Designing an Effective Training Program, Part I

Over the coming weeks, I’m going to be bringing you a series I’m calling ‘Designing an Effective Training Program’.

I can’t say how long it will be because it is a work in progress. I first expected the ’step over, drive down’ series to last 2 weeks, butI ended up writing 4 lengthy reports for it.

With all the projects we are working on here at Athletes’ Accelerationit is impossible to create large amounts of content in advance, 52 weeks per year, especially for a free newsletter.
Sometimes we need a week or two off between articles!!

Now this report on program design is to help give you a basic, yet detailed, look at how to set up your programs for you and your athletes.

However, it is not meant to be the definitive text on periodization,I am not trying to reinvent the wheel or promote myself as the next Tudor Bompa. (If you don’t know who that is, you’ll learn a great dealfrom this series!)

Thus, this information comes from a variety of sources.

My purpose is to provide you with information and resources to help youcreate better annual plans for your athletes. However, coaching is a science *and* an art. If your goal is to simply cut and paste sampleprograms into your own program, you are not putting in the same effortyou expect from your athletes.

Therefore you won’t get very much out of this, or any, training advice.

It doesn’t matter whether you coach team sports, run 4,8 or 12 week groups or train yourself, if your season as a whole isn’t organizedfollowing specific training guidelines, then neither you or your athletes should expect to see consistent or continuous improvement.

No periodization at all is just making things up as you go along.

And I can’t think of many situations in life or athletics where sucha philosophy is a recipe for success.

I know that the ’step over, drive down’ series was a popular and much needed one based on the depth and range of positive responses I got.

With this series, I invite you to ask questions as we go along. I strongly believe that is the best way to learn. While we don’t professto have all the answers to every possible sport, training situation or scenario, we will certainly do our best to supply valuable answers to any and all questions and comments that come in.

Just as importantly, the information here will be useful to you whetheror not you currently own Complete Speed Training.

However, sales pitches aside, having a large inventory of effective drills and exercises to pull from for the various phases and elements of training is, quite frankly, essential to the continuedsuccess of your athletes.

If you have Complete Speed Training it is simply a matter of, literally, plugging the information from the DVDs into the appropriate workouts.

If you haven’t purchased Complete Speed Training yet, this is an idealtime to get a copy. Otherwise, you’ll come to understand *how* toorganize and plan training, but you won’t have the tools to implement your knowledge.

It’s like having the recipe for a 4 course meal meal, but not havingany of the ingredients. You can make do with what you have lying aroundthe house, but how good will your dinner actually taste?

Click here to get your copy of Complete Speed Training before the next newsletter is delivered:
http://www.completespeedtraining.com

Now, we can begin our look at training theory.

I find that one of the biggest misconceptions regarding training theory is that there is some universal method of training that magically applies to everyone.

There isn’t.

There are multiple paths to the same goal. The problem comes when coaches aren’t on any particular path at all. Instead they just wanderaimlessly toward some poorly defined end point, making things up based on their mood that day. Science is not used in any of their training decisions.

This is not to say that experience and tradition don’t have a role inprogram design, they do. But they shouldn’t be the foundation of theprogram.

On top of that, let’s not make training theory and program designmore complicated than it is. Adding depth and detail for the sake ofbeing fancy will take away from basic training principles that serveas the glue holding the plan together.

In the past, I would try to add as much detail, charts, graphs and testing protocols as I could think of to my programs. I thought this would get better results.

Well unless you coach full time, you don’t have time for that. And all it will do is add more to an already full plate.

Just like I always advocate the ‘train smarter, not harder’ philosophy with training, I also employ the ‘coach smarter, not harder’ mindsetwhen it comes to organizing and planning training.

Don’t forget, a well thought out program doesn’t absolve you from havingto teach running mechanics, drills, etc. In fact, it makes those issuesall the more important.

But you should still factor in the amount of time you have to committo program design before you get in over your head. I always wish I hadmore time to add more details to my training programs, even the onesthat result in state champions.

There is no such thing as the perfect plan. Plus, any plan must account for the fluidity of your season. What I mean is, s*** happens.

Your athletes may be excessively sore, rain may keep you inside, coldweather could make it unsafe to get that speed workout in, acompetition may get rescheduled, an injury could occur, school couldget cancelled.

All of these things will force you to adapt to the current situation.

That is why it is so important for you to take the time to learn howand why certain things affect athletes. You need to be able to make changes to your training plan on the fly without it throwing your entire season into chaos.

If you’re just cutting and pasting a sample program and calling it yourtraining plan, what will you do when forced to improvise?

