Seeking advice, ridculous times and inconsistencies

Hi all, been a while since I’ve posted on here, but constantly am reading through old threads. Thanks Ange for maintaining this goldmine of information.

So basically I have been training more serious this past year with more free time and access to a great facility. My goal has been to officially run under 7 in the 60. All year I have been on pace to do so. I’ve been consistently under 4.0 for 30m on my Freelap timing system. Early in the year I ran under 7.10 for 60 on my Freelap as well. So I know I have the raw power and basic qualities to run well. Progressing through the fall on a SL scheme, I have been able to run 2.8 pretty consistently to 20, 3.9 to 30, and 4.9 to 40m. I gradually did my best to take my time to perfect each segment before progressing and lengthening the runs. I started to run out to 40m around October. Segments being roughly 2.85+1.10+1.0x on average at this point.

It’s kind of ridiculous, and I expect everyone to think I am trolling or something, but this is what really happened. As far as technically, I was really just working on making sure I maintained my body angle and avoiding popping up, just having a smooth transition. Some reps came out around my average time I just mentioned and everything was measured off correctly and my system was working just fine. Then, on a particular rep I checked my Freelap. It said “0.87” for the 30-40m split. The preceding split, however, was 1.25 from 20-30m. I thought perhaps the thing glitched and subtracted and added a tenth of a second or something. But during this session, I clocked 3 more ridiculous times (with some of my “normal times” here and there inbetween) which were a split of 0.91, 0.87 again, and finally 0.85. The caveat was that all of the fast runs were 1.2-1.3 from 20-30, whereas the more “normal” runs were around 1.10+1.0x. Since that session, on another day I clocked 0.86 on a flying drill. But that was only once. I have clocked plenty of pedestrian times since over 1.0.

I thought, assuming this is somehow legit, perhaps the very slow times during the 20-30 segment that set up the proceeding segments are indicative of ground contacts that are compensating for being too quick at the start. I thought perhaps I can try to shift this extra tenth or two onto the start, so that I can get into the proceeding segments more smoothly. I tried a few things and ended up running 0.9-1.0 during the 20-30 segments. This was compensated by running my first 20m about a tenth or two slower by emphasizing a few other things technically. However, using this strategy, I somehow slowed down a lot from 30-40. So the splits using this method were 2.9-3.0 for 20, 0.9-1.0 for 20-30, and 1.0-1.1 from 30-40. Doesn’t make sense either.

Obviously I haven’t been able to piece the best splits together. But if I somehow did, it would be 2.77+0.93+0.85. Which is pretty unbelievable. I just want to be able to optimize my time, but now I stepped into a can of worms where there are different approaches (cues, technical models, etc).

Unfortunately I have no film on these particular runs, which obviously occurred very unexpectedly on mostly 2 particular sessions. Hopefully I can catch another one soon so I can share what is going on. All I can tell you is how I felt. It was strange. My strides felt huge, but not through reaching of course. My arm action felt very reactive in those moments. I didn’t really feel the ground or my legs, but I would say oddly enough that my hips FELT lower to the ground, which is very strange. It was so easy and I felt like I could keep running like that forever. That is how they felt. In comparison, my slow runs feel shorter and more efforted. I just want to know what is going on here, and how to consistently run faster. Using the same cues I don’t get consistent results. I’d really appreciate any advice anyone has. Thank you for your time.

Hello Brett,

Merry Christmas from Toronto ONTARIO CANADA. We had snow yesterday but today it’s warm and rainy but nice for walking Winston, my 7 year old french bulldog.

Thank you for your note.

It has been my pleasure to maintain this website and keep information available to those interested in learning how Charlie trained as one of the 5th fastest men in the world. In addition to that he developed and coached one of the most dominate groups in track and field history and went on to share with the world how that was done. ( this kind of content is unprecedented because coaches and athletes almost never share information unless they have to or have nothing to lose) We now know so much more about cycling but would we have had Lance not had a problem?

You said you are training more seriously, and you have more time and greater access to a facility.

Are you training more? Differently? Now you have a coach? You have more money so you don’t need to work?

Yeah, many reading this will be bored with the questions but in order to define how you are training more seriously we need to understand. What is the operative definition of " training more seriously?

Brett, I have other comments under “Coach Ange’s blog”. Good luck and make sure you are having fun, enjoying the ride or you will stop learning.

Hey Ange, thanks for your thorough responses. To answer your questions, since the pandemic I have been working less and have more time and energy to devote to training. For the past several months I have been able to dedicate myself to two speed sessions a week, two weight sessions, along with 2-3 tempo and ab sessions a week. Due to work and location, my training for the past couple of year has been meager, disorganized, and hodge podge. But I have been able to establish my current regimen due to my situation.

As far as my actual training plan, I am focused on the 60m and so I am using an S-L scheme. Essentially one of the speed sessions I focus on acceleration more and the other more emphasis on max v. Progressing gradually 10m at a time. Starting with trying to perfect 10-20, then 20-30, 30-40. Lately session might look like 3x20mB, 2x(2-3x)40mB. So, volumes around 300m or so. I will progress to more 50-60m in these next few weeks. Tempo-wise, I stick with about 1000-2000m per session. With weights, I have been doing mostly 3x5 on bench and squat, I don’t have any auxiliary lift equipment, but it gets the job done, and I’ve been about the strongest I’ve ever been at 5’10" 170lbs and my best set for bench has been 3x5x255lbs and squat being 3x5x435 at a parallel depth. I am quite flexible and do massage and additional stretching on tempo days. The volumes and intensities of my training are on the more conservative side as I’ve previously done speed volumes over 400 in the past. Having a written plan and not going beyond it, always trying to do less, has definitely helped me to avoid tightness in tiredness. So overall I do feel very good. I suspect that my inconsistencies are probably a result of not relaxing, and perhaps this is due to doing loads of high intensity explosive work at too high of an effort. I have been considering doing control speed (very submaximal and longer runs) as it could give me a better opportunity to relax. All the short near-max sprints have really done wonders for my starts, my best times for 20m being 2.77 and 30m being 3.89, but I have been all over the place going past 30. So I’m thinking maybe doing more upright work may provide the opportunity for more practice in that position and elicit more relaxation. Constantly reviewing the lectures and books from CF, I also just reviewed a seminar Charlie did for the SWIS symposium. Thank you for your responses.