How to get Faster! Simple Speed Training

Most coaches and athletes would most likely consider speed to be the most important ability when it comes to success in sports however most coaches and athletes do not know how to properly develop the quality of speed. This is usually due to the belief that speed is something that you are born with and it can not be improved through training. Another misconception is coaches implementing old school or maybe “traditional” training programs which in fact do not train speed at all. Finding the information to correctly create and implement speed training is difficult in today's world of technology where anybody can claim to be an internet guru or expert. I am constantly learning myself and do not consider myself an “expert”. I have witnessed many different approaches to sprint training, the successful ones follow these basic principles. This guide will give you the basic tools to help coaches and athletes confidently build a speed training program that works.

Typically what is not lacking in many athletes is hard work. This quality is very important to long term success however, the term hard work can be misinterpreted. Hard work does not necessarily mean your workouts have to be exhaustive. Running until you're red in the face, profusely sweating and on the verge of vomiting are not objectives for a workout. Hard work for me is training smart and being disciplined to train consistently, while achieving proper rest, sleep and nutrition.

Small changes can go a long way, implementing the information found in this guide to your current speed training program will be very important to your development as an athlete. Changes do not happen overnight but through consistent long term commitment. This guide is not an in depth long training program but it will give you the basic principles of speed development so you can build your own program and grow as a coach and athlete.

You think conditioning is speed training.

If your sprint program consists of you running 300 yd shuttles, gassers, 16x110s, 400m, 1.5 mile trail runs then you unfortunately are not training speed. These activities are typically used for “conditioning” and maybe even misused for conditioning as well. If the goal is to increase your sprinting speed, I would make sure your program does not include these very frequently or at all.The speeds that one runs to accomplish these types of distances are far from the speeds needed to actually push your sprinting speed to higher velocities.

Suicides do not help either.

If you like to include suicide runs or ‘up-backs’ then you are missing out on speed. Although running these drills feels like you are reaching high speeds and working your change of direction abilities, it is not. These are not going to cut it. These types of exercises are very fatiguing especially if they are repeated over time with short resting periods in between. Once fatigue sets in, the sprinting velocities will drop dramatically.

You lift weights before you sprint.

Sprinting is one of the most intensive activities an athlete can perform and not much else comes close to it. Sprinting should always be the first priority. By that I mean it should not only be the main focus of your program but it literally should be done first in your training session (of course only after a proper warm-up has been performed). Follow up your sprinting session with your weight lifting. Make sure you do not over do it, remember weight lifting is there to aid the speed work, it is not the main focus of athletic development. That being said, weight lifting is very important and plays a huge role in athletic development and injury reduction. A program without weight training is an incomplete program.

You’re sore for days.

Basing the effectiveness of your workout on how sore you are the next day or following days is not a good idea. The goal of a speed/sprint workout is not to bury yourself or make yourself throw up, pass out or be in agony. If any of those side effects occur during a sprint based workout, it is not a sprint workout and will not help increase your speed. How do you know if you did too much? You should be able to participate in another speed training session 48 hours after the previous speed session (in most cases).

You don’t care about sprinting technique.

Although this is a topic that is outside the scope of this article I felt I had to mention that technique in sprinting is important. Just like any other activity like throwing a baseball, kicking a soccer ball or catching a football, technique for sprinting should not be overlooked. Most team sports involve running and... Learning and understanding the shapes and postures of sprinting can be difficult to learn and understand if you do not have experience on the subject. This is why it is important to train with someone who knows what they are doing. If you do not have that person in your inner circle you can always have a training partner, friend or family member film your sprinting on a smart phone and send it to a coach who can help analyze and provide feedback.

You never time your sprints.

It is important to measure progress to find out whether you are making progress or not. Timing your sprints is answering the question: am I getting faster? If the time it takes to cover a certain distance is decreasing then the short answer is yes. However, make sure you are timing your sprints accurately. Ideally, the timing of these sprints will be done with a fully automatic timing system. However, many people do not have access to such systems. If all you have at your disposal is a stop watch, make sure the person timing you is consistent. A good rule of thumb is adding 0.24 seconds onto the time you recorded on your stopwatch to account for human error. Essentially adding .24 seconds onto your recorded time is covering for your timer’s reaction time on hitting the start and stop button on the stopwatch. For example; if you run a 40 yard dash in 5 seconds based on the recording of a hand held stop watch, you should add .24 seconds onto the 5 seconds which would leave you with 5.24 seconds.