It’s the same reason why I don’t write out every workout of my season in advance. I learned the hard way that once your schedule gets thrownoff once, that whole plan has to be amended. You’ll need to plan whatyou want to get done in detail and in advance.

But always have a plan B that affects the body the same way as Plan A.

OK, so that is a very quick overview covering some of the things you should be thinking about as you begin to aquire new information.

You’ll want to go out and start making changes in your program and inyour training.

This is the art of coaching. Learn something new, apply it to your athletes and see what works for your situation and athletes and what doens’t.

Next topic:
I have found that one of the biggest problems in having this discussion is that of different coaches using separate terms to describe the same things.

Therefore, before we really get going, it is critical that we be on the same page regarding our use of terminology. I will be using terms that may not be familiar to you and that could cause confusion.

So, check out this link and familiarize yourself with the terms anddefinitions so that we don’t encounter any unnecessary road blocksalong the way:

http://www.completetrackandfield.com/track-definitions.html

Bookmark that page, print it out or add it to your favorites, but make sure you can access it at your convenience.

But make sure you read it all.

Now, any well designed program revolves around one central principle.

Without it, you can’t possibly devise effective training in the longterm or the short term.

What is that one overriding principle?

The End Result.

What is the goal of your training? What are your athletes training for?

Is it to win the Superbowl? Qualify for the post season? Peak for the State Championship?

You can’t ask for directions if you don’t know where you’re going.

Designing an effective program is no different.

I want you to think about a few things for next week.

What is your end goal? Is your current or past training designed specifically to help you or your athletes be at their best when thatday arrives? Or does erratic, inconsistent training prevent you fromgetting there in the first place?

When you really sit down and think about it, how organized and specific is your athletes’ training?

Next week we’re going to break down the most important principles involved in designing an effective training plan.

Until then, become familiar with those training terms. And if you haven’t already, get your copy of Complete Speed Training so you have the resources to implement your new and improved training system:
http://www.completespeedtraining.com

Let’s face it:

We live in a fast paced world.

When it comes to staying in shape or getting in shape, society makes itvery easy to compromise.

How many times have you skipped out on a workout because you:

‘didn’t have time’

or

‘have too much to do’

We’ve all been there. We know we *shouldn’t* skip the workout, but we just don’t make the time to do it.

But all that has changed!

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The first thing that has to be mastered before any traditional speed drills is athletes’ arm action. I can tell exactly what an athletes’ legs are doing just by watching the way they move their arms.

The role of the arms is to stabilize the torso, maintain balance and help the legs generate power (so to speak).

So I always start with:

ARM ACTION DRILL

- feet hip to shoulder width apart- weight slightly forward on the balls of the feet
- chin up, chest up
- front arm between 70-90 degrees, back arm 90-120 degrees
- hands should come up to cheek height, clear the hip in back
- all movement through the shoulders
- cue athletes to ‘pound nails’ behind them by driving the elbow down and back
- arms never cross midline of body

Once athletes get that down, they may be ready for the traditional speed drills.

Start with the ‘A’ MARCH.

Use two variations of this drill. The first is simply done without the use of the arms because most of the time that is too complicated for athletes to do.

So once athletes can coordinate the ‘A’ MARCH W/NO ARMS, I’ll then add the arms following the same technical expectations as with the ARM ACTION DRILL.

With this drill, the legs should behave in a piston-like fashion. That is, there should be no ‘pawing’ or ‘cycling’ of the legs. Such cues and movements will get athletes in trouble once they increase their horizontal velocity.

Increased speed will naturally force athetes’ legs into a more cyclical pattern. For now, they need to train their neuromuscular systems to decelerate the thigh as soon as the active heel clears the support knee.

In short, this will look like the name implies; a march.

‘A’ MARCH (with no arms)

- hands on hips
- cue ‘chin up, chest up, toe up (dorsiflexed), heel up (over the opposite knee) for the duration of the drill
- recover the active heel underneath the hips
- step over the support knee
- drive the active leg down into the ground as soon as the heel clears the knee (ankle should not drive out, paw or cycle past the hips)
- initial foot strike should be with the ball of the foot, not the heel
- active foot should strike directly beneath the hips
- active foot should land no farther than ½ footlength in front of support foot- alternate legs for prescribed time, # of reps or distance

Once your athletes get this down with perfection, you can add the arms to the drill. You’ll be amazed at how quickly everything falls apart with this simple addition.

And if athletes are struggling with this basic drill, imagine how inefficient they must be when attempting to run at full speed.

