Do You See What You Think You See?

Family Update

We are all settling into a schedule with Brennen. Obviously sleep isn't what is once was- but that's ok.

Brennen actually sleeps pretty good. He has had a couple nights where he slept 4-5 hours. Jenn and I took him with us to our business meeting yesterday with our business coach and he slept almost the entire meeting (9:30am to 2pm). I mean Brennen slept all this time, not my business coach :).

Jae and Bailee are still fighting over who gets to hold him first and for how long. I guess that is a good thing to be fighting over compared some of the other things.

Big News Coming in Less than a Month

I told you back at the end of 2007 that I some big news coming soon. Well ,it is really rolling now. Be looking for our big news at the end of the month. I can hardly wait to announce it to the world. Sorry, can't tell much now, but lot's more to come real soon...

Do You See What You Think You See ?

Training athletes is no different than anything else- the more expereince you gain the better you are at understanding it. I have been working with athletes for many years and have developed a keen sense to be able to really see what is occuring in movement, especially Multi-directional speed.

I have said many times that you have to be the type of coach that quesitons what you are taught. By doing so it allows you time to prove that it is either correct or incorrect. That is how I established my knowledge in speed development. I looked at things differently than everyone else. It had to make complete sense to me or I look deeper into it.

I recently viewed a speed dvd and listen to the coach talking about what will be occuring in the athletes leg cycle during a particular exercise. I knew what was going to happen, but I was curious to see how the coach would cover himself. The exercise was a stationary cycling drill. The coach talked about how the leg will follow in the same path as it would if the athletes was running. When the athlete began the exercise the leg obviously took a different path.

It is not that the exercise is wrong or bad, it is just that how the exercise is going to performed compared to what the coach is teaching are different. This can cause a problem when a coach keeps yelling at an athlete for not doing it the way he demands, when in actuality the athletes can't do it that way.

It is so important to understand what you are really seeing. Here are a few important things to consider when teaching speed:

1. Stationary drills should be used for posture, joint range of motions, and spedicifc and general strength. They are not true speed drills. They only indirectly support speed.

2. Form Running drills should be used for posture, tempo, relaxation, specific, and general strength, and neuromuscular training. They are also not true speed drills becasue they trace a different pattern than real running of multi-directional speed.

3. Perform Acceleration and Sprinting to improve the real actual techniuqe of these two.

I often see coaches use the stationary running arm drills. This is good and important. But you can't say that this is how the arms should move when accelerating or in top end speed. Becuase when the intensity of actual running take over the biomechanics change and the force production angles change.

I am not saying don't use them. Just say the appropriate things when using them. In the case of the stationary arm running drills you want to say " we are going to be working on how to relax the shoulders and properly swing the arms from the shoulders" If you have the athlete stay in the 90 degree bent elbow position during the drill, you need to expect that it will most likely change during actual acceleration.

I guess my point is that we need to know what is actually occuring before we teach something to our athletes or to other coaches. We have way too many skills and techniques that are so far outdated and should have never been used- it is just that no one questioned them and made a better decision.

OK, Gotta run. I have a lot more projects to tackle today. Have a great weekend!

Yours in Speed,

Lee