You are trying to improve too many different qualities.

Try to limit the focus on how many qualities or abilities you are trying to improve at once. It is very tough to see huge improvement in your sprinting speed and your aerobic conditioning simultaneously. They both require very different training and have very different outcomes. Although both qualities are necessary for most sports, it is best to focus on improving one at a time while maintaining the other. This is why the best miler in the world is not also the best 100 meter sprinter in the world. I can’t remember a time where Usain Bolt won an aerobic endurance race. If speed is the “main thing” then let’s keep the main thing the main thing.

Keep sprint distances short.

Most sprinting distances per repetition are typically very short distances. For team sport athletes most distances I prescribe are between 10-40 yds. More advanced athletes have a lot of training underneath their belt and exhibit great technique can potentially go up to 80 yds but that is rare. Most athletes reach their maximum velocity within 30-50yds, anything further than that the velocity of the sprint tends to decrease.

Keep rest times long.

Anytime sprinting is the focus, the amount of rest between repetitions must be high. The recommendation of at least 60 seconds for every 10 yards covered is a good rule of thumb. For ex: if an athlete sprints 40 yards they would then rest for about 4 minutes until they perform another repetition. This is to ensure that the speeds are high, the fatigue is kept low and the quality of the technique is maintained throughout.

Keep total sprint volume low.

The more is always better thinking does not apply here. Too much of a good thing can become bad. Young people love doing tons of volume because America! And Hard Work! Ya Know? Too much total sprinting volume in a day or week can potentially set an athlete up for injury. Any occurrence of injury is a setback and will lead to ineffective training. Everybody is different and there are exceptions to every rule but below is generally how much volume is recommended in each session and on a weekly basis. I really like this chart put together by Cameron Josse, who is a performance coach for the Indiana University Hoosier Football team. Although the chart is tailored to football players, it can be extrapolated and applied to other sports where player size and body weight varies by position. I would say the volumes of each session recommended by Cameron Josse could be decreased even further and most athletes would still see great results.

Chart created by Cameron Josse

Frequency of sprinting.

Generally it is recommended to have at least 48 hours of separation between sprinting sessions. For example if you had a sprinting session Monday morning at 9am you should not have another sprint training session until at least 9am on Wednesday morning. Sometimes 48 hours is not enough, in some cases 72+ hours may be necessary depending on how well you recovered in between sessions. If you are still sore in areas which are very important for sprinting, then you should wait until the soreness is no longer present. Rushing your recovery and sprinting when you are still sore or tired is going to lead to a low quality sprinting session with a potential increase in injury. Train Smart, recover harder!

The different parts of sprinting.

Sprinting can usually be broken down into two parts. The acceleration phase and max velocity phase. I will go into more detail on both in another project. Typically the acceleration phase consists of the start and the portion of the sprint where the athlete is still increasing the speed of their sprint. Max velocity is typically referred to as the part of the sprint where the athlete is at least running at 95% of maximum velocity until they achieve maximum velocity and until velocities begin to decrease again. Max velocity typically can not be held for more than 10 yards depending on the athlete. Sprints 25 yds or less typically focus on improving acceleration and sprints longer than 30-40+ yds typically focus on improvements in maximum velocity. It is important to focus on both. Improvement in one phase usually helps the other and vice versa.

Do what is right for you.

Although this guide gives general recommendations that should satisfy and help improve most athletes, there are individual differences. Find out what works best for you. Do not do more sprints or longer sprints just cause it is more. The best strategy usually is finding the minimum effective amount of sprinting volume that gives you the best improvement while minimizing residual soreness and over training.

Parting Thoughts

Thank you for purchasing and reading Simple Speed, the short guide to answering your first initial question about how to get fast. This short guide hopefully answered most of your questions and maybe even created new ones. To me, the best information answers my questions but also creates new ones. Feel free to reach out with any more questions.

Thanks for reading,

Kevin Consoles

Email: kevin@kevinconsolesperformance.com

Twitter: @KCPerformance_

Instagram: kevinconsoles.performance