Special Unique Request-charlie And Other Pls.

Expert Discussion Advanced Sprint Training
1

Hello everyone. I don’t post here much (never until now) but very much enjoy the site and the depth of knowledge of its community. I also admire Charlie’s work greatly and having elite track athletes as friends, know the hypocracy of the persecution against Charlie and Ben.

I have a special request; I need some basic sprint training advice and I’ll explain my background and why. I am a 39 year old strength athlete (powerlifter flirting with the possibility of some strongman stuff soon). I am 6.1 and 275lbs. I’m fairly lean for a powerlifter but certainly not under 10% BF. I have two interests in sprint training, the first of which really isn’t relative to my question. First, I started basic sprinting as a regimen for aerobic fat burning over the typical get on a bike or jog for an hour. I like the metabolic advantages and the relative muscle preservation of sprinting. My “former” sports background is that of a basketball player until I was 30 or so. I played at a high level and I think you’d find that my genetics were “elite” under any measurement of performance. During my B-ball days, I was approximately 190lbs., I had a 40inch vertical leap and could run the 40 in 4.3. Fast forward to powerlifting in my early 30’s and I got to benching x of 400lbs, squatting and deadlifting in the 6’s - all drug free and with terrible weight lifting levers (long arms, long legs). I’m by no stretch of the imagination bragging, but just trying to give everyone some understanding of my background and abilities as it relates to what I’m trying to accomplish and the nature of my query.

Now, onto my question (sorry for the length). I have a bet with some coworkers that I can run the 40 now in a time comparable to those my size at the recent NFL combines, i.e., at or better than 5.2. 2 months back, I ran a 5.5 in the cold, in basketball sneakers, with no prior sprinting. Thus far, I cannot best that time. I have encountered a couple of problems. First, when training at distances of 40-100yds, I keep pulling my hamstrings no matter how well I warm up or stretch. I think my hams have become programmed if you will, for the squat and deadlift movement, and I have created some relative imbalances as it applies to sprinting. So, I “broke down” the 40 training and am now running 20’s. My hams tolerate this much better and I can tolerate a greater volume of sprinting per session.

Can someone give me some brief, elementary guidelines for a suitable cycle of sprint training with the aim of achieving my sub 5.2 goal (within the next 8 weeks), and one that will not unnecessarily interfere with my strength training. In other words, I know I could sprint train haphazardly, lose 25lbs, and run a sub 5.2 on pure ability with the weight loss alone. But I don’t want to lose any appreciable muscle mass. I need an intelligent approach and I need some advice on the hamstrings.

I know this isn’t a “serious” training question - forgive me, yes, I am not a competitive sprinter. I’m just a 39 year old ex athlete that wants to show the naysayers what elite genetics are really capable of - and, we have some good old fashion money and pride riding on it. I also want to maintain my “athleticism” and want to keep sprinting a part of my regular routine for that purpose and fat burning - but I can’t afford the downtime from leg training everytime I pull or tweak a hamstring. I would appreciate any input.

Thank you in advance!

2

Why do you want to tolerate more training volume? Running 20’s sounds like a good idea, but by all means keep the intensity high and volume low. If you only need to run 1 good 40, why would you train like you need to run lots of them? Enough with my criticism. Need more details on what you’re actually doing, unless you want someone to create an entirely different program.

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Thanks, good question and let me clarify. I’m not trying to increase the volume. But when I was running 40’s or attempting 100’s, I couldn’t get a decent session in b/c the ham would go - let’s say on the 6-7th max 40 attempt.

More background; I have recently adopted DB Hammers AREG management to my training…so my sprint training has been warm up, run the 20, achieve best time, fact that time by 6%…so, if my best was a 3.0 (my best has been 2.75 HT) in the 20, I’d add 6% and continuing running 20’s until I couldn’t run below 3.18. The result of this approach has been I’ve only been able to run 4 or 5 runs below the cutoff which I know is a reflection of my general lack of conditioning for this skill. But the bottom line is this; I’m only running about 10-12 20’s in the session - hardly high volume, and I’m doing it on my “nontraining” days.

Does this help?

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Jeez guys, I’m just looking for a little simple sprint workout from the experts here. I have no idea how to put together an even elementary sprint training cycle. Or do I have to buy someone’s book here? Or do I have to post more often? I can post forever on the strength forum but then again, I don’t beat dead horses. Sorry for the attitude (really), but no one here can rattle off a simple program?

Is it because the goal is vanity? No one here would ever be guilty of that right? No competitive athlete would ever be vain. Or maybe, if I was some longshot D2/3 football player prepping for a regional combine, I could get some advice?

