Posted In: Blog Discussion
It’s been ages since my last real post on ELITETRACK and I don’t have a legitimate excuse. So I figured it’s only fitting that to get out of my blogging rut, I post the work of someone else. Here’s the very interesting slidedeck of Mladen Jovanovic on perioidization for sprinters. Mladen explores some fundamental concepts that are important for planning out training that many lose sight of.
ELITETRACK Founder
What do you think people lose sight of, Mike?
It seems quite over-complicated, to be frank. I don’t really know how one is to look at this and have any usable insight into periodization in a practical sense, not to mention, managing the competitive period (in both individual and team sports) is arguably the most difficult portion of planning and sorely ignored.
What do you think people lose sight of, Mike?
It seems quite over-complicated, to be frank. I don’t really know how one is to look at this and have any usable insight into periodization in a practical sense, not to mention, managing the competitive period (in both individual and team sports) is arguably the most difficult portion of planning and sorely ignored.
Davan you are a knowledgable guy. What do you think would be important aspects about periodization we should see covered? Could you shed light on the subject?
"Nature hides her secret because of her essential loftiness, but not by means of ruse." -Albert Einstein
I am not sure the purpose of your question, since I am not the one doing presentations on the subject.
Either way, my issue is that it vastly over-complicates the issue, it leaves out tons of the most relevant considerations to make, and frankly, periodization should be considered AFTER you have analyzed what the athlete responds to in the context of the fitness-fatigue model (this is what I generally subscribe to). Is it really worth debating block vs concurrent periodization when you can do to almost any D1 track meet in the US and see more than half the athletes warming-up improperly, fueling questionably, and have athletic trainers that think ice is the end all solution? It it worth it if your athlete is struggling to even make the regional meet at NCAAs?
One of the biggest problems I have with these theory-jerk fests, when it comes to periodization, is the fact that most of the athletes involved need to improve everything, substantially, for their season to have much relevance. If you are talking D1 T&F and a guy running 10.5/21.1/47.0/1:50.00/14.00, you will be lucky to qualify for regionals. You need to worry about improving specifically in your events every mesocycle to even stand a chance of making nationals, yet we’re worried about having athletes ready for some fantasy day/period where they will peak? That’s a silly way of addressing the training year, in my opinion.
I subscribe to the basic fitness-fatigue model. Pretty much every periodization strategy has resulted in world record performances and each continues to be successful. It is more about the art of coaching and implementing said system and having athletes that buy into it, work hard, have the talent, and stay healthy. In the context of nearly every athlete that isn’t a shoe in for nationals or a lane in the final, this approach of planning out some peak and focusing on the veracity of periodization methods simply doesn’t work. You need to be getting better all the time. You cannot afford to get away from the high performance level or you will be too far away from your goals. In that context, you need to figure out what method at a meso level is leading to continued improved performance. This will be situation-dependent, based on facility access, athlete development, weather, competition schedule, and numerous other factors that make periodization a secondary topic.
If you live in Iceland you cannot take the same approach to jumping/sprinting/hurdling as they do in Jamaica. If you are a lock to final (assuming you’re healthy), you need to plan differently than someone who needs to improve substantially to even qualify for the meet. These kinds of considerations should be driving your decision of what type of ‘periodization’ you should be using. Hell, with half to 3/4 of the coaches always talking about Plan B (and C,D,E,F,etc.) what is even the point of that perhaps?
If you focus on the fitness-fatigue model and aiming for continued advancement in your event/goal and things directly related to it, you will come to a scheme that is most appropriate and will likely vary athlete-to-athlete, team-to-team, etc. Starting by selecting a periodization model is silly. The presentation itself just further complicates and needlessly overcomplicated subject.
I am not sure the purpose of your question, since I am not the one doing presentations on the subject.
Either way, my issue is that it vastly over-complicates the issue, it leaves out tons of the most relevant considerations to make, and frankly, periodization should be considered AFTER you have analyzed what the athlete responds to in the context of the fitness-fatigue model (this is what I generally subscribe to). Is it really worth debating block vs concurrent periodization when you can do to almost any D1 track meet in the US and see more than half the athletes warming-up improperly, fueling questionably, and have athletic trainers that think ice is the end all solution? It it worth it if your athlete is struggling to even make the regional meet at NCAAs?
One of the biggest problems I have with these theory-jerk fests, when it comes to periodization, is the fact that most of the athletes involved need to improve everything, substantially, for their season to have much relevance. If you are talking D1 T&F and a guy running 10.5/21.1/47.0/1:50.00/14.00, you will be lucky to qualify for regionals. You need to worry about improving specifically in your events every mesocycle to even stand a chance of making nationals, yet we’re worried about having athletes ready for some fantasy day/period where they will peak? That’s a silly way of addressing the training year, in my opinion.
I subscribe to the basic fitness-fatigue model. Pretty much every periodization strategy has resulted in world record performances and each continues to be successful. It is more about the art of coaching and implementing said system and having athletes that buy into it, work hard, have the talent, and stay healthy. In the context of nearly every athlete that isn’t a shoe in for nationals or a lane in the final, this approach of planning out some peak and focusing on the veracity of periodization methods simply doesn’t work. You need to be getting better all the time. You cannot afford to get away from the high performance level or you will be too far away from your goals. In that context, you need to figure out what method at a meso level is leading to continued improved performance. This will be situation-dependent, based on facility access, athlete development, weather, competition schedule, and numerous other factors that make periodization a secondary topic.
If you live in Iceland you cannot take the same approach to jumping/sprinting/hurdling as they do in Jamaica. If you are a lock to final (assuming you’re healthy), you need to plan differently than someone who needs to improve substantially to even qualify for the meet. These kinds of considerations should be driving your decision of what type of ‘periodization’ you should be using. Hell, with half to 3/4 of the coaches always talking about Plan B (and C,D,E,F,etc.) what is even the point of that perhaps?
