Down goes Bolt! Down goes Bolt!

So the favorites for the Jamaica International 100m are Doc and Gatlin?? Of course you can add Jeter to the list.

Notice the time of the year--transition in training, not the middle of summer, when you'd expect them running at highest speed (and of course force required goes up exponentially with speed).

About 3 years ago, I received some coaching seminar notes given by Steve Francis (no relation to Charlie), coach of the MVP club in Jamaica--Powell, Fraser-Pryce, and such. The general prep is basically intensive tempo with reps in the 300-450m range, like 6X300 or 4X450; and steep hills or sled pulls up to about 30m with 50 pounds (half that for women). There are some technical sessions and light tempo, but it's basically those two things, each twice a week, plus weights of course. Glen Mills and Bolt are doing the same kind of thing.

Well, I said to myself, "I can do that," so I went out and got injured too (hamsting). Sure enough, I did it just like them.

If you think about it, what's going on is intensive tempo at about 85%. And sled pulls, also not close to speed or SE (80-150m) rates. Even if you're pulling that sled as hard has you can, your tendons and muscle tissues aren't doing concentric motion at the same rate as you will need when you race.

After you've been doing this for months (MVP club doesn't even start training on a track until March, and they're still doing grass at that time AND they do sled pulls for 6 months of the year).....

(1) You start trying to do SE and Speed at 90% and faster;

(2) You get injured.

Very powerful way to train, but the transition is DANGEROUS.

That which doesn't kill you...

Jamaicans injured, Kim Collins not competing for his country anymore....

Tyson Gay, just don't get injured again and a gold medal is yours this year.

you're not wrong in your perception of intensities, but the fact that you think one can go out and replicate a phase of training, is completely ridiculous! There are so many variables taking place that without being there or having the EXACT same training administered to you BY THAT COACH or an associate, is impossible to replicate.

Were you using the EXACT same strength training as the MVP group? What about simple warm-up protocols? How about regeneration techniques?

It is good to have an understanding of a training program and implementation, but when it comes down to it, if you don't have a coach... WRITE YOUR OWN TRAINING!

I hate to tell you, but the schedules for Tyson from Lance Brauman are not THAT much different. But he has some SE in there from the beginning.

Don't know about Bolt, but I was there when Jeter did it, and the injuries for Jet and Blake look pretty serious to me. I wonder if they'll be able to peak this year.

Gay

Gatlin

Doc??

That would definitely stick in the craw of the Jamaicans.

It must be testing time.

Pow believable wrote:

you're not wrong in your perception of intensities, but the fact that you think one can go out and replicate a phase of training, is completely ridiculous! There are so many variables taking place that without being there or having the EXACT same training administered to you BY THAT COACH or an associate, is impossible to replicate.

Were you using the EXACT same strength training as the MVP group? What about simple warm-up protocols? How about regeneration techniques?

It is good to have an understanding of a training program and implementation, but when it comes down to it, if you don't have a coach... WRITE YOUR OWN TRAINING!

What you and many others here don't seem to get is that the way knowledge is enhanced is from learning from the top people and what they're doing. That's why people like me go to USTFCCCA conventions and go elsewhere to see Renato Canova, paid for by our institution. We aren't all geniuses and we actually learn. And when something doesn't work, you try to find out.

Like most coaches that are employed, I don't talk much about what my team is doing or what my own training is, and some of this might be shocking high volume and back-back workouts for some sprinters on here, but....

I went from this (MVP-based) and got injured in transition to 60's and 120's on the track

Mon 4X400 long hills (intensive tempo effort)

Tue 10X40 steep hills

Wed off (MVP has a technical session here)

Thu 6X300 intensive tempo on grass

Fri 10X40 steep hills

To this (all grass special endurance level effort) and did not get injured in transition

Mon 4X2X150 barefoot on grass, rest 1-2 min/15 min

Tue 3X5X60 barefoot from blocks on grasss, rest walk back/15 min

Wed off

Thu 4X2X150 barefoot on grass, rest 1-2 min/15 min

Fri 3X5X60 barefoot from blocks on grasss, rest walk back/15 min

The new version has long set breaks to make the effort/speed special endurance at 90%+ but not 95%. The 3X5X60 actually starts at 3X5X30 and gets longer (short to long over the season). The weekly schedules of long-short-off-long-short or slight variation is what many professional groups (Bob Kersee, John Smith, Monte Stratton) are using for at least part of the season. There is a philosophy that many high level sprint coaches use that you can do back-back training if you use different energy systems.

Maybe they're all secretly gay.

Sprintgeezer wrote:

I can almost FEEL that medical treatment from here.

Like I said, I expect them all to return in form, later in the season--except for Powell, of course.

So how come you didn't expect medical treatment to carry him to Gold last year?

Exactly the kind of training I do coach D and I've seen massive improvements.

But then again I was starting from 11 flat.

The problem Coach D is that you get strength gains in certain muscle groups, the quads and the glutes/hip flexors and not in others from that kind of overdrive training, particularly the hamstrings and their tendons below the knee.

As you transition out of a start your hamstring starts taking greater and greater loads eccentrically and concentrically. These loads were never trained into the athlete and then you have a tear. In fact it would be difficult to impossible to train these loads into the muscle without a complete overhaul of pre seasonal training.