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People are trying to do you a favour here by getting some background before sending you off with some program that would probably screw you up.
You want us to do some work for you, but you don’t want to do some work for yourself?
You recognize that you need a program that won’t interfere with your weight program (and vice-verse). How can we answer till you post what your lifting program is? Once we see it, maybe we can help, but don’t be shocked if we ask more questions as well!

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Fair Enough Sir. I thought I posted enough info. Sorry for the attitude. I am presently transitioning from a traditional Westside program after 9 years to a “DB Hammer” program. My ultimate goal is to learn some of the things I like about the DB Hammer stuff, especially the AREG and Iso stuff, and then merge it back into the Westside stuff, but do so more consistent with the Science behind it. What I mean by the foregoing, for a small example, is avoiding what I feel to be an error in Westside methodology by trying to address power/speed, etc in the same week. I am also concerned with the 4x/week schedule for a natural athlete. I don’t say these things lightly, I say them after reading everything they claim the system is based upon, and my 9 years experience with the system. But I digress for I am not a blemish on Louie’s rear end or anyone else at WSB :slight_smile: They do some great stuff! So, right now, I working “upper body” four days apart, and “lower body” four days apart. So, I am one day on, and one day off. The off days I use for working prehab stuff, forearms, neck, calves and this is when I attempt to work in some sprinting.

You know my goals. My specific problems are the hamstring issue and I am sure I am not yet conditioned for sprinting. I am sure my form is hell so I could use just some very basic suggestions, such as if doing some high knee type runs would reinforce form to some extent. I am not trying to become a sprinter at my age and besides, I have too much respect for those athletes to have ever considered myself a sprinter, even when I ran 4.3 :slight_smile: All I want is to, on a long term basis, make sprinting a part of my normal GPP for its fat burning and muscle sparing benefits, perhaps working up to 100’s, 200’s and 400’s w/o blowing my hams and, in the short term, running 5.2 or better 8 weeks from now. The latter is my immediate goal.

More recently, I’ve been running 20’s HT, and my best thus far is 2.75 which seems slow to me?? Is it? I tolerate the 20’s well but I’ve been using this AREG system to measure fatigue and I realize its potential folly for this specific application. Inducing fatigue is probably great for strength work, but I am having trouble with its potential application to sprinting. So essentially, I want a simple program and some suggestions as to how to manage my volume per workout, perhaps some stretching or warm up tips for the hams, some very very basic forms tips etc. I hope I am not asking too much gentlemen and I thank all in advance whom will be gracious enough to help. Thanks! If anymore info is needed as to my strength routine, let me know.

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A couple of the basic concepts behind Charlie’s system are not performing any training that taxes the CNS more than 1x every 48 hours and never sprint training in the 80-95% range. This no-man’s land is too slow to actually improve your speed but too fast to easily recover from.

So, you will want to do your speed training on the same day as your heavy lifting (perferrably before.)

However, before we get too deep here, I think the big key for you will be to address your hamstring issues. You can’t train for the sprints if every time you run fast, you blow a hamstring. I’m not sure what the problem could be here…video of you sprinting would help a lot.

BTW, if you can run a 20 in 2.75, then a sub 5.2 40 should be easy.

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This is just an idea, maybe a lousy one, but I keep thinking that if you haven’t run for a while, then just maybe some slower speed runs to “remind” your body what running is like would be the key to “unlocking” your speed(since you say you’ve been fast) in a safe way. Seems to me that going straight from heavy PL/no running to sprint training is inviting a hamstring problem. Maybe starting with reps of 200M runs at whatever pace feels comfortable to loosen up your legs while reestablishing neuromuscular pathways, if you know what I’m getting at?

You have the power, but applying it safely is the issue IMHO. My guess is you wouldn’t add that much power in 8 weeks, but rather should focus on form and relaxation. My .02, anyway, maybe you’ll get some info from everyone telling me how wrong I am :stuck_out_tongue:

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Let me tell you how wrong you are!! :smiley: Just kidding!! I get the feeling someone here is waiting to hear some “ancient chinese secret” to speed development. To just rattle off a program without more background would be like trying to cure genital warts with a blow torch, just setting your a$$ on fire doesn’t mean the problem is fixed. I hope everyone is picking up on my sarcasm. Video would be very helpful. You have displayed exceptional speed in the past, but you are a little bit older so you need to address that accordingly. As Charlie says, “High quality performances are the result of high quality training.” How is your actual strength right now? I think you mentioned how strong you were, but did you mention how strong you are now?