The next drill you have to teach is the ‘A’ SKIP. Now this drill really exposes lack of coordination, so make sure that the ‘A’ MARCH has been perfected.

Generally, athletes are so bad at this drill (I don’t want to admit how long it took me to learn this drill correctly) that I only let them perform it with one leg at a time, in place and, of course, with no arms.

Like with the ‘A’ MARCH, teach this drill with no arms at first. For the sake of political correctness, I won’t make an analogy as to what your team will look like if they try to do the full drill right away.

Most of your athletes will just turn this into a regular, exaggerated skip. That’s why I start them in place.

But the key to the ‘A’ SKIP is the double hop on the support leg.

Each hop should only be a couple of inches off the ground, but there should be two of them: the first as the active leg recovers and active ankle steps over the knee and the second as the active leg is decelerated into the ground. When done correctly, both feet should hit the ground at the same time.

‘A’ SKIP (no arms, alternating legs, in place)

- hands on hips
- cue ‘chin up, chest up, toe up (dorsiflexed), heel up (over the opposite knee) for the duration of the drill
- cue athletes to repeat ‘hop, hop…hop, hop’ in their heads to help coordinate the double hop movement
- recover the active heel underneath the hips while hopping with the support leg
- step over the support knee
- drive the active leg down into the ground as soon as the heel clears the knee (ankle should not drive out, paw or cycle past the hips) while hopping on the support leg
- initial foot strike should be with the ball of the foot, not the heel
- active foot should strike directly beneath the hips
- active foot should land no farther than ½ footlength in front of support foot
- alternate legs for prescribed time and/or # of reps once double hops is successfully coordinated
- deceleration of active thigh (’drive down’) should be noticeably faster and more forceful than the initial recovery of that active leg

In writing it doesn’t look much different than the ‘A’ MARCH but it is. Once athletes can coordinate the double hop you can let them cover some ground, add arm action and alternate legs.

The next drill to teach is the ‘A’ RUN. This drill starts to simulate running mechanics in a more obvious way than the other drills, though it can be just as difficult to learn.

I’m going to describe the full ‘A’ RUN here. I usually start with the HALF ‘A’ RUN which is simply to limit the range of motion by stepping over the calf instead of the knee. So simply change ‘knee’ to ‘calf’ when first teaching this drill. Also, I only teach this drill with arm action as it should be mastered by this point.

Despite the exaggerated nature of this drill, athletes should not cover much ground with each stride. It should not look like a bounding drill.

‘A’ RUN

- cue chin up, chest up, toe up, heel up
- keep the shoulders in line with or in front of the hips
- do not break at the hips
- starting at a jogging pace, recover the heel, step over and drive down using proper technique learned in previous drills
- at the same time, use appropriate arm action to maintain balance and find rhythm
- simply alternate legs and slowly increase speed as dictated by power generated through force application

Performed correctly, this drill looks like someone running throughwaist deep water. Once mastered, I will often add a hard acceleration out of the ‘A’ RUN. This will force athletes to keep driving down because the tendency is to fall back into old habits. The acceleration will make this more pronounced.

Don’t forget, old habits die hard.

The final drill in my progression is the FAST LEG drill.

It’s also my favorite.

This simulates the speeds and ranges of motion that are closest to actual sprinting, but isolates one leg at a time. There are a number of variations that I use with athletes, depending on their level of coordination and skill mastery.

They’re discussed in greater detail in the Complete Speed Training program.

With the FAST LEG drill, start out by focusing on one leg at a time. Jog very slowly between repetitions with very little range of motion so that the difference in technique when jogging versus doing the drill is very pronounced.

Let athletes do as many of as few FAST LEGS as they need when first starting. If doing the drill for 30 meters, let them only do 2 total FAST LEGS if that is all they can coordinate. At first it will take a lot of brain processing for athletes to coordinate the movement correctly so they won’t be able to bust out repetitions in a rapid fire format. At least at first.

But you’ll see what I mean when you try to learn the drill yourself or watch them try to do it.
Ideally, athletes should be able to go: FAST LEG, 2 steps, FAST LEG, 2 steps, etc., whether alternating or using a single leg. However that is an advanced skill requiring both practice and patience.

One final thing:

Cue athletes to think about the drill as two separate, but seamless movements: recovery and step over, then drive down.

Often, athletes will recover and then just let the foot flop down out in front of them. They must focus on the whole movement. They’ll discover that the more force they apply, the more they can feel themselves being propelled forward.

