Sprint Drills

There's a lot of research and debate in the athletics coaching world about the value of sprint (running) drills. I wrote an article on this and top coaches often dismiss them as being of little direct value to actual sprint performance. Some place them on a conditioning continum alongside circuit exercises.

I haven't been able to discover much research on drills over the years and that which I have has often indicated that there is a poor transference in terms of speed of movement, angular velocity and movement patterns. Some Canadian research I discovered was critical in terms of A skips, for example. These drills are still a staple of many coaches and their athletes worldwide. Nevertheless many coaches place a high value on drills, as do I. It's the selection and the usage of the right type of drills that's key. I, for example, also see drills as having a significant S&C and pre-training value (i..e. to protect against injury). I plan to produce a number of videos on the drills that I use for both sprints and long and triple jump. You'll find the first below. I became familiar with these on-the-spot-cycling drills, many years ago when I did a training session, as an athlete, with the then national Soviet athletics coach and former long jump world record holder Igor Ter-Ovanesyan and I basically used them myself and with all the athletes I coach ever since...