If you focus on the fitness-fatigue model and aiming for continued advancement in your event/goal and things directly related to it, you will come to a scheme that is most appropriate and will likely vary athlete-to-athlete, team-to-team, etc. Starting by selecting a periodization model is silly. The presentation itself just further complicates and needlessly overcomplicated subject.
Thank you for the quick and solid response. I cannot speak for Mike but from my own experience I think most of us coaches on this website don’t want to fall victim to the issues we are discussing. I do think it is important to have a very deep or master like knowledge of these concepts to maximize talent. I have stated many times that I want the athlete to improve globally. However, I believe their needs to be a long term plan certainly with a new athletes as you could make grievous errors before the kid reaches a level of fitness to properly display what that athlete might need to move forward.
I do agree those without mastery knowledge might limit there athletes progression by not having the correct training model or plan. I have seen many athletes never even get out of the “gate” so to speak because of improper planning or holding back key training waiting for a peak.
I believe that horizontal jumps prove your fears or concerns to be correct. As speed and sprinting have become truly a side note in a lot of jump coaches training. Simple physics would tell you faster you are on the ground the farther your potential flight. However, recently we have not see great sprint/jump combos. This jump regression is not just a USA issue. If you look at men across the globe long jump is down.
"Nature hides her secret because of her essential loftiness, but not by means of ruse." -Albert Einstein
I know for a fact multiple coaches on this site have fallen victim to it, whether they will admit it or not or whether or not they are even aware of it. Not time to call out people, but it is what it is.
I like long term planning, but that is more relevant for age group athletes and people still going through maturity. For example, there was a recent documentary documenting how many Swedes have had terrible injuries and careers cut short. Poor planning long-term? Perhaps, but they got multiple Olympic gold medals in a very limited talent pool, so I would say it is an incredible success, even if it was at the cost of potentially longer careers.
The concepts discussed/debated in the presentation are just silly to even consider IMO without knowing every aspect of the situation and the athletes involved. For example, I think an extremely specific, concurrent, high frequency approach can work fantastically and might lead to ultimate performance in many events. It has worked dramatically well in weightlifting and the Greeks had incredible success with it through Tzekos. With that said, it is incompatible with almost ever situation an average coach or athlete is in since it would require exceptional amounts of soft tissue therapy, full time training (aka LOTS of funding and support), and likely, illegal or grey area recovery means. Likewise, I think a program like Clyde Hart’s is an utter joke for most people trying to hit ultimate performance in any event (yes, even the 400m), but it might make perfect sense if you only care about 4×4 titles, you get dozens of new and extremely talented horses every year in an unlimited supply, and you will guarantee yourself a shot in the final by simply insuring people are healthy and not fat. In that context, it might be a great program.
Without the context, the whole discussion is nothing but a circlejerk that won’t help us get anywhere or change our programs in a positive way.
Well is Mladen not arguing for contextual matters?
As for injury setbacks the problem is coaching. Overuse injuries is quite a clear message. All you have to do adapt the training to the context. You can have a progressiv template. But when the achilles starts to hurt be flexibel.
Well is Mladen not arguing for contextual matters?
As for injury setbacks the problem is coaching. Overuse injuries is quite a clear message. All you have to do adapt the training to the context. You can have a progressiv template. But when the achilles starts to hurt be flexibel.
Where did I say he isn’t? I know English isn’t either of your first languages, but try to understand that I believe he is over-complicating matters for the numerous reasons I have described.
I know for a fact multiple coaches on this site have fallen victim to it, whether they will admit it or not or whether or not they are even aware of it. Not time to call out people, but it is what it is.
I like long term planning, but that is more relevant for age group athletes and people still going through maturity. For example, there was a recent documentary documenting how many Swedes have had terrible injuries and careers cut short. Poor planning long-term? Perhaps, but they got multiple Olympic gold medals in a very limited talent pool, so I would say it is an incredible success, even if it was at the cost of potentially longer careers.
The concepts discussed/debated in the presentation are just silly to even consider IMO without knowing every aspect of the situation and the athletes involved. For example, I think an extremely specific, concurrent, high frequency approach can work fantastically and might lead to ultimate performance in many events. It has worked dramatically well in weightlifting and the Greeks had incredible success with it through Tzekos. With that said, it is incompatible with almost ever situation an average coach or athlete is in since it would require exceptional amounts of soft tissue therapy, full time training (aka LOTS of funding and support), and likely, illegal or grey area recovery means. Likewise, I think a program like Clyde Hart’s is an utter joke for most people trying to hit ultimate performance in any event (yes, even the 400m), but it might make perfect sense if you only care about 4×4 titles, you get dozens of new and extremely talented horses every year in an unlimited supply, and you will guarantee yourself a shot in the final by simply insuring people are healthy and not fat. In that context, it might be a great program.
Without the context, the whole discussion is nothing but a circlejerk that won’t help us get anywhere or change our programs in a positive way.
Where have you seen this be an issue with Clyde Harts program outside of Baylor? I know many coaches who have adopted his methods with great success. For example, our summer track teams 200/400 group, Sean Burris teams in St. Louis and yes even my program. I have actually trained a short to long group and long to short group through an entire season. The long to short group preformed way better. In addition it’s important to know I didn’t copy cat his program but took some of his methods and blended into my own program. Another interesting note is we have only had one hamstring pull in six years along with very few shin splints. I would be interested to hear your opinion in further detail about Hart.
"Nature hides her secret because of her essential loftiness, but not by means of ruse." -Albert Einstein
[quote author="davan" date="1375241629"]I know for a fact multiple coaches on this site have fallen victim to it, whether they will admit it or not or whether or not they are even aware of it. Not time to call out people, but it is what it is.
