Gee, this couldn’t possibly be more anecdotal. Just because you don’t understand the science behind sprinting doesn’t mean it isn’t true. Just because you think you are using proper logic doesn’t mean you are. Just because you guess but don’t think you do doesn’t mean you don’t
It’s difficult to understand a complete program from an article. Felix was only a begining high school athlete for the first year of high school. After 4 years, including the fastest time in the world, she was not a beginning high school athlete. You’re basing a lot of assumptions in a lot of areas, including effects of the workout on CNS. Load times for exercises are 10 seconds or less, significantly shorter than the typical training load used in other methods. The trainees are not fatiqued when they leave the weightroom because they don’t work to fatique in the weightroom.
The Ice Man proves (to those who understand) that during high speed running, horizontal forces are not created by chemical muscle mechanical activity after the start phase and are dependent on breaking forces.
Decreasing strength training shows a total and complete lack of understanding of sprinting.
Odd that virtually all locomotion experts use treadmills, specifically designed for testing purposes, and not one of them has figured out that they are not accurate.
Ground contact time is dependent on Newtons 3rd law not the speed of the treadmill.
This brings up an issue I’ve touched on here and in the GPP DVD. The height AND the duration of the stimulus must be considered in determining the stress on the CNS.
You can see this in the weight program adjustments in response to increasing speed work in the GPP. Likewise, in the final taper, where both the number of lifts and the total speed volume is reduced, there is considerable room for planning flexibility.
We’re going around in circles here.
As you say: “Just because you don’t understand the science behind sprinting doesn’t mean it isn’t true.”
The argument is who, exactly, it is that doesn’t understand.
You say: “Not one of them (the locomotion experts) has figured out that they (treadmills) are not accurate.”
Regardless, what is actually happening may be less important than what is perceived to be happening by those doing it well, and how others can share the perception to improve their results.
This is an interesting point. From some of my research into the neurological origins of feelings it appears that a lot of what we call cognition or learning is to do with matching feedback from different body systems (skin temperature, muscle tonus, light levels). While scientific research in this area is going to take a long time to figure out what exactly is going on i have been learning and teaching some complex skills by overlapping feedback from the kinesthetic, auditory, visual constructed (in your mind’s eye) and external visual (observation of others) and have been able to learn some extremely complex skills in a matter of a few minutes of total practice time (not including rest breaks). While my successes are hardly decisive evidence I think they explain a lot of what Charlie does instinctively. For example the hill work in GPP provides kinesthetic feedback as to proper acceleration mechanics so whatever neurological imprints are already there before they are “learned” on the flat. Food for thought.
Cheers,
TC
What do you mean they are not fatigued? There will always be some residual fatigue whether it being acute or chronic, otherwise the athlete could do your program all day long everyday without any detrimental consequences? It may be just the case the the management of the stressors (sprints, weights, other activities) in Allisons training worked well for her.
It may be just the case the the management of the stressors (sprints, weights, other activities) in Allisons training worked well for her.
Of course you realize that your statment fits every coach equally for every aspect of their coaching.
However, since the workout is minimal in application and prescribes a lot of rest it is less likely to have the negative effects of other workouts.
Let me rephrase so it will be more accurate for you: there is minimal fatique created during the workout, so compared to the other run-of-the-mill workouts there is virtually none.
Having coached the “prescribed” workouts from self-designated “elite” sprint coaches for more than 25 years, I can certainly speak to the comparison.
Felix is not the poster child for the strength workout. Her results were average, differing little from hundreds of athletes who have used it for the past 4 years.
Those who don’t understand are those who believe the impossible. Those who believe that sprinting at top speeds uses chemical mechanical muscle work, rather than impulse from elastic energy release, must believe that the sprinter can volitionally produce forces up to 3 times bodyweight in fractions of a second. For a 150 lb sprinter, that means generating 450 lbs of force production from one leg in less the .11 seconds. In fact, it could be as low as .09s for an elite sprinter. Not even the most powerful Olympic or Power lifter could come remotely close to that kind of rapid power output in that amount of time.
In this case what is actually happening is more important for training purposes than what is perceived.
I suspect the reason they use a treadmill has nothing to do with Newton’s 3rd law and everything to do with cost and control.
