Charlie Francis has said the shutdown of antagonists is very important for sprint speed.
Personally, having watched ballet dancers perform, I notice they shutdown the antagonists very easily, more so than probably any other athlete. However, that doesn’t mean they do it FASTER than sprinters. Or DO THEY?
Part of the reason they shutdown opposing muscles easily is becuase of their suppleness.
Ivan Abdajev sias this;
"The part of the muscle which is contracting is called sarcomere. The longer it is, the faster it reacts, the faster it contracts. The shorter it is, it could provide enormous strength, but in a longer period of time. "
My question is; How much flexability work is needed? How much range of motion dynamic work?
Should lengthening the sarcomere be a focus of sprinters training program?
Extensibility is needed,not flexibility per se.
And yes,lengthening (re-lengthening) of the sarcomere should be addressed if fast movement is what you are after,ballet dancer,or sprinter!
Velocity of movement is a general quality,depending upon general structural and functional momentary status of the system.
The chosen activity will dictate the specific use of that quality,which will require further specifically limited functional and structural adaptations.
I think that it’s like calk and cheese, u can’t really compare the two. It’s pretty obvious that dancers will not be able to shut down the antagonist faster than a sprinter, in fact I would say they don’t even come close.
So is there some way to incorporate the type of training a ballet dancer would use to be able to shut down the antagonist so completely into a sprinter program. So they could shut down their antagonists just as fast but more completely.
goose this is a great thread good idea. look at what ballet dancers do. what is it in their training that which allows them to produce powerful muscular contractions while still deactivating their antagonist muscle groups? they jump. they bound. they leap. they are doing plyometrics guys. but not just that they are reinforcing, with years of training with leaps and bounds, the alpha gamma loop. bascially when they land muscular stretch receptors send signals via afferent muscle fibers to the base of the spine where to big things happens interneurons in the spine increase the activation of the given muscle and its synergists and interneurons inhibit the activation of opposing antagonist muscle groups.
I am not sure if this would benefit a sprinter. The antagonist turns on to protect itself from being ripped in half by the agonist. A dancer moving at the speed of a sprinter would = injury. Sprinter’s antagonists shut down and activate when they are supposed to in regards to optimal sprinting.
Another thing to keep in mind is the tone of the muscle. Charlie has mentioned that pre-race massage helps the sprinter’s muscles to be relaxed, but not too relaxed. It has to be somewhere in between.
this is true the antagonist does turn on near the close packed postion of the joint to protect the joint from damage but muscle force during balistic activites is produced in a small range of motion for this time antagonist must be at their must minimal to optimize expression of motor ability.