I have a feeling this is what happened to Walter Dix last year as well, and seems to have just missed Bolt, Blake, and Powell for the most part last season. But now it has caught up with them.

At the end of the day, sprinting is still a running event that requires balance and you have to keep balance in any training regimen. There is a very simple answer to these training issues, incredibly simple but I will not say what it is here.

I always find it amazing that some of the skinniest and smallest sprinters often have the most consistent performances and injury avoidance.

did it do it: "There is a very simple answer to these training issues, incredibly simple but I will not say what it is here."

lol, I love this kind of stuff.

d: "So the favorites for the Jamaica International 100m are Doc and Gatlin??"

No. Doc, and GAY.

Gatlin isn't on the startlist.

Gay

Patton

KBC

R. Bailey

D. Bailey

Carter

Thompson

Clarke

d--

The long-short-off-long-short is what I'm trying this year, except I'm going to repeat 3-day cycles:

long-short-off

Also, my "long" will be only relative, and max out at 200, hopefully usually around 120-150. "Short" will be either 25m accelerations/starts/jumps plus drills, or weights (VERY short indeed).

It's the version of the MVP training for someone who actually has to work.

I don't find this speculation about particular training being contributory to these injuries, compelling.

Ok, so Powell's group does this. That might account for Powell. Now you're saying that Bolt was doing something like this...why would Bolt convert to a training method that produces more injuries and inferior sprinting? And what about Blake and Jeter, were they also converts to this kind of training and "dangerous" transition?

IMHO--IMHO--it has more to do with PED use than anything else.

Who have been the most glaringly suspicious sprint athletes over the past 5 years?

In no particular order, Bolt, Blake, and Jeter.

Who has gone down?

In no particular order, Bolt, Blake, and Jeter.

Powell is a wildcard. He is unreliable, unknowable. That dude has problems that are bigger than training.

BTW, that kind of training has always sounded to me like bunk. Sleds require very high--the highest--forces, but applied over a longer time, with slower cycling, and less training of time-to-max-and-back-to-zero. Similarly, doing 400-type stuff trains the muscles at a lower cycling rate, and worse than that, involves as you say "exponentially less force" at the same time.

Think of how a ham blows. It never blows on the first, second, or third step out of the blocks. Many think this is due to it not being used as much during this phase, but it is not really "how much" it is being used, but "HOW" it is being used that I think is the important thing.

On the start and during early acceleration, there is much less recovery action than there is in mid/late acceleration and top speed. Later in the race, the ham must stay contracted for a longer period of time, which leaves less time for back-to-zero--or if you prefer to think of it as a higher-power application and then a coast for recovery, it has the same amount of time to come down from a higher force application. Either way, it amounts to less time for recovery.

If this ability to quickly cycle and thereby permit recovery is not trained (like happens when you do sleds or 400's), fatigue builds up in the muscle with each contraction--and after a few of them, it passes the critical point and the muscle fails. If you are sharp and disciplined, you can feel it coming, and shut it down just before actual tearing occurs--but this requires substantial discipline, especially in a race situation.

Look at the structure of the workouts you did when you did NOT get injured in transition--shorter stuff, probably with faster turnover/cycling. Practicing quicker cycling also trains the neurology to be co-ordinated at that speed, something you also won't get from sleds and 400's...or even potentially from hills, for that matter.

However, having said all that, it is extremely coincidental that they have all gone down in the same year, at the same time of year, with the same injury. Granted it is a common injury.

The natural question is, who else has been training like this, and therefore the next likely candidate to go down, according to the training theory?

According to a doping theory, all the choice spots are already filled...who would be next on the list? I'm not sure.

Interesting. Considering Jeter went from mid 11s to 10.64.. Could I assume I would've gone from 11.9s to low 11s and maybe sub-11 with proper training? Hit a talent plateau after that? 24.0 to 22-23? Perhaps training in parallel with lifting weights for more strength?

Looking at Kiryu, I was a similar height and build - 1.75 (5" 9.5') and 60-65kg range. His quad/hams look more developed and maybe he has stronger tendons to get that speed from the turnover? I knew another SE Asian kid in the year below me who could do low-mid 11s with a similar build and greater flexibility than I think I had. So it's not a stretch for me to imagine that Kiryu can be similar and just another step forwards and hit low 10s.

Ah, Kiryu would not just be another step forwards, he would be 12-15m forwards.

testing time wrote:

It must be testing time.

Really? You don't get tested if you're injured? Cmon, you know that's not how it works.

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A lot of what you say here is true Sprintgeezer.

I've noticed over many years that some sprint groups like to do too much low intensity work. If you want to train that way for long periods of time, the transition can be terrible. What should happen is some very high intensity turnover all year round.

The same thing is true for middle distance runners and long sprinters. Many get injured during the transition stage. I had these problems with my athletes also until i started with very high intensity, high turnover work in much of the off-season. The number of injuries disappeared.

d: "the injuries for Jet and Blake look pretty serious to me"

Why do you say that? They both walked off under their own power, Jeter even finished her race.

I guarantee, however, that they are serious enough to warrant "medical attention".

This could be the best year ever in the sprints.