Once they learn to alternate legs, their speed will naturally increase due to the power they are generating. For most athletes it really drives home the importance and benefits of ’stepping over and driving down’ when it comes to running faster.

FAST LEG:

- cue chin up, chest up, toe up, heel up
- don’t break at the hips, dip or drop the shoulders when performing the drill
- slowly jog forward
- recover the heel, step over and then drive down focusing on firing the glutes and creating great force
- coordinate arm action with leg movement
- land on the ball of the foot with the foot
- active foot should land no more than ½ foot length in front of support leg
- slowly try to increase # of reps completed over a given distance
- alternate legs when single leg technique is mastered

That is my proven drill progression. I know it works because all my athletes get faster, sustain less injuries and out perform their competition.

I used the Complete Speed Training video to help me write these descriptions. And the truth is that these written descriptions really don’t do the drills justice.

If a picture is worth a thousand words than the Complete Speed Training Program has to be worth 100,000 words.

Easily.

Try these drills out yourself or with your athletes. If you use the same teaching progression I showed you here, your athletes will get much, much faster.

It’s just that simple.

But I strongly recommend getting a copy of Complete Speed Training. The secret to running faster involves much more than just drills. This is just a piece of the overall training puzzle.

I’ve already put the puzzle together for you.

Click here to learn more:

http://www.completespeedtraining.com

How much faster can an athlete get under the right training?

The answer to that question is one we try to provide answers for
each and every week.

One of the fastest ways to get there is through the use of
effective speed drills.

Why are speed drills so effective?

Because, when done correctly, they train the athlete to move in an
efficient and powerful way that takes advantage of the single most
important factor in speed development.

Force application.
Over the past two weeks I’ve been talking about the importance of
using speed drills as one of the primary methods of developing faster
athletes.

But not all speed drills are created equal.

In fact, there are a few drills that I don’t think you should use at all.

These drills actually reinforce the bad habits that you’re trying to
break.

What’s worse is that they are drills that are used regularly in most
programs.

Remember, the goal with any technical training is to retrain the
nervous system to fire the muscles in a way that promotes the most
efficient and powerful running style possible.

So you can’t let athletes do drills that will erase all their efforts.

When it comes to speed development, here are my top 3 drills you
should immediately eliminate from your program:

1. High Knees

We’re trying to get athletes to recover the heel underneath the hips,
step over the support knee and then drive the foot down into the ground
so that all the motion stays underneath the Center of Mass (CoM).

The key point is keeping the ankle beneath the hips/CoM. Many
athletes let that foot paw out or cycle out past the CoM and this results
in a breaking action where the athlete is actually slowing down with
each stride.

Doing high knees supports the idea of bringing the foot out past the
CoM instead of recovering, stepping over and driving down.

Eliminate high knees in favor of more effective drills proven to
improve technique.

2. Butt Kicks

This is another classic speed drill.

However it teaches athletes that running involves knee flexion when,
although it may look like the hamstring is involved through bending
at the knee, it actually doesn’t operate like that when running.

The recovery of the active leg is not from the ‘butt kick’ action.

When inexperienced athletes do butt kicks, it reinforces backside
mechanics (where range of motion appears to take place primarily
‘behind’ the body) which is a tell tale sign that athletes are not
producing any power while sprinting.

Lack of power = lack of speed.

Using butt kicks in your program gives athletes mixed signals as
far as teaching them the right way to move.

You have to get rid of butt kicks in favor of drills that promote
efficiency and power.

3. ‘B’ Skip

There are a few different names to this drill, but the problem
remains the same.

This drill starts out like an ‘A’ Skip (a great drill). But as soon as
the active ankle clears the support knee, it all goes downhill.
In the ‘B’ skip, the active ankle now drives out past the CoM as
though the athlete were kicking in a door that was in front of them.

From there they cycle/paw through with the foot landing, more or
less, underneath the hips.

This is simply unacceptable from a technical standpoint.

One of the biggest problems athletes have is learning to drive the
foot down into the ground as soon as it clears the knee.

This leads to a number of extremely limiting problems. Regardless,
this drill should be put on the shelf with only one exception…

I do use this drill with some of my athletes.

But only these athletes:

Track and Field hurdlers.

The ‘B’ skip is an ideal drill for teaching lead leg mechanics with
your hurdlers.

But hurdling and sprinting are not the same.

So, unless you’re working with hurdlers, get rid of the ‘B’ skip and
replace it with proven drills that are guaranteed to improve
running form, mechanics and speed…

Learn the most effective speed training drills proven
to develop faster speeds:

http://www.completespeedtraining.com