After Bolt’s 9.76 :eek: anyone have info on glen mills training methods? who else is in his group?
Below is some info on Mills after a quick search
http://www.charliefrancis.com/community/showthread.php?t=10263&highlight=Glen+Mills
Glen Mills
His main emphasis was on developing a philosophy. We all read the same books, study the same courses, get the same internet research info, but the important thing is ‘how we use this knowledge in the circumstances we’re in’. The coach is measured by results, not by knowledge.
The info must be adjusted to get the results, as it is important to be specific to the athlete’s needs. Athletes have various deficiencies, so treat them differently.
He was keen on getting sprinters to develop technical skills from early age. Work on e.g. arm drive movement 6 times a week. Because sprinting is a precision event, every movement is crucial. If one area is negative, it will have a serious overall impact. If ground time over one stride is improved, over 46 strides its huge.
He’s a believer in starting speed from day 1. If you don’t need it, it won’t help, so he doesn’t perform volume and mileage for months at the beginning. It will have a negative effect. If a muscle runs slow for months, and suddenly you want it to change gear, it doesn’t work. From day 1, he’ll also include mechanical drills, starting drills and games involving response.
He’s an advocate of training the body and the mind. Feel everything you do in your workouts, every drill, every stretch. No music or other interruption, just focus. Stay un-interrupted in the mind and you’ll exert more force.
Talking about the 100m, if a final time is slow, don’t attack the wrong area. Look at all components: from start to drive to acceleration to top speed, maintenance and deceleration. Analyse each stage, and you’ll find weaknesses. You may start giving speed endurance work when the problem lies in the max speed phase.
He touched on how some sprinters run well one day and like a snail the other. These aren’t genuine sprinters. They’re not genuinely fast.
He mentioned how Kim Collins does no weights because he doesn’t like them. His strength work comes from plyometrics and resistance work without weights. To get to the level he has, he obviously has an abundance of fast twitch muscle fibres. However, these will age. This, along with general wear and tear will force him to do more weights in the future. Half measure weights, though, will not produce results. He’ll have to commit.
He performs tests on his athletes every 8 weeks as opposed to Stephen’s 4.
His only overspeed work is with a gentle slope. He also hates parachutes as they fly all over the place.
It was an awesome day, with the Masterclass lasting 2 hours, followed by an amazing Crystal Palace meet in the evening.
I was positioned on the back straight, so saw history in the making with woman’s first 5m Vault. It was also a perfect place to watch Gatlin scream away from the bunch with 10m to go. Wariner also looked great, leaning and charging into the first bend, even though he lost this one.