I like long term planning, but that is more relevant for age group athletes and people still going through maturity. For example, there was a recent documentary documenting how many Swedes have had terrible injuries and careers cut short. Poor planning long-term? Perhaps, but they got multiple Olympic gold medals in a very limited talent pool, so I would say it is an incredible success, even if it was at the cost of potentially longer careers.
The concepts discussed/debated in the presentation are just silly to even consider IMO without knowing every aspect of the situation and the athletes involved. For example, I think an extremely specific, concurrent, high frequency approach can work fantastically and might lead to ultimate performance in many events. It has worked dramatically well in weightlifting and the Greeks had incredible success with it through Tzekos. With that said, it is incompatible with almost ever situation an average coach or athlete is in since it would require exceptional amounts of soft tissue therapy, full time training (aka LOTS of funding and support), and likely, illegal or grey area recovery means. Likewise, I think a program like Clyde Hart’s is an utter joke for most people trying to hit ultimate performance in any event (yes, even the 400m), but it might make perfect sense if you only care about 4×4 titles, you get dozens of new and extremely talented horses every year in an unlimited supply, and you will guarantee yourself a shot in the final by simply insuring people are healthy and not fat. In that context, it might be a great program.
Without the context, the whole discussion is nothing but a circlejerk that won’t help us get anywhere or change our programs in a positive way.
Where have you seen this be an issue with Clyde Harts program outside of Baylor? I know many coaches who have adopted his methods with great success. For example, our summer track teams 200/400 group, Sean Burris teams in St. Louis and yes even my program. I have actually trained a short to long group and long to short group through an entire season. The long to short group preformed way better. In addition it’s important to know I didn’t copy cat his program but took some of his methods and blended into my own program. Another interesting note is we have only had one hamstring pull in six years along with very few shin splints. I would be interested to hear your opinion in further detail about Hart.[/quote]
Interesting. Are we talking a 10 week high school season or a full 40ish weeks?
What are you defining as long to short? Clyde Hart’s program doesn’t exactly get progressively shorter. It goes from higher volume, slower speed to lower volume, higher speed. The rep distances aren’t dramatically different. I don’t really understand what you are calling long to short in this situation. It’s like not he is running fast 600s or 800s to start his season and then cuts it down.
I will need more detail because I’m perplexed when you say you took elements. What elements? It literally is “start with 12 x 200 and drop a rep and a second each month” essentially. Yeah, I’m dumbing it down, but that’s essentially what it amounts to. That isn’t what I would call long to short if you want to buy into that terminology. SMTC where guys are running FAST 500s and the like for 100m guys in the fall is much closer to the interpretation off ‘long to short’ (although they’re still doing starts and ‘technique work’ over short distances early on).
I think those programs can have situational success because people don’t get fat and often don’t get hurt if they are durable and the coach/athlete relationship isn’t capable of handling any intensity in a program (ie poor or no attention to recovery). If you are fit, healthy, young, and not close to your potential, you’ll PR just showing up. In the context of most HS and college programs, athletes might even need these ridiculous tempo volumes since their coaches and teams subject them to ridiculous volumes of meets that might leave a faster, but less fit athlete out of commission. When I was in high school, we had at least 2 and often 3 meets a week, of which would involve 100/200/4×1/4×4 and the other an invite with prelims and finals in the 1/2 and then a 4×1. That’s insane volume. If you come into that without a lot of fitness, you’ll crumble if you are putting in a lot of effort into the races. That’s where talented lazy, potentially even uncaring athletes are key. They can survive that even if they aren’t perfectly fit because they are essentially performing submaximally.
The shin splint issue, I honestly don’t believe that for a second. Shin splints have been documented to be as influenced by volume and frequency as anything else. People don’t get shin splints after they sprint for the bus. They do get shin splints the first time they go for a slow long jog. I get bouts of shin splints after most lay-offs (ie taking a few weeks off at the end of the season and starting GPP). The worst shin splints I ever had came from that kind of training and it is the worst I’ve seen in others as well.h
What are you defining as long to short? Clyde Hart’s program doesn’t exactly get progressively shorter. It goes from higher volume, slower speed to lower volume, higher speed. The rep distances aren’t dramatically different. I don’t really understand what you are calling long to short in this situation. It’s like not he is running fast 600s or 800s to start his season and then cuts it down.
I will need more detail because I’m perplexed when you say you took elements. What elements? It literally is “start with 12 x 200 and drop a rep and a second each month” essentially. Yeah, I’m dumbing it down, but that’s essentially what it amounts to. That isn’t what I would call long to short if you want to buy into that terminology. SMTC where guys are running FAST 500s and the like for 100m guys in the fall is much closer to the interpretation off ‘long to short’ (although they’re still doing starts and ‘technique work’ over short distances early on).
I think those programs can have situational success because people don’t get fat and often don’t get hurt if they are durable and the coach/athlete relationship isn’t capable of handling any intensity in a program (ie poor or no attention to recovery). If you are fit, healthy, young, and not close to your potential, you’ll PR just showing up. In the context of most HS and college programs, athletes might even need these ridiculous tempo volumes since their coaches and teams subject them to ridiculous volumes of meets that might leave a faster, but less fit athlete out of commission. When I was in high school, we had at least 2 and often 3 meets a week, of which would involve 100/200/4×1/4×4 and the other an invite with prelims and finals in the 1/2 and then a 4×1. That’s insane volume. If you come into that without a lot of fitness, you’ll crumble if you are putting in a lot of effort into the races. That’s where talented lazy, potentially even uncaring athletes are key. They can survive that even if they aren’t perfectly fit because they are essentially performing submaximally.
I guess going from long runs from 16×200 to 6×200 is not a large change in load? I don’t go about that exactly with my tempo days.
ZACK I think you know me well enough that my kids and other coaches in the area don’t just train for two and half months. We have winter conditioning, high school season, and summer track. That can push the season into the six month range. That of course doesn’t include athletes who might be long sprinters moving up that do xc.
