Ok well I have been doing what my coach wants, and i figured he must know something if hes a level 1 track coach, but im pretty sure he was dropped on his head or something… heres our work outs… (last weeks)
Warm ups- we do this everyday
jog 4 laps. then 3x15 push ups and 2x25 crunches. then jog 10 min. and drills (55m and back each drill)
Work outs-
monday - 8x200m (27sec pace) 2 min rest between
tuesday - 4x150m… 3x35m block starts 3x60m block starts. 2x8 flights of stairs.
wednesday - 2x200 (32sec) 2x100 (14sec) 2x200(29sec)
thursday - repeat of tuesday
Friday - off big snow storm.
then we all do another 10min jog to cool down. dynamic AND static stretching.
i run the 100 and 200 and this seems like way to much volume and its making me run slower and slower. whats everyone else think???
Yea, I’d just start asking questions. Don’t be a jackass, just be polite and ask some stuff to get him thinking.
For some reason this reminds me of a chat I had with a new head coach. He a small college national champ in the 200. He was like
“oh yes, Mr. X has great potential. We are even talking about turning pro. Here is my plan for him. Each week we will run 2 hard sessions consisting of 8x200m. We will give all the athletes stopwatches with a pacing(beeping feature). We will achieve the following times in training:”
week1- 8x200m @30sec
week2- 8x200m @29sec
week3- 8x200m @28sec
week4- 6x200m @27sec
week5- 6x200m @26sec
week6- 6x200m @25sec
week7- 4x200m @24sec
week8- 4x200m @23sec
week8- 2x200m @22sec
week8- 2x200m @21sec
Never heard from their great sprinter again…
Awhitcomb, please try to have an intelligent discussion with your coach and ask for his plan. Make sure it’s not something like the above.
he got his “info” from clyde heart and an air force coach in a seminar a few years back. It is a 12 week program shortened up into about 8 weeks. he always use michael johnsons name and tells us he did this to get fast, but the majorit of use run 200m and under. I ran a 23.9 two weeks ago then a 24.3 last week. when I ran easily low 23’s in hs. His only reply was you dont want to peak at the start of the season. Im kinda ashamed that Im running time I ran when i was 14. I even showed him some example work outs from this site and he pretty much said ti was garbage and You wont get faster in ur volume is low on speed days… oh yeah another thing were not aloud to wear spikes on speed days… only if were using blocks… :mad: he is a distance coach, has run the boston marathon and ran 5k and 10k in college. So i think hes taking a long to short approach, which quite frankly isnt work for our 100 and 200 guys.
i forgot to add this above… but yeah its along the lines of that and my PISSED. i think im just going to start schedualing classes when practices are so I can do my own work out.
You have my sympathy. While your situation is unfortunate, it’s not uncommon.
I have a daughter who is coached somewhat similarly at her high school. My advice to her has been to run her workouts so she’s running with high quality (90%+) on alternate days, doing high quality reps until the volume reaches about 500 meters and then back off to cruising speed for the remainder of the reps, which works if she’s not closely supervised.
On days she should be doing tempo, she runs her reps at tempo speed – <75%. Sometimes she gets pushed to pick it up on those days, and sometimes she does but typically she is able to run at a level to make it more like recovery work.
You might try it if you can’t convince your coach that this isn’t garbage.
For example…
monday - 8x200m (27sec pace) 2 min rest between (handle this as tempo work at about 31 seconds)
tuesday - 4x150m (you could run the first 3 and maybe all four at 90% if you get full recovery)… 3x35m block starts 3x60m block starts (Move this work to Thursday if you can. If not, do these first and drop the 3x60 if you can or keep them and drop a couple of the 150s, which would be better). 2x8 flights of stairs.
wednesday - 2x200 (32sec) 2x100 (14sec) 2x200(29sec) (This is like tempo work again, which is OK)
thursday - repeat of tuesday (Maybe you could have the block starts over 35 and 60 meters moved to this day)
friday - do more tempo work.
Good luck, it’s a tough and frustrating situation.
That looks much better… but what he considers speed and what others do is completly different… the monday and wednesday (what you call tempo) is considered our speed workout. Id consider doing this workout but he stands and watches us with a stop watch and clipboard recording our times. oh yeah he told me yesterday power lifting (cleans in particular and squats) are not benificial to a sprinter, this is what got me to thinking it isnt at all right… this is college level track and field too (forgot to add that)
This is unfortunate. Athletes today appear much more intuitive and some coaches refuse to accept the input. For some reason, those in the fraternity forget that it is a partnership, IMHO. Trust is a high component between athlete and coach. Ironically, Hart and Lindeman would probably work you in some ways different than “the seminar” notes.
This is where extensive sprint camps combined with non-interscholastic competitions, in some cases, have a significant impact on performance. However, as stated, communication with the coach is important. Perhaps, as time goes, he may be more open to adjust and revise accordingly; once confident his authority and/or knowledge is not threatened.
i agree with this 100% athletes are getting more involved, and with websites like this they can have more input and thought into the work outs. just some coaches dont like to be contradicted by their athletes. Im not the type of person that will complain about a cruddie work out, but I know my body well enough to know when something is hurting it.
I totally understand your pain. I went through something simular like your going through now :mad: . I was being trained like a 400 meter runner for the 60, 100 and 200. It was’nt until somefriends of mine (and fellow athletes) showed me how they were being trained for the same thing. Next thing I know my times started getting better :D. My advice is to search the threads and talk to other sprinters from other schools (colleges).
I have been reading this forum for almost a year now and it has helpped me tremendously. All i gotta do now is figure out a way to do this stuff instead of his… schedual my classes at practice time :rolleyes:
Warm-up looks ok. You aren’t getting any true speed work though. The only speed work you’re getting are the 35’s and 60’s when you’re already fatigued from the 150’s. You’re doing alot of intermediate speed work which may be counterproductive to your goals too.