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First, when training at distances of 40-100yds, I keep pulling my hamstrings no matter how well I warm up or stretch. I think my hams have become programmed if you will, for the squat and deadlift movement, and I have created some relative imbalances as it applies to sprinting

DB Hammer has written quite a bit about this problem. Train a muscle to be able to gain large amounts of tension and then throw it into an environment where it not only must quickly gain tension but also be able to release that tension just as quickly and you’re just asking for problems. I’d say you have been de-programmed so in order to reprogram yourself you’ll probably need to avoid what’s causing the problem in the first place and that for you is heavy strength work.

Are you familiar with RFI glute hams? They will definitely help fix that problem. Do you train westside? I’d just replace all the slow strength work with power and/or reactive work for your leg training. That alone whould be sufficient.

As for adding the sprinting portion it shouldn’t be too difficult. Adding in around 300 yards of sprints twice per week along with some technique drills should be sufficient with one tempo day in between. Focus on starts and very short distances one day and work on accelerations out to longer distances the next or something like that.

Higher-Faster-Sports.com

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1: The Auto-reg type training takes you to the limit in what you’re doing already, so some adjustment will be required.
2: You already have a history of hamstring problems.
I think a reasonable starting point is the use of short hills- starting with reps over 10m and moving out to lower numbers over 20m over the next 3 to 4 weeks, done easily for technique.
The next step, the move to flat sprints, moving from 20m out to 30m, will require a modification to the auto-reg system for that period to a maintenance type program to allow enough CNS and muscular reserves to permit improvement in the runs themselves. I think I would restrict the sprints to 30m and below except for 2 test runs over the full distance, done 10 days before your contest 40.
My first thought would be to build in the hill work twice a week before a strength day for weeks 1 to 4, and the flat runs 3 x per week in the second 4 weeks. The total weekly vol should be reached by week 3 and maintained through till the last week, when it should drop (this means that the SAME vol is done over 3 x per week as previously over 2 x per week on the hills.
Now let’s think about applying some numbers for the reps. Can you tel us what you’ve done in the past?

12

So does this mean intensive tempo and “speed conditioning” is bad…even when training for sports w/ anaerobic endurance. I assume the other option would be working on fitness with extensive tempo and pure speed, and then using a greater speed reserve.

Is there a particular thread where I can read more about this?

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I was just gonna ask the same question. What’s the use of intensive tempo? And does this no man land apply for 200m sprinters as well?? quite curious to know?

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Avoiding intensive tempo has nothing to do with the application of Special Endurance., which is in the 95th speed percentile or higher for either the 100 or 200m.

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Charlie, thanks for the input. However, I’m not familiar with some of the sprinting nomenclature so first things first. I’d love to order one of your books this week ( I know you’re not pushing it, but I’ve been wanting to read your stuff for quite some time now). But please tell me where I’d get my best “bang for the buck” in terms of your training system, theories, etc. I know about “speed trap” but my gut tells me your other stuff would be more on point.

Next, are we staying with sprinting on my off days? How will I determine how many runs/sets/etc., e.g., volume. What about intensity? I do not know what tempo runs or accelerating runs are. As far as hills, what grade?

In the last two weeks, I’ve been running 20’s. Best time 2.75 and I’ve been stopping when I can’t hit below 3.15 which, in my present relative condition, is only about 8-10 runs total.

Thanks a bunch.

And to whomever posted about the hams being “programmed” wrong, I agree 100% and pretty much said as much in my original post. I have been doing the RFI glute/ham raises and agree with you 100%. Other than that, does anyone have any basic stretching / warm up guidelines for sprinting? I am leery of static stretches and the only “stretching” I use for lifting is warming up.

Thanks a million guys.

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Another reason I’d like the book; I need to start doing my homework for my 12 year old son. He has great genetics and runs like the wind right now. First I need to put the stopwatch on him b/c it doesn’t lie :slight_smile: and, I need to get his feet wet to see if he likes T&F. He primarily likes basketball and is lukewarm to the suggestion of T&F. But I have the feeling that his interest could go higher with a win under his belt :slight_smile: Anyway, I just want to know as much as I can. The kid has all the tools - he just has to want the job.

Looking forward to a good read :slight_smile:

Steve

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I would keep the sprints before your heavy leg days to allow for the most recovery possible before the next big session. I think the sprints should be kept to a number where you stop at the first sign of deterioration. Keep relaxed and let the intensity take care of itself.
Prob start with 3 sets of 4 x 10m on a very slight grade, with 1.5 min between each run and a 5 min break between sets. The move to 20s should prob be 2 set of 4 x 20m, with 2.5min between reps and 7 min between sets. Keep the legs underneath you keep relaxed. This is a rough guideline only, and stop at the first sign of performance drop.
With what you’re trying to accomplish, I’d prob start with the forum review and then get the GPP DVD, which will show you the technique you want.

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Thank you Charlie!

Steve Dana