As for shin splits I guess you should come down and see us train. We have a 5k xc course on campus allowing us to do daily soft surface work. In addition to an field turf in the middle of our track were we can do most of our drills and replace track work acceleration, max v work if kids are tender. Now you don’t have to believe me but you are always welcome to come see us train. You might be surprised.
"Nature hides her secret because of her essential loftiness, but not by means of ruse." -Albert Einstein
>I guess going from long runs from 16×200 to 6×200 is not a large change in load? I don’t go about that exactly with my tempo days.
I don’t understand this post and its context in my post.
>As for shin splits I guess you should come down and see us train. We have a 5k xc course on campus allowing us to do daily soft surface work. In addition to an field turf in the middle of our track were we can do most of our drills and replace track work acceleration, max v work if kids are tender. Now you don’t have to believe me but you are always welcome to come see us train. You might be surprised.
That has nothing to do with what I said.
I must ask you if you’re doing tempo, warm-ups, and drills on grass why you cannot do your acceleration and max velocity work there as well.
Volume and frequency are the reasons why you get shin splints (assuming you don’t have some crazy foot contacts). Hell, I’ve gotten them using only grass surfaces doing tempo only if I pushed volume too quickly.
Surface will have an impact obviously as well. You can’t compare an activity on grass to one on a synthetic surface.
I must ask you if you’re doing tempo, warm-ups, and drills on grass why you cannot do your acceleration and max velocity work there as well.
Volume and frequency are the reasons why you get shin splints (assuming you don’t have some crazy foot contacts). Hell, I’ve gotten them using only grass surfaces doing tempo only if I pushed volume too quickly.
Surface will have an impact obviously as well. You can’t compare an activity on grass to one on a synthetic surface.
The drills are at the beginning of practice which starts at the track. Hence field turf. The field is marked and so is the track so it’s quicker to measure distance then going over to the grass and wheeling out measurements. We do our longer intervals on our grass course because it gives us a large area to do longer intervals with less drastic turns.
Your comment about the repeat tempos on the 200s was a little bit of confusing and I was trying to get some clarity on the point you were trying to make on long to short methods.
How do you progress you training throughout the year and what type of athletes do you coach?
"Nature hides her secret because of her essential loftiness, but not by means of ruse." -Albert Einstein
Davan to answer a couple other questions. We do not do any long runs at a slow pace with our sprinters at any point in the year. Like Hart has in the fall. We don’t start our season with the largest volume and go down. Instead start with moderate volumes climb three weeks and unload the forth week or a week that makes sense for recovery(like spring break). We do of course cut volume in our peaking phase. I also try to do three peaks a la Charlie Francis one during the winter, one at the end of high school, and one in summer track. However, our themes our similar to Harts days and so is the structure and purpose. We do have days were our kids run special endurance 450s or other distances depending on the week. We do have tempo 200 bit not on Monday as that doesn’t make sense in terms of the quality workout we are trying to get. We usually do 200s on Tuesday. Active recovery Wednesday. Then Thursday acceleration, max v or race modeling. In our high school I control the schedule so we don’t have our kids run in more then one meet a week unless we are trying to mimic a state meet like scenario (which is held over two days). That way we usually have premeet Friday and race day Saturday.
One of the main things I have realized since going to Hart like training is our kids can handle more work then you might expect and my athletes have improved more year to year then previously when we were doing much less volume and higher intensity. Most of these young ladies improved each year in the program hitting their best as a senior.
"Nature hides her secret because of her essential loftiness, but not by means of ruse." -Albert Einstein
Davan to answer a couple other questions. We do not do any long runs at a slow pace with our sprinters at any point in the year. Like Hart has in the fall. We don’t start our season with the largest volume and go down. Instead start with moderate volumes climb three weeks and unload the forth week or a week that makes sense for recovery(like spring break). We do of course cut volume in our peaking phase. I also try to do three peaks a la Charlie Francis one during the winter, one at the end of high school, and one in summer track. However, our themes our similar to Harts days and so is the structure and purpose. We do have days were our kids run special endurance 450s or other distances depending on the week. We do have tempo 200 bit not on Monday as that doesn’t make sense in terms of the quality workout we are trying to get. We usually do 200s on Tuesday. Active recovery Wednesday. Then Thursday acceleration, max v or race modeling. In our high school I control the schedule so we don’t have our kids run in more then one meet a week unless we are trying to mimic a state meet like scenario (which is held over two days). That way we usually have premeet Friday and race day Saturday.
One of the main things I have realized since going to Hart like training is our kids can handle more work then you might expect and my athletes have improved more year to year then previously when we were doing much less volume and higher intensity. Most of these young ladies improved each year in the program hitting their best as a senior.
"Nature hides her secret because of her essential loftiness, but not by means of ruse." -Albert Einstein
The drills are at the beginning of practice which starts at the track. Hence field turf. The field is marked and so is the track so it’s quicker to measure distance then going over to the grass and wheeling out measurements. We do our longer intervals on our grass course because it gives us a large area to do longer intervals with less drastic turns.
I asked you why are you comparing speed work on the track with tempo work on the grass. Why not put the speed work on the grass? Softer surfaces are more compliant and easier on the legs. Color me unsurprised that low volume tempo work on grass is easier on legs than max velocity work on the track. Inappropriate comparison. How about 10x200m of tempo on the track and 12x20m block starts? That’s a similarly silly comparison. You get shin splints from acute changes in total loading, particularly volume and frequency. Intensity is 3rd or 4th on the list of causes.
Your comment about the repeat tempos on the 200s was a little bit of confusing and I was trying to get some clarity on the point you were trying to make on long to short methods.
