I witnessed at the track yesterday a 14 yr old female sprinter running for endurance a 1600, 800, 400, 100 . Is this good for the female? If she is a sprinter I somewhat understand that they are training her for endurance with the 1600, but what about her fast twitch muscles? I also see kids under 14 running 4x 400’s. It does not fell right. What should the kids be running? And HS kids what kind of sprint development and endurance do they need?
If you look around on this site, you will see protocols that work as well for kids as they do for anyone else. Having a sprinter run stuff beyond 200 meters at that age is ludicrous.
I would focus on acceleration up through 30 meters, max velocity in the 30 to 60 meter range, and then speed endurance in the 60 meter to 80 meter range – not all the same day. Once in a while, you could throw in some special endurance, which would be a rep or two at or near race distance. Use full recovery and keep the emphasis on quality (near max speed). Keep the volume reasonably low (200 to 300 meters total for the short stuff) and (300 to 400 meters for the longer stuff). Do the speed work about three days per week and do tempo runs (on grass – at about 65% effort) on days between for recovery and general conditioning.
I encourage you to look around on the site using the search feature, you will find a wealth of information here.
Thanks very much , and You are right their is a wealth of information here.
Thanks very much , and You are right their is a wealth of information here.