Depends who’s timing.
Ok. then ignore my comment didn’t realize the athlete is question was one of James and Buddy’s guys. If it was 80% of the other S & C in the NCAA I would still have doubts on whether proper technique was taught.
Again, won’t discuss it on an open forum. Entirely inappropriate venue.
Charlie, that’s an understatement…
sitting amongst scouts at the finish line and times consistently range by at least 1 tenth of a second.
A very routine example for a 40yd time, recorded by 10 scouts, is as follows:
- 4.48
- 4.43
- 4.49
- 4.53
- 4.52
- 4.47
- 4.51
- 4.46
- 4.50
So that’s 10 versions of what one single 40yd attempt looked like.
So which one is correct?
Take your pick.
Welcome to NCAA/NFL football.
On that note, I received more information regarding all of the splits/times etcetera from the combine and I must make another addendum to my combine thread:
the official times (which are only relevant to those who follow the TV and internet, ergo not the GMs, coaches, or scouts) is actually an aggregate of the stop watch times and the electronic time.
Yes, it’s true, the ‘official’ times are basically an average of the hand held and laser times.
I just don’t get it.
Exactly. If I was timing I think it would be more like 4.8 (in the case of my athlete who claims 4.4)
grass 40s?
James are these spilts accurate:
McCoy:
40yd: 4.50
20yd: 2.59
10yd: 1.52
Depends on who’s watch we’re referencing.
It’s truly that varied.
Example, there are reports of LaRod running as fast as 4.36 and 4.39 that have been published in papers and on the internet (the Giants have him at 4.39) and we were given a post-pro day report that had times ranging up to 4.44
Bad coaches work WAY faster than good coaches.
Looking back over this thread I caught this.
It’s funny, your post would seem to indicate that you’ve forgotten of the atrocities that exist at the S&C as well as ‘combine/pro day’ coaching level in this industry.
If you question how 6-8 weeks of one thing could negatively affect 2 years of another- think again.
I would wager that one single exposure to a run of the mill ‘conditioning’ workout that is conducted at most D-1 institutions would render Bolt incapable of running sub 10.5 for a week or two.
That is an extreme example; however, you might also be shocked to know that I have first hand information of at least one combine/pro day prepatory camp that includes ‘running’ drills of that exact same character. Two years in a row I’ve had athlete’s sent there by the same agency and I test them prior to their departure and again when they return.
Both years the guys returned slower and less explosive then when they left- by a significant margin.
would cause many high level guys to under perform greatly. 2 months you can flat out destroy years of work. I sometimes don’t think that people appreciate how much damage some S&C coaches do.
For the uninformed, such as myself, can you give an example of what such a workout might be (either made up or actual) that would do such damage?
I do remember reading something a couple years ago about how a marathon runner was put through a sprinting workout, and then was so sore he was unable to do anything for a considerable amount of time after.
kids at CMU ran 55 120 yd sprints at midnight in the summer workouts. Or the other time they did 1,200 reps in a leg workout. Those 2 examples would suffice as quite high on my stupidity scale. Both could set athletes off there training schedule by a month or more.
The execution of the drills themselves varies from institution to institution.
Problematically for so many athletes is that so many ‘S&C’ coaches hang their hats on outworking the competition and the work falls directly into anaerobic-glycolytic efforts which does not correspond to the bioenergetic structure of the sport.
Drills consist of 110yd linear runs, 300yd shuttle runs, Gasser runs that are over and back across the width of an American football field (~53yds each way), and so on.
The glycolytic efforts come into play because the efforts themselves are often instructed to be ran as fast as possible and the recoveries between efforts are incomplete.
Add to this type of work any combination of jumping/plyometric drills, running over/around bags, etcetera and the volume becomes extensive yielding what I suspect to be galactic blood lactate concentrations.
This type of work is often performed on the same day as some type of intensive weight training.
Again, it varies from program to program, based upon what I’ve seen in the industry, and it’s a complete rodeo.
What do you mean “running” drills of that character? Or more specifically what character?
Distances and patterns of movement that are far too long in distance and duration, demanded to be ran far too fast, and separated by incomplete recoveries.
