Hi, I was wondering if you all felt that after squats, deadlifts and lunges that some leg curls and extensions would be helpful for increasing speed over the winter months?
Thanks
Curt
Not really. I’d spend my energy learning/doing the olympic lifts rather than doing leg extensions or leg curls. If you do decide to do leg curls/extensions, don’t spend alot of energy on them. Maybe just do them with very light weight on some of the off days as a means of recovery.
This has been discussed loads of times before, do a search and you should find some more infomration.
tell me,how would doing so improve speed!?? sometimes less is more and clever training will improve speed.
Oh really? I did a search and found nothing. I put in leg curls as a subject line and found nothing in any forum. Maybe I am doing something wrong. If people keep saying do a search then the first 30+ topics that come up when you do a search are all the same… “do a search”.
Thanks,
Curt
To propel yourself forward you will primarily use your hams for your kick. This is what a leg curl does. Then you will need to extend you leg forward to get a good kick again. That is what an extension is for. It just seems logical that curls and extensions would be very beneficial, but I really don’t see much about the exercise on here. The question is for my 14 year old neighbor that is trying to increase speed. I don’t want to load him up with too many big movements at his age, hence the question of a more concentrated movement such as leg curls and extensions. Yes, he is going to do VERY light squats.
I am helping him lift. I have been trained for years in upper body lifting, but legs are something I didn’t focus on, due to me being a cyclist and that my legs have always been ahead of the rest of my body.
Thanks,
Curt
H,at 14 years of age i would seriously emphasise working on technique.you would not believe the amount of speed that can occur when correct technique is used and also you will be helping him build a great base for the future.if you can get a video posted here i would be more than happy to give you solid advice on technique.
now getting back to your initial question about HS curls and extensions.i personally would avoid both exercises.****to propel yourself forward requires a total body movement! at this age i would be more inclined to use plyometrics and body weighted exercises.if your choice is weights then i would use total body movements which will target all majors with specific movements ie powercleans
During running the hamstrings primarily act as extension of the hip not at the knee joint. So you might want to try hyper extensions or hyper complexes (see GPP DVD) to develop this strength.
Short answer:
Yes you can do leg curls and extensions and they will help with overall strength just make sure they arn’t too heavy (e.g. around 8 reps in controlled form).
Searching:
As for searching you just need to be patient and search through the posts and do some reading. CF.com is the best resource on the internet but it is very big. Below are 2 threads i found in 20 sec using the keyword “extension”.
http://www.charliefrancis.com/community/showthread.php?t=9085&highlight=extensions
http://www.charliefrancis.com/community/showthread.php?t=9810&highlight=extensions
With practice you will find what you are looking for.
People will answer threads that havn’t been answered before or require individual attention but we can’t keep answering stuff over and over again. I know it is frustrating but when someone says “do a search” they just mean that they don’t want to keep on reitterating themselves over and over again because the answer you need is out there.
This perticular topic is discussed in almost all of the CF.com products and numerous times on the forum as newbies join up and go through the usual questions:
"Should i bench surely it isn’t specific to sprinting?, Are Power Cleans the exercise to do? Will hambstring curls help me? Will creatine help me? Help me improve my start etc etc.
One day I will put together a FAQ but until then we will just have to search.
One good way is to look for posts by high ranking members such as Charlie, KitKat etc and see what they have to say.
Happy reading.
tc0710, the reason you found those threads in the search and h curtis didnt is because YOU have access to the “expert discussion” forum and HE does not. So when he uses the search function it automatically skips over the thousands of posts in expert discussion that probably have the answers he is looking for. So just a note, dont be so harsh on people who use the search and cant find the answer to their question. I tried to bring up this issue earlier so that the search function goes through ALL the posts but I was just told to “request access to the expert discussion forums.”
Tks TC, these above are amazing ideas, FAQ is the best we could create on this site.
BTW, how can i rank by high members ? o tryied by relevancy, title and user name without success.
Sorry, I didn’t realise that the search skips out the expert discussion. I appologise, thanks for pointing this out. I guess the reason I didn’t know was because I didn’t realise I was an “expert user”!
They also act as an extensor of the knee. Lombard’s paradox.
FWIW, I did the same search in all forums that I am aloud to read and I came up with two topics. One on cycling and the other was not what I was looking for.
Not sure why people new here can’t at least search the expert forums?
Curt
That is quite an offer. I could tape him, but I don’t think I can host it. I will see if anyone I know can host such a thing. It will be a while before I can get this on DVD however.
Thanks for the offer. I may have to remind you of it in the future. 
H your welcome and BTW sprinting and sprint mechanics are not rocket science as alot of members think.if you need any further help fell free to PM me and this goes to any other member whom needs help/wishes not to post due to the thought of the post appearing as “stupid”.
just because a member is an expert user dosen’t mean this person knows the picture
Thanks. If you don’t mind I will ask a question on here. I don’t care if people think I am clueless.
Here is the bigger picture. I am well versed in increasing body strength and that is what this 14 year old and I have been focusing on. He wants to be a wide receiver and needs to get faster as well though. This is something I am not really familiar with. He also needs to gain weight. Hence, I am thinking of trying to get him to gain muscle and hopefully he will be stronger and then in the Spring we can focus on his speed and technique. I may find a coach for his speed if I have to.
My question is this. What are some good gym exercises to increase his strength, which will hopefully increase his speed? Squats, deadlifts, lunges? All with light weight of course, he is 14. This kid needs to gain muscle. Too light for football. Yes, I know there is a football forum, but I feel sprinters are in the know when it comes to running fast.
Thanks for any thoughts on this.
Curt
As X-Man posted before, I would go with technique for both strength and speed; not heavy loads, not long distances (e.g, 120 m at max).
He is too young for any specialisation in any event/sport, in my opinion. Improvement in all aspects will come anyway…
If he wants to play well when he really needs it, that is!
Hope it helps!