Speed Development

Included below are videos that I will be using in a speed development talk on Monday February 22 2010.

My personal belief, one which is shared by the sprinting community the world over is that speed is a skill. As it is a skill it is something that can be constantly developed and improved. Much like a concert pianist hones his or her skill with hour upon hour of practice our athletes spend time each week working on their skills.

Take for example your feet. Take a moment and tap them as fast as you can simultaneously while seated. Continue to do so for the duration of ten seconds. You will find that initially you are able to tap them quite fast. As time progresses you will find that your muscular coordination begins to lag and your are forced to tap them more slowly and with much more concentrated effort. In the same way the mechanical inefficiencies of sprinters become apparent at the end of their race. The race may only be 60m but the affect of muscular fatigue is still readily apparent.

Now if you were to take time each day and practice your foot tapping skill you would find that you would soon be able to increase your total taps over ten seconds. The only explanation for this is skill acquisition. How then do we teach sprinters to be faster? If we have a modest goal of reducing each touch down time in a 100m race by .005 we can receive the benefit of a reduction in our total time.