Simple… Their screwing up strides. We all know every step is gonna be different. An then you place this mini hurdles with specific spacing, lets say 2ft or 3ft apart for example…
But what if your tight that day, you step wrong, you stumble, etc.
Your gonna overstride to reach it or your gonna break them or even worse… 1 of my guys said when he was out at Altis he saw guys stumble & break plenty of them. He even used them & swears they slowed him down cause he’s used to a set pattern, that was too short for him, then it was too long…
& when I pointed this out everyone got their panties in a bunch… I got like 1000 reasons why they should use them.
I gave those up top, got nothing but crickets as a response
I am not sure that wickets and performing mini hurdles will make or break a sprinter.
I think we need to teach athletes and coaches to have some basic skills about what feels right for them. What feels correct for a coach might be different than what feels right for the athlete.
Did you as a coach perform the drill you are teaching to athletes or did someone teach you that drill?
If you are an athlete, do you have any reference points for that drill, does it feel good or does it feel awkward.
How much success as an athlete and or coach did you have prior to making a more concrete plan or effort with method in your process of wanting to become faster?
I was not the world champion in the 100m hurdles but I was close enough and hungry enough to learn and most importantly improve a great deal from where I started.
There are so many factors that come into play for achieving your goals on the track and how you train is one of the biggest factors as well as where you get your information and why should you trust and or believe that information will change your life.
I have done wickets and done mini hurdles but there are so many other factors that need to be prioritized LONG before performing wickets would even be thought of. As far as I am concerned the distraction of gimmicks are endless and take time and energy away from the discipline and hard work of getting fit and learning to take time for the process and journey of becoming a great athlete.
I think most people are not doing Vince Anderson’s original wicket drill, and therein lies the problem.
As far as …
When the wickets start (after the accel.step cones), typically you are at/around ~5’ spacing and end 6’ or 7’ or more (depending on the athlete’s ability, speed, body segments, etc). An inch or three in daily variance (due to readiness or whatever) isn’t going to wipe out or break all the hurdles…or ruin the drill.
From what I see, MOST coaches are NOT going thru the trouble to layout all the acceleration cones, and the progressive wickets-spacing per VA’s charts/data. It also called a maxV tool for a reason…if done correctly, the athlete will be pretty close to (90-93%) max velocity toward the end of the run (if laid out correctly). Coaches laying down a generic 5 or 6 foot uniform spacing, and just having the athletes go at it all willy nilly is just … well, at that point its more a football drill than anything … “high knees”… and therefore I think better things could be being done there.
You are going to need A LOT of wickets to lay out a run long enough (18-21 mini hurdles)…and then to lay out 3-5 different spacings for different athletes? that’s a lot of hurdles at time.
Performance, and therefore spacing, is different on grass than track. Almost nobody is going to keep track of this and go thru the trouble …