Great story for members here at Charlie’s site:
After the 2007 season one of our athletes was sent, by his agent, to ‘said’ training camp out of state to prepare for our NFL pro day.
I time his sprints, gauge his strength on the bench, and test his vertical jump prior to his departure.
While there, the resident ‘S&C’ coach tells him to lift up his shorts so he can evaluate the musculature of his quadriceps. Our athlete had recovered from a knee repair earlier that season and their was still some girth discrepancy between the two thighs. Upon seeing this the ‘S&C’ coach tells him:
"you want to know why they’re not the same size…because your strength coaches at PITT SUCK!
So, upon his return I once again test him and every single number is worse than when he left.
Thus, I have a few weeks to repair the damage before our pro day and…I do and he PRs on everything.
A month or so later he has some arena league tryouts, and I still train him, and he continues to set a massive PR on the 40yd.
I agree that 6-8 weeks of bad training can absolutely lower one’s sport form easily.
However, regarding the Optimal training of football players, I have many questions. Maybe some of you can answer.
-
How can one balance the physical preparation with the actual practices?
In the current american system, there are usually 1-2 hour a day sessions of practice, while lifting takes place on the side. Which leads me to my next few questions. -
It appears that many on this site suggest training most football players similar so a sprinter. Although i dont dissagree that many principles applied to sprinting relate to american football, i question the transfer of the volume/intensity of the actual sprint training itself.
Im not sure if this is making sense. But say, 300-500 meters of work in one speed session can be used. How can Football players be coached in this manner? Should practices be mostly sub maximal (tempo type) sessions. Furthermore, If one can only sprint 2 to 3 days per week, what is to be done during practice on the other days?
Also, The main difference in sprinting and football, is that i do believe that football players do need more interval type work, because although a sinlgle play may not break out of the alactic energy zone, a combination of those plays with the short rest periods between plays, will yield a cumulitve effect that poses much more stress on other energy systems than that of a 100m sprinter would not encounter.
Overall, I think we can all agree that the physical preparation of most american football players is not suffiecintly meeting the needs to attain highest sports form, however i feel like there is not enough discussion on what are the best ways to combine all factors of practice and strength and conditioning.
Personally, I tend to agree with James’s earlier post about how easy it is for these athletes to improve.
Too often strength and conditioning is the primary focus when it should be secondary. A simple lifting program with the ‘weights is general’ motto focused on injury prevention, and increasesing strength, and hypertrophy when necassry, along with proper recovery and regeneration methods will yield the most optimal results. But how to combine the practices and the training?
The solution, without going into specifics, is to account for sport practice in the overall plan; a matter of give and take. During spring ball and training camp our job is retention and restoration and the tactical coaches job is development. From Jan-mid March and May-Aug our job commences with restoration/GPP and then becomes development and from Aug-years end our job is retention and restoration for starters, development for non-starters/red shirts, and restoration for all while the tactical coaches job is development.
The failures within the community, in my view, lies in what is actually characterized by development and towards what tasks are adaptive reserves expended.
The greatest challenge for me, is tolerating the lack of efficiency within the infrastructure of the coaching models inherent to the North American sport training system.
I think I’ll be putting together some DVDs in the vein of how Charlie has put out his latest view videos (me and a white board) in which I may clearly elucidate my method of solving these training problems.
in seeing some of that James. I agree that the infra structure of American sports in general is screwy. You have some sports that are so steeped in antiquated theories on the whole that it is scary. Hockey and Football are high on that list. I believe Charlie said it best when he said “Punitive workouts are the tools with which morons define themselves.”
As an independent athletic prep coach, I have had the misfortune of dealing with coaches who wreck kid’s because their ego’s tell them they are just as capable of training them as I am due to “the many years I have been involved in this sport.” It’s very hard to be the head coach, and then interfere with all your other coaches, undermining their processes. There is a reason teams like Pitt, USC, Oklahoma, etc do well. The head coaches administrate and get out of the way of their positional guys. Good programs let the S&C coach do his thing, not constantly challenge them.