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Developing Speed

Traditional athlete training pro-

grams for power, speed and quick- ness focus only on moving faster; they teach athletes how to start fast and run fast using sprinting intervals and teach acceleration mechanics. Do a quick search and you will find an abundance of “acceleration programs” marketed to build faster athletes. While they do a good job improv-

ing acceleration, forward speed-based training does not transfer well to complex agility tasks, which require deceleration and direction change mechanics.

The Nature of Sport, Recreation and Real Life

Sport, recreation and real life activi-

ties require athletes to read their en- vironments of organized chaos and to perform the required multi-directional skill response with precision and in- tention. Recreational athletes (eques- trian riders and trail runners) must be able to navigate sudden changes in en- vironment, shadow opponents (pick-up basketball players) and react to evolv- ing play (soccer and baseball players) and weather (golfers). Getting from point A to point

Athletes who want to be fast, must train fast.

BY PETER TWIST

W

hen a sport coach or a parent inquires about sport conditioning train- ing outcomes, one of the

most frequent questions is about im- proving speed. Every sport enthusiast loves to witness game-breaking speed, and every coach dreams about coach- ing a pure speed athlete. Historically, we believed that ath-

letes were either born fast or built for endurance. The assumption was that athletes with pure speed were geneti- cally gifted with a larger proportion of fast twitch fibres, they were aerobic

38 Fitness Business Canada May/June 2009

beasts with slow twitch fibres in abun- dance, or they had an indistinct mix of fibre types and were average in both speed and endurance. Genetics cer- tainly plays a big role, but all athletes have the potential to be fast, provided they train for the desired outcomes. If you want to be fast, you must train fast. The development of speed is much

more complex than simply generat- ing foot speed. Using a progressive approach that ties directly to the de- mands of sport, recreation and real life, conditioning coaches can develop ath- letes who are fast, agile and powerful without exposing them to unnecessary risk and injury.

B requires braking skills, to stop, change direction and then accelerate. Deceleration exposes more weakness- es than acceleration; it is this phase where races for loose balls are won and lost. Deceleration skill is the illusion of quickness. Indeed, the race in sport and recreation is rarely like a 100m track sprint with a stationary start to a linear run. Most activities demand aggressive braking and the ability to translate this into quickness in an op- posite direction. Lack of deceleration control,

strength and balance is exposed as in- jury or delayed action. Many athletes lose energy on deceleration. Properly trained, deceleration can be harnessed for more explosive concentric phases. A well-trained athlete gains quickness on direction changes. This creates dis- tance from opponents, giving athletes more time to make tactical decisions, avoid football tackles, get open for Ultimate passes and avoiding cross- checks to throw a lacrosse ball.

Athletes of All Ages Benefit from Deceleration Training

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