Kit kats 400m program

Track & Field 400m
41

Sorry I did say i would post my next phase, had some drama over the weekend my apologies

This is my leed on ohase from the above, targeted development is of course speed end. Youw ill see however that the weekend strength threshold work does not cease throughout.

SPP (November 26th – January 6th) Speed End
All sessions start with 4 Progressive / technique acceleration runs over 36m
Conditioning circuit held Mondays 6-8 at the university in addition to weight/strength training

This phase will include more vertical orientated Plyometrics, along with myo-tendon development.

Wk1 - Speed
Tue - Accelerations / Speed, 336m (3 min rec) / 520m fly’s 40m build up (5 Min rec)
Thurs - 3150m ins/outs. 436m
Sat - LS, 31k reps (4min rec)
Sun - LS, 32 Long hills (2 min rec) (Abbey Fields)

Wk2 - Speed
Tue - Accelerations / Speed, 410 accels (3 min rec) / 560m (5 Min rec)
Thurs - 60/80/120/150 (10m = 1min rec)
Sat - LS, 10*450m (partner rec)
Sun - LS, 14 Long hills (1:40 min rec)

Wk3 - Speed
Tue - Accelerations / Speed, 410m (3 min rec) 520m Fly’s 40m build up (8 Min rec)
Thurs - 3120m (8min rec) 360m
Sat - LS, 31k reps (4min rec)
Sun - LS, 32 Long hills (2 min rec) (Abbey Fields)

Wk4 - Speed
Tue - Accelerations / Speed, 436m (3 min rec) / 60-80-100m (8 Min rec)
Thurs - 436m (3min rec) / 530m Fly’s 50m build ups (6min rec)
Sat - LS, 4800m (3min rec)
Sun - LS, 14 Long hills (1:40 min rec)

Wk1 - Intense
Tue - 2-8100m B2Bs (45sec- 10min rec)
Thurs - LS 3-3200m (4-10min rec)
Sat - LS, 41k reps (4min rec)
Sun - LS, 32 Long hills (2 min rec) (Abbey Fields)

Wk2 - Intense
Tue - LS 4-2*300m (2-10min rec)

Thurs - LS 5-2*150 (1-6min rec)(split 300s)
Sat - TEST - 3 split 400m (250-150) (1min rec) / 36-60-150m
Sun - LS, 12 Long hills (1:30 min rec)

Thanks guys

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Hi a-j,

Thanks for posting your phases. This is terrific stuff. I was thinking about the comp phase I posted, and will revise it. One question I had about your phases was the recovery aspect.

Do you find that changing the focus of a two week block reduces the need to take a down week? Like are you able to go right through with no down weeks because you are changing focus?

I was thinking of a more traditional S to L competition phase- I feel that an 8 week phase is relatively easy to manage without overdoing it. (3-1, 3-1 work recovery)

We have a couple of great meets where my guys can run the 300 on an oversized track, so I’m pretty excited. I will get to work and post the proposed competition phase including potential races.

T

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For me, I noticed that the change in emphasis like this worked really well, I drop the weights for the very last week of each phase.

Had no problem with recovery at all by doing this. I find that the 4 week block to be the toward the limit most can handle on a specific focus, so adding that change detracts from that rather well.

44

Just an update. One of my athletes, mentioned in this thread, run 53.6 today in the 400 with 70km/h winds recorded on the 200m bend. 2 weeks we pulled out of the 6x200 progression at 5 x 200.

Starting to have some faith in what we have been working on all year. If I have planned correctly, he will pb in the 200 in the next few weeks and then we have 12 weeks (or so) to the State Champs and hopefully can improve another second or two in the 400

45

Nice update DMA.
Maybe you could start coaching one of the former kids I used to coach at my son’s grade school. He is a very talented athlete who is now 17. I was not able to continue to coach him post may 2010 and tony sharpe’s group is too far. He ended up working locally with a university program and he told me this past saturday ( dec 8th) he was running 18 x 180’s. I can’t stop thinking about this as I feel I abandoned him.
It’s really great to see and hear about the successes of other’s athlete’s based on sound training methodology.

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Thanks Ange. I am hoping to sit down at some stage and write up his training this year, what was planned and what he did due to injury and illness. Interestingly an athlete I coach by correspondence, ran 1.5 seconds faster than he has been - due to having a bit of chat before he raced.

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It would be great to see what you planned and show also what you ended up leaving out as you said due to illness and injury. So much can change in the training process but it’s also about how you handle it.
It sounds like you have a lot to offer these athletes.
It’s great to hear.

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Congrats DMA. I think everyone has the right to adapt the concurrent program to suit their own needs.
A-J I really like how you’ve reconstructed the program but retained many oif the principles while adapting it to the needs of indoor sprinting. It seems the threshold thread served one of the purposes Charlie had when he encouraged me to contribute which was to stimulate discussion and from that often comes creative thinking and what else is adaptation than the outcome of creative thinking. I hope that doesn’t sound pretentious because that’s the last thing i would want to be accused of being. I just wanted to thank you guys for stirring the pot as it were and improving on my old program. It is is now a quarter of a century since I wrote the concurrent theory and tested it on Darren Clark and Maree Holland. Their times of 44.38 and 50.24 in reaching 400 finals in Seoul 1988 remain legitimately in contention for any of the recent Olympic and world title finals.
Happy New Year everyone. I hope 2013 is beautiful for you.

49

You are correct. The progression listed was mainly for 200m type speed. Ultimately you are limited in the 400 by your speed reserve. Running 22.0 as a male won’t get you very far post-collegiately. The program work nicely because you flow in and out of training elements and are never too far away from losing any one quality.

Last summer, the athlete ran the 400m Canadian finals. It was clear his 200m wasn’t good enough so the focus went to races at 200m to improve that speed, which he did by summers end. This fall and winter, the athlete is considerably faster through 60m and 300s in training.