My point was that his program isn’t long to short. His program is slow to fast. Very high volume to low volume. He believes that if you can run 12×200 or 6×200 in certain times, you can run 1×200 in a certain time. That’s just silly. It also isn’t long to short as traditionally described. He isn’t shortening rep distances over time, he is dramatically lowering volume and increasing intensity of the entire program. It is the worst form of linear periodization, on the level of single factor linear weightlifting models, probably worse though since the technique and energy systems aren’t identical at different speeds like it is in lifting.
How do you progress you training throughout the year and what type of athletes do you coach?
I’m still developing my thoughts on programming. There are too many things that have worked and not worked and the scientific literature backs almost no approach I’ve seen. Coaching wise, refer to the previous thread we talked about. Those girls run multiple seconds faster (in the sprints) than the best girls you talked about. That isn’t a knock, just the fact that their talent makes a discussion pretty much irrelevant since they could win almost any state title without training.
I’ve seen >95% of the training of a guy that went from 6.7 (stuck there for years) to 6.5 60m in a single season. I have trained myself from 11 high as a high school 16 year old to a 6.7 60m guy.
I’m not really sure where you want to go with all of that. What I will say is my thoughts are very in line with Vince Anderson (not necessarily in practice) in that you must be focused, from day 1, on improved performance in your event. If you aren’t guaranteed a spot in the final of your goal meet (state final, ncaa championships, usatf, etc.) or you are not near your genetic ceiling you need to focus on getting better every mesocycle. Building bases and being more than a few percent away from PR performance doesn’t get you far, even with an age group level athlete. Programs like Hart’s do exactly that and exactly why I don’t like it and have not seen it work in achieving absolute performance.
Davan to answer a couple other questions. We do not do any long runs at a slow pace with our sprinters at any point in the year. Like Hart has in the fall. We don’t start our season with the largest volume and go down. Instead start with moderate volumes climb three weeks and unload the forth week or a week that makes sense for recovery(like spring break). We do of course cut volume in our peaking phase. I also try to do three peaks a la Charlie Francis one during the winter, one at the end of high school, and one in summer track. However, our themes our similar to Harts days and so is the structure and purpose. We do have days were our kids run special endurance 450s or other distances depending on the week. We do have tempo 200 bit not on Monday as that doesn’t make sense in terms of the quality workout we are trying to get. We usually do 200s on Tuesday. Active recovery Wednesday. Then Thursday acceleration, max v or race modeling. In our high school I control the schedule so we don’t have our kids run in more then one meet a week unless we are trying to mimic a state meet like scenario (which is held over two days). That way we usually have premeet Friday and race day Saturday.
That sounds nothing like a Clyde Hart program and much more similar to something Charlie or John Smith does. That is why I am extremely confused. The fact that you run 450s and use 200m as your distance for extensive tempo really doesn’t make it similar to Clyde Hart’s anymore than programs that use similar distances. The essence of the Clyde Hart program, from listening to lectures, talking to former Baylor coaches and 400m athletes that ran for Baylor, and reading all his articles is that he doesn’t believe in having high intensity elements from day one. Even SMTC has blocks and ‘technical’ work on top of the fast special endurance in the fall. Hart’s program is death tempo, practically daily. This is why the program can get a million 10.2-3 practically untrained high school guys but can’t put out 10.0-10.1 guys with any sort of consistency or regularity, compared to FSU, LSU, A&M, TCU, and many others.
One of the main things I have realized since going to Hart like training is our kids can handle more work then you might expect and my athletes have improved more year to year then previously when we were doing much less volume and higher intensity. Most of these young ladies improved each year in the program hitting their best as a senior.
I already addressed that I fail to see how your program is Hart-like in any way. Being completely serious, I haven’t seen one thing you have posted here or elsewhere that indicates it is anything like his program beyond perhaps some rep distances.
If a high school athlete/teenager didn’t improve each year or the team on average doesn’t have improvement each year, that would be a massive red flag to me. I had some serious injuries in high school (football) and still improved substantially each year with terrible coaching and marginal talent for the sprints. I’ve seen kids do some of the dumbest shit you can imagine and set state records, improving each year, simply because they are maturing and getting more race experience under their belt. That should be applauded, it should be expected. When identifying a good high school coach, I want to see low injury rates, high happiness/satisfaction among the athletes, and local outperformance (factoring in the talent make-up of the group). Improvement alone isn’t enough and performance alone (without context) is pretty much meaningless since I’ve seen how easy it is for talent to outperform any sort of coaching/therapy/etc.
And I want to get something out of the way since I am tired of the revisionism about Charlie’s training. The man did insane volumes. Absolutely batty volumes. It worked for a lot of his athletes for tons of reasons, but he was not this low volume guy. Anybody that has seen his seminar graphs can tell you what his ‘sample’ spp programs are like, but I will share an actual workout from Angela’s training log the she lists in her book Running Risks:
Tuesday, April 15th, 1980
Morning workout
4 lap jog, 6x20m drills
1x600m
1x300m
3x100m
Medball work
10x [50m running As/high knees, 40m accel, jog back]
Afternoon workout
8 lap jog, 6x20m drills
1x600m
1x300m
3x100m
10x [50m tempo run into 20m running As, jog back]
Short Break
6x Medball circuit I & II
Extensive tempo (+ is a 50m walk and there is a slow 100m walk between sets):
100 + 200 + 100
200 + 200 + 100 + 100
100 + 200 + 200 + 200
100 + 200 + 200 + 200
100 + 200 + 100
Short Break
50m into running As
50m into 20 push-ups
50m into 20 sit-ups
50m into hip circles
50m into 20m running As
50m into 20 push-ups
50m into 20 sit-ups
50m into 10m running As
50m into 10 push-ups
50m into 10 sit-ups
This was 1 day in April, I believe the week of a meet. In case you’re wondering, you’re totaling over 5k of tempo, plus miles of jogging and calisthenics.
