Weight training for sprinting

Expert Discussion Advanced Sprint Training
1

Iv searched round for ages looking for a good weight routine for sprinting, has anyone any ideas of a good routine.

What are the main (essiential) leg and upper body weights that every sprinter should be doing.

Help much appriciated.
Thanks.

2

The search button is your friend :slight_smile:

To get you started some of the main lifts sprinters perform are:

backsquat
reverse leg press
deadlift (snatch grip, high pull and variants)
RDL, SLDL
bench press
standing shoulder press
chins/rows
dips (supp exercise)
All forms of ab/core work

OLY lifts and derivatives:
powerclean
power snatch
power jerk
derivatives of the above including full clean and jerk and snatch

Hope this helps. Some people do calf work as well. Others rely on sprinting and plyos for calf development.

Cheers,
Chris

3

Chris has given u a good overview, it would never need to go further,
though I will narrow it down this way;

Start with;

a) A squatting movement.
b) A pulling movement
c) A pressing movement
d) an auxillary movement.

Some choices;

a) Full oly back squats
b) Powercleans
c) push press
d) Romanian deadlift or hyper ext.

OR

a) Parallell back squats
b) Chin ups
c) Bench press
d) reverse hyper extension

OR

a) Jump squats
b) bent over rows.
c) Dips
d) reverse leg press.

Hope this helps, this is the basics, some have done it like this:

Ben Johnson (fastest. )
a) Parallel Squat
b) lat pull downs
c) Bench Press
d) reverse hypers/ hyper ext, (occasional reverse leg press.)

Linford Christie (most muscular sub 10 sec sprinter.)
(power phase April-May)
a) Back Squats (sometimes half, sometimes full, sometimes quater squats
b) Power clean

  • Bent over rows
  • Upright rows
    c) Bench press
  • Military press
    d) Side and forward lat raises + arm drives with dumbells.
4

Linford the most muscular??? Maybe the most cut, but surely he is not as muscular as Dwain Chambers! ccreaney, the most important thing to remember when designing a strength program for sprinting is that it should be general in nature, meaning few lifts that hit many muscles(no bicep curls!) and that the strength work is secondary to the primary goal, which is developing sprinting speed.

5

Linford’s upperbody developement was FAR more muscular than Dwain Chambers upperbody whilst Dwains thighs were obviously far bigger than Linford’s. Linford went up to 215 pounds in the winter months at 6ft 2.5 in" whilst I don’t think Dwain has topped 210 pounds at 6ft 0 in". So over-all about the same.
I know that Ccreany actually wanted examples of routines off which tey r self explanitary.

6

Thanks for the help lads, its much appriciated

7

Hello…regarding Ben, does anyone know:

  1. If his lateral pulldowns were infront or behind the neck?

  2. The reason for paralell squats?

  3. Why he didn´t use powercleans?

Take care…

8
  1. If his lateral pulldowns were infront or behind the neck?

In front

  1. The reason for paralell squats?

Best limit strength movement for low body.

  1. Why he didn´t use powercleans?

Poor technique

9

Thanks for the info David!