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    Positive Running – Some Comments

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    By on Vern Gambetta's Blog
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    I have great respect for people who are innovators, people who are willing to put their ideas out and put their asses on the line. This is what Frans Bosch has done with his idea on Positive Running. In no way does he propose this as the answer. He is trying to raise some questions, to get all of us to look with different eyes. There is no doubt that the top sprinters of today “look different” to me. In speaking to him, he noticed the same thing, so he set out to hypothesize why. The result is his idea of positive running. I am very familiar with the work of Ralph Mann, having been very involved in the research going into and including the 1984 Olympic Games. His work was a paradigm shift at the time. He forced everyone to take another look at sprinting mechanics. Dr Peter Weyand at Rice University has reaffirmed Mann’s work, not refuted it as many claim. Certainly we all know it is about what happened at ground contact. The amount of force imparted into the ground, the direction of the subsequent force application, but in my opinion no one has really done a good job of looking how at how we set up the leg and foot for ground contact. This is what Bosch and Klomp are forcing us to take a look at.

    I also would like to address another comment by Mark Day – this is not about selling a book or a DVD, this is about stimulating a good intellectual discussion of what is happening in top speed mechanics. These guys (Bosch & Klomp) are two very honest and sincere individuals who are forcing us to look differently at one of the primal activities of man – running, especially running at top speed. For me the book and the DVD are both artistic and very intellectually stimulating. No one is being forced to buy the book or the DVD. Their work is quality. Let’s accept it for what it is, a challenge to conventional wisdom that must be scientifically validated or refuted. It just reminds how much we do not know. There are so many assumptions and myths in coaching that when someone challenges those assumptions they are often looked upon as a pariah.

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    Vern Gambetta

    Vern Gambetta

    Director at Gambetta Sports Training Systems
    Vern is the Director of Gambetta Sports Training Systems. He has been the a conditioning coach for several MLS teams as well as the conditioning consultant to the US Men's World Cup Soccer team. Vern is the former Director of Conditioning for the Chicago White Sox and New York Mets. He has lectured and conducted clinics in Canada, Japan, Australia and Europe and has authored six books and over one hundred articles related to coaching and sport performance in a variety of sports. He has a BA in teaching with a coaching minor and an MA in Education with an emphasis in physical education from Stanford University.
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