[jjh999]

jjh999 on April 17, 2003 at 10:38 pm #8344

In response to the evolution of the ‘Mechanism of 100m fatigue’ thread, I decided to start one re: the 200m.

Carson brought up the question about the maintenance of speed, rhythm, etc. after the 1st 100m. I think that is important to teach the athlete that they can not blast the entire turn (unless they are way out in lane 8…). I’ve had good results by using the distribution of a very hard 1st 50m (we practice this so they know exactly how far/long to go). From there, the focus is locking in that rhythm and focusing on maintenance of posture. It’s amazing how much better the athletes finish when they follow this distribution. So many coaches watch their kids falter down the stretch and say, “He needs more strength work”. That may be true, but many times I watch athletes completely sell out for 100m and crawl in, when if they managed their energy more efficiently, better results would follow.

Thoughts?

[Kebba Tolbert]

Kebba Tolbert on April 17, 2003 at 11:05 pm #19790

this could turn into a interesting discussion… i’ll post after practice

[QUIKAZHELL]

QUIKAZHELL on April 18, 2003 at 12:21 am #19791

jj,
i agree. i see alot of runners also try and blast out the entire curve and dont have much left. however when i run the 200 which is my best race (21.2h) i get out like you said but i dont know if im so much focusing on running a very hard 50 and then locking in that rythrm as you said. how i look at it is i get out hard staying realxed increasing speed up to 50 meters and at the 150 mark start to burn and slingshot off the curve and open up downhill. im not sure if what i said made much sense but i have been a pretty sucessful 200 runner thus far. I also feel it depends on strength/speed endurance. i have noticed alot of runners that can beat me in the 100 cant hang with me in the 200 and if they can its only for 175 meters then im gone.

when i ran 21.2 it was in the summer as i set my schedule to peak at that time i ran 10.6 the same day. it was handtime but most of the summer meets i run in are. my best during the outdoor collegiate season was 11.00 FAT and 22.02 FAT. what do you think of a runner that can basiucally just double his 100 time in a 200? what are his strengths and weaknesses?

[jjh999]

jjh999 on April 18, 2003 at 12:37 am #19792

Man, this board is fun…

I have a couple of unique anectdotal perspectives on this…

Re: 200m race distribution: Last season, I had the opportunity to work with a freshman that had a PB of 22.11 in the 200m. At the NCAA DIII meet, he PBd @ 21.34. Four weeks earlier he had run 21.44. The same athlete also had results earlier in the year of 21.8x a 2-3x’s. There were no major differences in health or fatigue during the 4 runs…the difference: Execution. During the 21.8x runs, he pressed the entire curve and fell apart coming home…(keep in mind, this was an athlete who was consistently splitting 47.low in his 3rd race of the day at meets, so stamina was not a huge issue). When he rationed his effort properly, he was able relax coming home and pass people as they tied up. He often commented to me how easy it was coming home when he didn’t press the first 10-11s of the race.

Re: Your 100, 200 times: Keep working to improve your 100m time…the 200 will come. As your 100m time drops (via better acceleration mechanics, maximum velocity mechanics, and the ability to hold posture at maxV), the 200 time will drop accordingly. Once the 100m time begins to show improvement, it is important that race-specific drills are performed in practice: practice the execution of the first 150…don’t just blast it. Then when you get into a competitive situation, you’ll feel as if you’ve been there before…

I was very similar to you in college: I was much more effective over 200m b/c I didn’t have very good starting mechanics or a decent level of strength (I was WEAK). Once I graduated and made a commitment to getting stronger, all of a sudden my 100m improved to the point where I became a 100m specialist (10.10w, 10.25 legal). Funny how things work out…

Sorry for the ramble…gotta get to practice.

JJ

[Mike Young]

Mike Young on April 23, 2003 at 3:10 am #19793

I think hitting the first 30-50m hard is the the way to go for both the 200m and 400m. I can think of two main reasons for this:

1. Momentum development: once you get your body moving fast it’s going to have a tendency to stay moving fast (according to my friend Newton).

2. The time frame (3-5 seconds) is short enough to not have any serious metabolic consequences. It’s almost short enough where we can think of it as cheating our body because we’re able to produce maximum forces without the consequences. This is a result of the the body running solely on the ATP-PC system during this time frame. If however, an athlete continues to really push hard beyond the point of ATP reserve their will be some serious metabolic consequences which will catch up with the athlete after about 6-10 seconds.

ELITETRACK Founder

[Kebba Tolbert]

Kebba Tolbert on April 23, 2003 at 3:55 am #19794

i agree with Mike….

i think that you’ve got to run the first 60m like a 60m dash and then float. i like have athletes then focus on something technical to “keep them smooth”. too many athletes lose focus towards the end of the turn, however, and stop pushing out. they anticipate the end of the turn before it actually comes….. so they miss the “slingshot effect”

I used to have my athletes always walk the track when they got to meets so they would know what was where. Is the turn 80, 100m, or 120m. If you just tell the athlete run the turn hard, run the first half of the turn hard, or work the straightaway… you could end up in big trouble depending on the venue.

beyond that i think that distribution is still an issue that has to be individualized to a degree. how long do you float for? do you work 90-110m? 90-120m and then carry that momemtium through 150m.

Boo made an interesting point a few years ago about the 200m being a much more neural than metabolic event and felt that a lot of the breakdowns were due to poor distributiion and poor posture. so he felt it was very impt to maintain posture and postural awareness in the last portion of the race so as to maintain elasitc qualities, conserve stride length, and maintain oscilllation/undulation of the hip and shoulders.

many years ag… Dan about the women’s 400m at the ’89 or ’90 TAC meet and said
that effort distribution was fairly poor because too many of them gave away so much at the beginning of the race by not accelertating properly (from a technical, postural, and a speed standpoiint). So they ended up in really bad positions later in the race because they weren’t effic. early.

-Kebba

[2belite]

2belite on April 23, 2003 at 10:21 am #19795

“many years ag… Dan about the women’s 400m at the ’89 or ’90 TAC meet and said
that effort distribution was fairly poor because too many of them gave away so much at the beginning of the race by not accelertating properly (from a technical, postural, and a speed standpoiint). So they ended up in really bad positions later in the race because they weren’t effic. early.” ( Kebba)

Kebba, can you go into this some more.
Thanks

[Todd Lane]

Todd Lane on April 24, 2003 at 4:03 am #19796

[i]Originally posted by ktolbert[/i]

Boo made an interesting point a few years ago about the 200m being a much more neural than metabolic event and felt that a lot of the breakdowns were due to poor distributiion and poor posture. so he felt it was very impt to maintain posture and postural awareness in the last portion of the race so as to maintain elasitc qualities, conserve stride length, and maintain oscilllation/undulation of the hip and shoulders.

-Kebba

kt-
i think that’s probably the most overlooked part of the 200.
you may have been at nacatfa when hart talked, i wasn’t but fetzer shared his notes with me. one of things i remember was hart was big on the fact that 40 seconds was about when lactic acid became a performance deteremint through accumulation.
i’ve always taken from that, that a race in 20-24 seconds is largely more neural than metabolic fatigue.
i can tell when our kids are running fast, because their hips haven’t left their feet behind.

as far as momentum- in south georgia it goes like this– you boot scootin boogie into a fast rhythm from the get go, cause you ain’t going to go slow to fast.

heard vince anderson talk this summer @ Level III, he mentioned how he puts a cone at 80 meters in practice. They do starts on the curve working to that 80 meter cone as far as getting out and on it.