And I want to get something out of the way since I am tired of the revisionism about Charlie’s training. The man did insane volumes. Absolutely batty volumes. It worked for a lot of his athletes for tons of reasons, but he was not this low volume guy. Anybody that has seen his seminar graphs can tell you what his ‘sample’ spp programs are like, but I will share an actual workout from Angela’s training log the she lists in her book Running Risks:
Tuesday, April 15th, 1980
Morning workout
4 lap jog, 6x20m drills
1x600m
1x300m
3x100m
Medball work
10x [50m running As/high knees, 40m accel, jog back]Afternoon workout
8 lap jog, 6x20m drills
1x600m
1x300m
3x100m
10x [50m tempo run into 20m running As, jog back]
Short Break
6x Medball circuit I & II
Extensive tempo (+ is a 50m walk and there is a slow 100m walk between sets):
100 + 200 + 100
200 + 200 + 100 + 100
100 + 200 + 200 + 200
100 + 200 + 200 + 200
100 + 200 + 100
Short Break
50m into running As
50m into 20 push-ups
50m into 20 sit-ups
50m into hip circles
50m into 20m running As
50m into 20 push-ups
50m into 20 sit-ups
50m into 10m running As
50m into 10 push-ups
50m into 10 sit-upsThis was 1 day in April, I believe the week of a meet. In case you’re wondering, you’re totaling over 5k of tempo, plus miles of jogging and calisthenics.
Davan I know you agree that Charlie was a baller. Check out Kevin Tyler templates, Charlie for the mortals. Basically the same structure and progression just with feasible volumes of speed and tempo. His training and those influenced by it (Steve Fudge) achieved solid results from 60-400m with non-Jamaican athletes.
I also think CF would say he worked Angela too hard at the time.
Your earlier point on over complication…….I see that everywhere from sports to finance. You see it everyday at the office I know.
Keeping it simple I think people should pick a philosophy they can get behind and believe in. As noted, many programs create world class results. Pick one that fits your personality, talent, beliefs, etc. and look at the commonalities as opposed to the differences.
I look at it like business strategy or investing, the worst thing you can do is go in 20 different directions trying to be or do everything.
Completely agree with everything you said, Brooke. Every point is in line with what I think and you did a much better job of summarizing my own argument!
I post the Charlie workout mostly because if I see another forum post where somebody talks about Charlie as this low volume, no or low tempo kind of guy, I am going to lose my mind. This is the guy that in 2004 released a sample program 60/100m program with >2000m a week of speed work and 5-6000m a week of tempo (plus lifting, plyos, core work, and throws) on top of it.
Davan I have looked you up. You are certainly got a lot faster since college. I do know you help coach some very fast kids with a club team. As someone who ran in college, coaches in high school and with a summer track club there are a number of ways to skin a cat. As we talked about before access to elite athletes makes coaching look a lot easier. The group you are working with is not the norm for 99% of the coaches across the country.
I do have Angella’s workouts and she certainly was working out all day long. I do own those same books and most of Charlie’s printed materials.
As stated by you and I agreed earlier in the thread I do not believe in taking cookie cutter workouts in this stage of my career.
However, over the extent of my career I have adopted a number of ideas from coaches. Setting up workout units by Gary Winckler, Special endurance from Hart, 10 day taper from Francis, Periodization from Sean Burris, Biomechanic work Frans Bosch, Strength Training Bompa and someone who covers all of these bases is Dan Pfaff. So my current system doesn’t match a specific method.
In terms of your check list of what you would want to see in a good high school program I know we put a check in all the boxes. I would say my one concern from our conversation here and elsewhere on this site is your limited experience with a high school track team as a coach. If you spent a little bit of time at that level I think there would be more clarity in discussing training with people at that level. I believe that might be where the gap in communication might be.
For me summer track and high school track are completely different animals. Concentration of talent is just one of the major factors leading to those differences. Like our young woman 4×100 that finished in the 46s last summer with two terrible handoffs.
"Nature hides her secret because of her essential loftiness, but not by means of ruse." -Albert Einstein
I ran 6.34 in the 55m in college in 2009 (age 21) and 6.97 60m at age 19 (my PR at age 25 is 6.76). I wouldn’t say I’ve gotten much faster, but I have definitely made steady progress each and every year essentially. I only ran for my team 1 year and ran times similar to that of my soph/jr years of high school (and substantially slower than my senior year of high school). I posted my progress in another thread before.
I fundamentally disagree with you re: high school coaching. I’ve talked with plenty coaches, seen plenty coaches and workouts (I have helped numerous teams here and there, particularly since I’ve tutored at a number of high schools in and out of college), continue to see plenty of athletes and their programs. I don’t think coaching is going to change my outlook because the club setting has already showed me what was obvious before. Talent pool is by far the biggest factor in success at that level. And no, size of the school is one small factor in that. I’ll take the school on the south side of Chicago over some school in the northern burbs with a student body 3-4x the size 10 times / 10. You can’t beat talent and there are places where it is abundant. Hell, one forum member here laughed with me when we watched a couple guys doing silly dunks at the basketball court next to my college apartment wearing Timbs, smoking blunts, and drinking brown bagged 40s. I am pretty sure they could have put some decent marks down in the sprints/hurdles/jumps as high schoolers if someone cared to bring them under their wing.
IMO, even with a full length season, coaching for high schoolers really shouldn’t be based to much on college coaches. You have an entirely mixed bag of talent, crappy facilities, and too many meets to get much training in at some points. On one end of the spectrum, you have 14 year olds coming in that its too early to really see what event they’ll be best at because they have such low physical maturity. On the opposite end, you have fully grown kids running college level times and competing for state titles. One of them needs basic coordination training, and the other one needs to worry about perfecting acceleration patterns, race execution, and perfect training plains. You just can’t approach these types of kids the same when some are (maturity wise) about six years older than others. Its a tricky situation.
