What would you suggest for someone who has good stride length (about 2.4m) but bad stride frequency (about 4-4.2 strides/sec)?
How would you get the stride frequency up to 4.8+ strides/sec while maintaining the length, as soon as possible?
What I understand (or think I understand already) is that there is enough force being put out because the length is long enough, but it just takes too long to apply the force to the track and GCT is too long.
So, applying the same amount of force in less time is what needs to happen to increase speed.
From what I understand, getting good frequency and a range of motion that is suitable to the athlete’s power is more important than trying to maintain the length at the expense of decreasing frequency if the athlete is not powerful enough for it. It isn’t possible to change their frequency from 4.1 to 4.8 while maintaining the same length. This is a 17% increase in top speed and will be more than 1 second improvement to their time (closer to 2 seconds). Perhaps shorten the stride length so that the frequency can improve, then as the athlete develops there will increases to both.
Depends on how the stride length is being achieved. Is it a natural foot landing or is it being forced? Overreaching and tring to increase the rate isn’t going to improve things. The stride length has to be appropriate for limb length and current strength levels and both frequency and stride length will improve together initially. Eventually, stride length will optimise and then frequency will be the route to further improvement but that occurs at a pretty high performance level.
There is a detailed description of Ben’s technical change from 10.30s to 9.79 in the fiirst Forum Review if you want more detail on this topic.
Heavy foot strike indicates you are landing too far ahead of the C/M because the hips are low. Increased power will help eventually but you may need to adjust the stride, and if you can sense that there is some over striding- it’s most likely.
Okay, I’m looking for a bit of transferrable info here.
At what point of the 100 or 60 would I look to measure the frequency of stride? Top flight zone would be my assumption and experience.
another question…how similar is the stride rate in accel phase vs. top end phase?
There is alot of discussion on this in the first forum review. What exactly are you looking to transfer? If it feels natural, it’s fine, no matter where it occurs.
Sorry CF for not being very clear.
When measuring stride rate/frequency, are you doing the math gathered from the entire race or looking at the middle portion of the race when the athlete is at top speed?
2nd question is:
How much different is the stride rate i the first 10-20m from the middle of the race (100m).
Total strides and thus average stride length may not change but the distribution of stride length will change as performance rises, as pointed out on the forum content:
1: Start stride length may shrink as the foot must land quicker and sooner when the athlete is driven out at a lower, more aggressive angle.
2: Mid strides get longer with more power.
3: Last few strides get significantly shorter as they change from freewheeling, slow bounds to power strokes closer in length to those of mid-race (at a much higher rate)
4: Average rate and specific point rate increase with performance.
When you say stride length must be appropriate for limb length and strength levels, could you see significant improvement in stride length with strength improvement considering the technical adjustments to prevent over reaching are made?
If I am not making myself clear, what I am referring to, is can limb length be a limiting factor in stride length regardless of strength levels?
To me, it does not seem so even at elite levels so long as strength levels can be increased.
Lastly, at elite levels, all things being equal can more gains be had with improving stride length (via strength levels) or stride frequency?
Wouldn’t getting stronger allow for a longer stride though? And couldn’t gains in stride length be unlimited as long as strength continues to go up? I think that is what Adam is getting at.
Getting stronger does allow for a longer stride, but ultimately the limiting factor is limb length, because strength gains cannot continue forever. Trindon Holiday can get as strong as he wants, but his stride length will always be considerably shorter than Usain Bolt’s, because Bolt is a foot taller than Holiday. While strength goes up, stride length goes up, but strength gains are limited by physiology, and therefore stride length gains are limited by the same factor. If you compare the stride lengths of top athletes, I bet you’ll find the biggest correlation is with their height, as their strengths are all quite high.
didnt CF say in CFTS that when ben johnson was running 10.1x his stride length was the same the same but stride frequency was improved and his strength levels were up about 10% when he was running in the 9.8x 9.79 range…so strength improves stride frq. aswell…correct me if i am wrong
Yet, Bolt’s frequency will not be the same as Holiday’s. So it cancels out eventually in the 100m dash. Height is not a limiting factor in sprints. It might be in olympic weightlifting for example (where a high FFM/height is required to be competitive in the various weight classes), but not in sprints.
As you increase your CNS output capabilities through H.I work (primarily sprints), your stride length improves and so does your stride frequency of course which is also a direct result of the ground reaction force
Right, but I am not comparing between two different sized runners, I am asking if strength levels go up and limb length remains constant, can’t stride length be increased with benefit to the runner? This is taking into account prevention of overstriding of course, but a stronger person will be able to propel themselves further with each push off. Overstriding to me is a direct effect of the technical nature of trying to put one’s foot too far in front which has no correlation with the distance a runner is able to propel himself via increased strength levels.
And my overriding theory here is that since strength is considered the most trainable physical characteristic of an athlete, wouldn’t improvements in strength and thus stride length be a much larger component.