I also believe there is a fundamental difference with an athlete keeping up with the surface they are running on and one producing their own velocity against a stationary one.
And finally, I think the history of science clearly pointed out numerous examples of poorly designed scientific concepts, held by many leading experts, which were proven to be inaccurate.
‘‘A theory is a good… model if it describes a wide class of observations and if it predicts the results of new observations. Beyond that it makes no sense to ask if it corresponds to reality, because we do not know what is reality independent of a theory. How can we know what is real, independent of a theory or model with which to interpret it?’’
Rather, the value of a model is that it makes predictions, the veracity of which can then be evaluated. If these predictions prove untrue, then the model must be relinquished:
‘‘Eventually the theory becomes a creaking and ugly edifice. Then someone suggests a new theory in which all the awkward observations are explained in an elegant and natural manner’’
Quotes from Stephen Hawking (Br. J. Sports Med., 38, 2004).
Food for thought indeed! Furthermore, with cognitive behavioural approaches gaining ground, the phrase can also easily be accompanied with that of thought for food!
Interestingly, what previously was assumed as “mundane positive thinking and reframing” is starting to find applicable ores in treating psychological disorders; the traditional focus on the ‘meaning’ of thoughts has been eclipsed by the mere interest in the ‘structures’ of thoughts.
The athlete doesn’t have to know the ‘meaning’ of the hill-workout, the ‘structure’ of the workout is more than enough to alter his start mechanism profitably.
A): From verbal cues towards indirect learning in athletic coaching! B): From meaning towards restructuring of thoughts in behavioural therapy! The similarity in approaches is striking!
I suspect they use treadmills more for control of variables than cost.
It’s good that you believe there is a fundamental difference between stationary and treadmill running.
You’re absolutely right in that the history of science is definitely littered with bad conclusions, poor research methods, etc., but it is a speck of dust compared to the folly of coaches who rely on visuals, anecdotal evidence, poor understanding of physiology, and lack of regard for science merely because it is science.
Excellent quotes. And the current theory of running as percieved by the majority of “elite” coaches is based upon …??? 
But you believe in science!
And in this case you believe in poorly structured science; you base your trust in studies that in no way are able to explain reality (treadmill with low speeds vs. flat sprinting with high speeds). As a “scientist”, you, of all people, should know what the connotations of the terms ‘reliability’ and ‘validity’ have in scientific discourse!
There is great difficulty in scientifically understanding how one single gene reacts in a certain situation, despite having a very limited repertoire of variables in the actual laboratory setting. But you seem very confident in ‘scientifically’ understanding such a complex issue as human sprinting, with a million of different variables at play (most of them outside the laboratory setting).
Incorporate the act of coaching together with individual aspects of athletes and circumstances into the equation and you have such a cocktail that renders science into alchemy!
Yep, hypnotists have been doing it for years (cross modality inductions and covert change work) but some of the brain research into learning using MRI scans is beginning to paint a picture that is slightly different from cognitive psychology (e.g. direct observation rather than subjective observation). Hopefully we will soon have a much better idea of what is really going on.
Of course, they are excellent quotes!
They can work both ways though and hence the reason for my post! Especially the last two sentences…
Can any theory/model untill now “predict the results of new observations”? How certain can we be of this?
Are individuals the “sample”, or the “population”, if any of the two?
You’re missing my point. What a coach or a scientist believes doesn’t alter reality.
I believe that top speed is as you say, but the duration of that state of play, when speed crests and acceleration reaches zero might last perhaps 2 or 3 steps before external forces, among them air resistance cause a slight deceleration.
This doesn’t really matter as personal experience shows that all the upright portion of the race is performed best when the athlete concentrates on the up and down action only, with full extention, whether or not acceleration is still present or how his/her conscious emphasis is actually translated into a physical reality.
However, that begs the question: If top speed sprinting uses only impulse from elastic energy release, then why can an athlete only sustain top speed for a short period of time?
In actuality, isn’t this discussion of top speed alone rather academic since all sprints involve a period of acceleration which actually does require chemical mechanical muscle work (if I understand the term as you are using it.) And even top speed (if not run on a treadmill) requires overcoming air resistance.