I just know that the two girls teams I manage (U14 and U12) from my district have produced lots of school sprint winners and a 1-2 in the regional 3km cross-country - with zero track training for the previous year at least.
Then again, the kids I recruited were mostly fast runners by nature.
Regarding hoops as GPP, I think it gives the kids a good all-round fitness and neural network base from which you can go to Specifics.
Re: plyos, I’d say you already have the vertical preparation and the landing conditioning. What kind of plyos are you wanting to do?
Then again the basketball players I’m dealing with are all representative players now (three years along) so they train at least once a week for hoops and they play at least two games every weekend (1 x club, 1 x reps). The court as you know is 28m from end to end so it lends itself to short sprints, with a jog-back recovery. Games are 20mins each half for club or 4x8mins quarters for reps. If a kid is on for 70 per cent of the game, it’s a pretty good workout even if it is diced into 3 or 4 minute bites.
But of course it isn’t going to enable anyone to sprint 200 metres without tying up. Those longer continuous sprints and some continuous plyos (like hill hops up and/or down [for eccentric strength] will give them the Specific conditioning they’llall need to make something of their general fitness out of basketball and convert it to success at a higher level on the track.
‘just my two cents worth’.
To CF- The other day I worked with one of my former female sprinters who tried the step down method for me. THis is what came of it. She accel. for 25-30m and began to step down. SHe liked it but she felt as if she was not getting enough lift.
She tried stepping over, she said she felt slower (and looked slower I might add)
she tried stepping down and drive the “thigh” forward under the COM and it was fantastic! She was really moving.
Can you or anyone else knowledgeable chime in on this?
Kit Kat- one of my qmilers asked me if they should be stepping down for the entire race.
Thoughts? I guess because it felt like more work than normal.
no I am just trying to get them to get the concept down (before timing).
I will soon enough
Normally if something is technique related, I like to go out and sprint while implementing it first. Unfortunately, I have a groin strain and possible sports hernia I am working on so sprinting is minimal to say the least