Yes you can do that. In fact, this is how I train my sprinters. However, since we have so many people on the team, I have the luxury of keeping my best athletes out of dual meets whenever I see fit. But I generally use the meets as special endurance training, then train speed during the week.
Thank you for the reply! My team lacks (good) sprinters greatly (surprise surprise they train everyone with intensive tempo even at the middle school level and wonder why we don’t perform well by the end of the season!). I appreciate your response, but I have a few more questions. What does your total volume end up looking like each week? What are you speed days like? How do you peak for any regional/state/etc meets?
I do not add up total WEEKLY volume. I mainly add up total DAILY volume, simply because I am doing speed one day, tempo the next, etc. - I am training different energy systems so the same rules do not always apply.
On speed days I try not to go beyond 300-500m per session, and even that can be altered depending on how each athletes feels. Speed work is something you need to pay very close attention to, as each athlete may be affected differently than others.
As far as peaking goes, to make a long story short, I up the volume of their workouts two weeks prior. Then 7 days prior, I taper the training in half (sometimes more).
I agree that the same rules do not apply, but I was planning to use total weekly volume more as a baseline so I am not overreaching or stray to far above or below the plan (granted workouts need to be viewed on a daily basis to what one can perform).