Edit- Heck, even college can be pretty tricky situation when it comes to planning. You’ll get some kids that are coming from college-style programs and are ready to get going with a high intensity sprint training program and others that are coming from your standard “Tempo 200’s” team and have no sense of coordination.
Long story short, unless your working with athletes who are at the point where they are working to squeeze the last tenth or so off of their potential, its difficult to try to keep the same approach and program year in and year out. You need to make it group specific, and often times specific to groups within the main group based on need.
I ran 6.34 in the 55m in college in 2009 (age 21) and 6.97 60m at age 19 (my PR at age 25 is 6.76). I wouldn’t say I’ve gotten much faster, but I have definitely made steady progress each and every year essentially. I only ran for my team 1 year and ran times similar to that of my soph/jr years of high school (and substantially slower than my senior year of high school). I posted my progress in another thread before.
I fundamentally disagree with you re: high school coaching. I’ve talked with plenty coaches, seen plenty coaches and workouts (I have helped numerous teams here and there, particularly since I’ve tutored at a number of high schools in and out of college), continue to see plenty of athletes and their programs. I don’t think coaching is going to change my outlook because the club setting has already showed me what was obvious before. Talent pool is by far the biggest factor in success at that level. And no, size of the school is one small factor in that. I’ll take the school on the south side of Chicago over some school in the northern burbs with a student body 3-4x the size 10 times / 10. You can’t beat talent and there are places where it is abundant. Hell, one forum member here laughed with me when we watched a couple guys doing silly dunks at the basketball court next to my college apartment wearing Timbs, smoking blunts, and drinking brown bagged 40s. I am pretty sure they could have put some decent marks down in the sprints/hurdles/jumps as high schoolers if someone cared to bring them under their wing.
Obviously I agree that school size is not as imporant as culture. Considering we are one the ten smallest schools in class 4 (largest schools in MO) routinely our team brings home a distirct plaque. As for the Southside of Chi town not exactly true in reality. This years class 3 state title(largest in Illiniois) was won by a Suburban School Roselle Lake Park High, 2nd was New Lenox Providence Catholic another suburban school, and in 3rd was Pekin Community another school well outside of Chi town. On the Girls side Lincoln-Way East High School State Champs, Edwardsville HS a Illinois St. Louis Suburban was second, and 3rd was Glenbard West is a west suburban school.
I do agree that certain demographics are totally underserved like the young people you mentioned putting on a dunk contest.
"Nature hides her secret because of her essential loftiness, but not by means of ruse." -Albert Einstein
IMO, even with a full length season, coaching for high schoolers really shouldn’t be based to much on college coaches. You have an entirely mixed bag of talent, crappy facilities, and too many meets to get much training in at some points. On one end of the spectrum, you have 14 year olds coming in that its too early to really see what event they’ll be best at because they have such low physical maturity. On the opposite end, you have fully grown kids running college level times and competing for state titles. One of them needs basic coordination training, and the other one needs to worry about perfecting acceleration patterns, race execution, and perfect training plains. You just can’t approach these types of kids the same when some are (maturity wise) about six years older than others. Its a tricky situation.
Edit- Heck, even college can be pretty tricky situation when it comes to planning. You’ll get some kids that are coming from college-style programs and are ready to get going with a high intensity sprint training program and others that are coming from your standard “Tempo 200’s” team and have no sense of coordination.
Long story short, unless your working with athletes who are at the point where they are working to squeeze the last tenth or so off of their potential, its difficult to try to keep the same approach and program year in and year out. You need to make it group specific, and often times specific to groups within the main group based on need.
Zack you absolutely correct about a need for multiple layers inside each program. We of course have these layers based off of years expereince, talent level, event group, and training needs. Of course some schools dont do these things but you would be suprised how many do or at least in my area. I believe these set kids up for a lot of success in college. In fact if you look at Missouri High School Graduates and put them all on one college team they would have placed second at the NCAA nationals
"Nature hides her secret because of her essential loftiness, but not by means of ruse." -Albert Einstein
Mladen is a smart cat, sometimes too smart. A few coaches ripped me one after slides of quantum phenomena and “Thesis-Antithesis-Synthesis” discussion.
I think a good presentation slide set still needs the speaker so let’s not judge anything as amazing or poor until the explanation. After that then see if it was helpful.
As coaches we want to make thinks complex to help us feel good.
Ryan…
As for the Southside of Chi town not exactly true in reality. This years class 3 state title(largest in Illiniois) was won by a Suburban School Roselle Lake Park High, 2nd was New Lenox Providence Catholic another suburban school, and in 3rd was Pekin Community another school well outside of Chi town. On the Girls side Lincoln-Way East High School State Champs, Edwardsville HS a Illinois St. Louis Suburban was second, and 3rd was Glenbard West is a west suburban school.
I don’t think you can use IHSA state team titles as representative of a school’s talent pool. Only individual (athletes and relays) qualifiers advance from Sectionals to State in T&F – not the whole team as in other sports (ie. wrestling (team), basketball, football, etc.).
So while a team may win a Sectional, it’s entirely possible that the 2nd or 3rd place team will advance more athletes to State. And at State, its not uncommon to see teams place higher at State than they did in their Sectional…
Our boy’s finished 3rd at State one year – and we did not win our Sectional… We also had a girl’s team that was routinely in the top 3 at Sectionals – yet only sent a couple kids to State each year (enough success to lose our multiplier waiver).
Don’t get me started on the IHSA’s multiplier/waiver system – especially as it applies to T&F
Obviously I agree that school size is not as imporant as culture. Considering we are one the ten smallest schools in class 4 (largest schools in MO) routinely our team brings home a distirct plaque. As for the Southside of Chi town not exactly true in reality. This years class 3 state title(largest in Illiniois) was won by a Suburban School Roselle Lake Park High, 2nd was New Lenox Providence Catholic another suburban school, and in 3rd was Pekin Community another school well outside of Chi town. On the Girls side Lincoln-Way East High School State Champs, Edwardsville HS a Illinois St. Louis Suburban was second, and 3rd was Glenbard West is a west suburban school.
