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Usain Bolt Jamaica world record sprint fast
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Training Tip Of The Week: Basic Sprint Drills

Track athletes are the fastest straight line running athletes in existence. Why?  All they do is work on running.  All of their drills are centered around running/sprinting.  The rest of the world changes direction and has sport practice to handle as well as the skill of their specific sport.  That being said, the running mechanics needed when changing direction are not any different.

The challenge is for the athlete changing direction to get to the “A Skip” position as quickly, and as efficiently, as possible.  There needs to be an understanding and mastery of running skills because changing directions requires so much efficiency, strength, and power.

Start out with 3-4 sets of 15 yards for of each of these.  Master these drills before trying to move onto others.

Usain Bolt Jamaica world record sprint fast
You want to run like this man? You need legs of steel!

Marching – The arm pump in a little too high on the up swing for me… and I would like the heel a little closer to the butt with the toe being up to the sky. None the less it’s still the best example that I could find online:

[fvplayer src=”https://youtube.com/watch?v=JGH68vKubSY?fs=1″ splash=”https://i.ytimg.com/vi/JGH68vKubSY/hqdefault.jpg” caption=”Marching”]

A Skip- Try to display some form of rhythm with this one:

[fvplayer src=”https://youtube.com/watch?v=ad0ToqBV3fo?fs=1″]

Butt Kick– since most of the athletes that I work with don’t have proper knee drive, I prefer this version of the butt kick.  Notice how the heel is coming to the bottom of the butt with the knee coming up with it.  It’s pretty close to the A Skip but the focus is on the heel to the butt verse the knee coming up when doing the A Skip.  In the other version of the butt kick, the thigh stays perpendicular to the ground and the heel comes up to the center of the butt.

[fvplayer src=”https://youtube.com/watch?v=rzt1GeT2fDM?fs=1″ splash=”https://i.ytimg.com/vi/rzt1GeT2fDM/hqdefault.jpg” caption=”Sprint Drill – Jenny Pacey – Heel to Bum”]

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Scott will be back soon with another related post so keep your eyes peeled and make sure to check out all of Scott Umberger’s older posts!  There are some serious gems in there that might just change how you think about training!