Supportive Literature of Speed Development

[ehart7]

@martijn

You’re in a tough spot. Peer reviewed journals are an interesting read but I wouldn’t be able to extract a training program from them. And even if they do provide support for some training element, it will be years and years after it has been shown to work in practice, which some at the time will dismiss as anecdotal.
The problem is that training is highly individual. We can’t clone Usain and send 10 copies to Clyde Hart, 10 copies to John Smith and 10 copies to Bob Kersee to determine scientifically what is the best way.

And BTW which of Charlie’s peers works for a journal? If you’re looking for reviews from peers one should look on the track.

I’m not really looking to extract a program from the research. I know what I want to do as far as speed development goes, I just need to defend that when I am told, for example, “historically we have done a long-to-short program with distances between 100m-400m for female golfers.” Obviously this is not speed development as the distances are too long to truly hit 95-100% intensity, especially for female golfers; also, it ceases to be truly alactic (and even anaerobic if the recovery times are low) and this is essentially worthless if RFD is what I’m after (which I am). So basically, I’m trying to find literature that supports the hypothesis that a short-to-long speed development program, properly implemented in the annual plan, can elicit a transfer of training effect for RFD (rate of force development) in untrained collegiate athletes. Of course, I’m not expecting anything that specific but I’m having a hell of a time finding anything that I can even stretch/spin to lend support that that argument.