I do agree that certain demographics are totally underserved like the young people you mentioned putting on a dunk contest.
You realize there are many schools/teams with no program and no coach, correct? One of the athletes in the club, she is the only track and field athlete in her entire school. That isn’t because she is the only one that would do it and has the talent to compete. They literally don’t have the resources or administrative interest in taking the effort of fielding a team. Oh yeah, their school is extremely proud though that they won a track & field team title fielding one athlete!
The problems with qualifying in Illinois have already been discussed and I am specifically referring to the sprints/jumps/hurdles here (and probably shotput as well).
Let’s not get into the number of those schools that had athletes transfer in either. Multiple schools have had students transfer in from that very area. I could give you multiple examples of team state champs that did this very thing, but again, this thread isn’t about calling out coaches or high school athletes.
IMO, even with a full length season, coaching for high schoolers really shouldn’t be based to much on college coaches. You have an entirely mixed bag of talent, crappy facilities, and too many meets to get much training in at some points. On one end of the spectrum, you have 14 year olds coming in that its too early to really see what event they’ll be best at because they have such low physical maturity. On the opposite end, you have fully grown kids running college level times and competing for state titles. One of them needs basic coordination training, and the other one needs to worry about perfecting acceleration patterns, race execution, and perfect training plains. You just can’t approach these types of kids the same when some are (maturity wise) about six years older than others. Its a tricky situation.
Edit- Heck, even college can be pretty tricky situation when it comes to planning. You’ll get some kids that are coming from college-style programs and are ready to get going with a high intensity sprint training program and others that are coming from your standard “Tempo 200’s” team and have no sense of coordination.
Long story short, unless your working with athletes who are at the point where they are working to squeeze the last tenth or so off of their potential, its difficult to try to keep the same approach and program year in and year out. You need to make it group specific, and often times specific to groups within the main group based on need.
Are you training?
“You realize there are many schools/teams with no program and no coach, correct? One of the athletes in the club, she is the only track and field athlete in her entire school. That isn’t because she is the only one that would do it and has the talent to compete. They literally don’t have the resources or administrative interest in taking the effort of fielding a team. Oh yeah, their school is extremely proud though that they won a track & field team title fielding one athlete!
The problems with qualifying in Illinois have already been discussed and I am specifically referring to the sprints/jumps/hurdles here (and probably shotput as well).
Let’s not get into the number of those schools that had athletes transfer in either. Multiple schools have had students transfer in from that very area. I could give you multiple examples of team state champs that did this very thing, but again, this thread isn’t about calling out coaches or high school athletes.”
I do understand the Illinois system as we race against schools from Illiniois often. In addition I am the Missouri Track and Cross country Coach association Vice President. With this job we tried to change our qualifying system. Currently our system is strictly to four at districts and sectionals. Times don’t matter. At least in Illiniois you have a qualifying standard system along with top two to get most of the best to state. On the other hand the multiplier for Illiniois track is ridiculous and hurts good programs that are on the boarder of class 1, 2, or 3. I am not even sure why they put this into place unless it was to deal with those basketball academies…… I mean private schools.
All schools have transfer students that is a common issue in many states. As for the reason I mentioned state championship teams instead of sectionals was not about best teams but top talent. However, these school mentioned are schools with fairly large teams. No doubt a top talent helps but larger schools have a better chance of top talent and most of these schools this year were from outside metro Chi- town. Pekin Community is an example of a team benefiting from a very talented young man. He just for note is one of the fastest kids in his age group, white, and a 23-10ish long jumper. I believe he won the Illiniois state championship in the 100, 200, and long jump.
"Nature hides her secret because of her essential loftiness, but not by means of ruse." -Albert Einstein
Ryan,
Don’t want to hi-jack this thread and let it get off topic in regards to Illinois track (IHSA). I appreciate your posts and insights regarding your training methods and experiences.
I can vent another day (or week, or month) about the IHSA and their policies. But yes, you hit the nail on the head regarding “basketball academies”…
KM
[quote author="Zack Trapp" date="1375351683"]IMO, even with a full length season, coaching for high schoolers really shouldn’t be based to much on college coaches. You have an entirely mixed bag of talent, crappy facilities, and too many meets to get much training in at some points. On one end of the spectrum, you have 14 year olds coming in that its too early to really see what event they’ll be best at because they have such low physical maturity. On the opposite end, you have fully grown kids running college level times and competing for state titles. One of them needs basic coordination training, and the other one needs to worry about perfecting acceleration patterns, race execution, and perfect training plains. You just can’t approach these types of kids the same when some are (maturity wise) about six years older than others. Its a tricky situation.
Edit- Heck, even college can be pretty tricky situation when it comes to planning. You’ll get some kids that are coming from college-style programs and are ready to get going with a high intensity sprint training program and others that are coming from your standard “Tempo 200’s” team and have no sense of coordination.
Long story short, unless your working with athletes who are at the point where they are working to squeeze the last tenth or so off of their potential, its difficult to try to keep the same approach and program year in and year out. You need to make it group specific, and often times specific to groups within the main group based on need.
Are you training?[/quote]
Sort of. I was cleared that I was ready to train again just today at the doctors, but resuming actual training isn’t practical at this point because I’m in the midst of 40 hour a week of intense band camp. Currently, I’m just doing what I can to get into decent shape before I start training in about a week and a half(When band camp ends). Maybe two and a half weeks.
You are welcome to start coming and train up where I am. Last offer from me though.
I’ll be able to get my license in June. Until then I’m stuck pretty immobile location wise. Once I can drive that would seem like a good idea.