18/10

55m- 6.27
60m- 6.78
100m- 10.54 (10.38w)
200m- 21.40 (20.97w) / Indoor 21.75 (flat 200m track)

Training history

2003- First year of track
  55m-  6.74
  100m- 11.18
2004- Did nothing
2005- 3 months of club track, first year lifting
  100m- 10.89
  200m- 21.94
2006- Freshmen Year
  55m-  6.44
  100m- 10.84
  200m- 21.74 / 22.55 indoors
2007- Soph Year (Injured for outdoors)
  55m-  6.42
  200m- 22.33 indoors
2008- Junior Year (missed half of outdoors with a hamstring pull)
  55m-  6.37
  100m- 10.81
  200m- 21.47/ 21.97 indoors
2009- Senior Year (missed peak due to another hamstring issue)
  55m-  6.34
  100m- 10.54
  200m- 21.40/ 21.91 indoors
2010- First year out of college
  55m- 6.27
  100m-10.38w/10.59
  200m-20.97w/21.35/21.75 indoors

Goals for the next year:

100m- To have good enough weather that I can compete in a 100m without freezing my ass off. Oh, I can’t control that? Then to be under 10.50 consistantly and wind legal.

200m- I hit a windy 20.9 last season but never had good weather to run another. I am going to save up money during the year so I can travel south during the late spring so that I can get into some good weather meets and try to open up in the 20.x’s this year.

Rough outline/idea for my training will have my first comp phase starting mid January and peaking meets at some D-1 banked tracks in mid to late Feb if possible. If thats not possible then at I’ll compete at some last chance meets in the midwest.

Testing

Excellent stuff! Excited to read your training…

Do you coach youself?

Wow, under 21 seconds would be some achievement, hope your pre-season goes well!

Josh is very detailed, disciplined and analytical in his planning and training habits, a true life student of the sport. This will be a very solid journal for those planning to follow along.
I wish you the best Hurley, can’t wait to watch you let loose again!

Thanks guys. I am coaching myself this year, but that shouldn’t be too much of a problem as I have been doing my own off season work since I started college. Our conference had a rule that didn’t allow any coaches contact from September through December, although that recently changed.

I think a sub 21 200 is definitely possible, but we were under pretty heavy loads during the season because the weight of the team was placed squarely on our relay member’s shoulders for conference. Because of this we all had to do 4-5 events, with rounds in most, and the training load to prep for it was high. My head coach was a dictatorial distance coach who come conference time enters whoever he wants in the events he wants them to be in, so we have to be prepared for damn near anything. I’m going to be dropping the volume a bit and seeing where that takes me.

Thanks J, I’ll be running a few meets early on around here, UW-W, Point, etc but then I think I’m going to head south for some banked tracks and 60s as much as possible.

Training since the injury happened was mainly rehab until a few weeks ago along with general fitness. For the last two weeks however I have been doing a lot of remedial type exercises, increasing flexibility, hip mobility and coordination, and body awareness. These have included hip mobility and medball circuits, along with gymnastics including cartwheels, rolls, basic breakdancing and martial arts movements, handsprings, backflips, etc.

I’ve also been remedying the lack of upper body strength that has plagued me for years simply because I detested upperbody lifting. I’ve been doing pulls, dips, and other work on olympic rings as well as playground equipment which has garnered some pretty interesting exchanges with parents who tend to either be concerned that I am an adult playing in a park to those looking for workout tips.

December 19… you know the place… 2x55m…. make it a reeeeal hot winter .

Haha, hell yeah. Give us a good chance to see where we’re at with some friendly competition eh?

I had testing planned for tomorrow and Thurs, however I am jobless and got a call asking me to help with some landscaping so it looks like testing will happen saturday or sunday. Can’t turn down the money!

Because of this, todays workout became a hard upperbody and coordination day, doing mostly gymnastics. I did 2 hours worth of light tumbling passes on grass (ie backhandspring-> back tuck, cartwheel series/aerials), and did some ring and bar work plus dismounts.

Ring and bar work was muscle ups, pull ups, dips and swings. Bar work was just kips, swings and small flyaways. I don’t do any dangerous stuff because this is all either in my garage for the rings or the park for a steel high bar.

Hip flexibility and core strength is really improving from the regular use of gymnastics so far. I’m glad I put it in my summer work. Looking forward to testing but I think the numbers aren’t going to be the best. I have no idea how much the landscaping will take out of me.

What types of test are you using?

vert, standing broad and triple, ohb, blf, clean and bench

once i’m further into my gpp I’ll test 30m times as well

Landscaping work didn’t take too much out of me today. Rebuilt a retaining wall and then weeded and put down mulch. It was cloudy all day and only like 55 degrees so I feel pretty good right now.

Tomorrow I am going to do a light shake out and flexibility routine, and then maybe a light jump circuit or something to prep for testing. As long as I feel well I am going to test on Friday.

Today’s shake out was a light game of tennis, some flexibility work and then a random pick up soccer game with some 40 yr old at the park named Azziz. He played in his business clothes and shoes and was actually pretty good.

Testing is tomorrow and I feel great, so hopefully the weather is good.

Testing day was today and I’m a bit bummed at the results, even though they are what I was expecting. I had to test early this morning because I ended up having a lot to do today, so I was tired. I also haven’t done much lifting aside from body weight stuff since my injury, except for some strength work after for rehab. That being said, my test numbers suffered from the lack of power work, but that doesn’t matter to me as its my first test and there are many more to come in the following months.

Enough excuses, here are the results. Tests were done on grass in shoes, not spikes, with a friend doing the marking.

Standing Broad- 9’ 10-1/2”

Standing 3x broad- 32’ 1”
  - I did this because the lawn wasn’t quite smooth enough for me to be comfortably triple jumping without worrying about blowing out an ankle.

Vert Jump- 33 1/2”
  -done by full reach up (yes I extended and leaned for most height on the initial measurement) Reach was 93 1/2”, mark was 127”

OHB- 44’ 3”
  -this one is a bit sketchy because I didn’t have a shotput. Instead I found a large rock that weighed 16.4 lbs and used that. Regardless, I will continue to use that for my tests so the results will still be comparable vs each other.

BLF- 42’ 7”

How close should the BLF and OHB be? I would have imagined that the OHB would have been a bit further.

I didn’t get a chance to test weights today due to time constraints. Those will have to wait until the next test in 4 weeks. I don’t want to test tomorrow when I start my workouts on Monday.

I think its funnier that you found out the weight of the rock than you actually using one, but good improv!  Having your OHB being the longer distance is usually the norm.

Man i hate imperial measurments…lol…good job though