Transcription
All right. Do you feel flat out slow and unathletic or you lack spring when you're sprinting? Then I got three plyometric exercises to help transform your speed and acceleration. And just so you can trust me, I've trained athletes to do this.
First, here's what you need to know. When you're sprinting, your calves, glutes, and hamstrings are going to be the primary drivers for pushing your body forward. But the problem is most athletes train these muscles in isolated segments. This will almost never transfer over to sprint speed unless you're doing the type of stuff I'm about to show you.
What athletes don't know is that acceleration isn't just one phase or one athletic trait. You have early acceleration, which is 0 to 10 yards or the first 1 to seven steps, and late acceleration, which is around 10 to 30 yards, or for elite athletes, even further sometimes. That means you need to train the glutes, calves, and hamstrings in the slow stretch shorting cycle and the fast stretch shorting cycle.
The difference between these two stretch shorting cycles is the way you get off the ground. The slow stretch shorting cycle means you're going to be using more muscle dominance and power driven strategy. And the ground contact time will usually take over 0.25 seconds. And the fast stretch shorting cycle is more elastic, ankle dominant, and will usually take over 0.15 seconds.
So if you struggle with speed and acceleration, what it really comes down to is doing plyometrics that not only mimic the movement of sprinting, but also the speed of early acceleration, which is the slow stretch shortening cycle, and late acceleration, which falls under the fast stretch shortening cycle. This is going to have higher transfer than isolating muscles as individual pieces.
Now, one of the most important plyometrics you can do year round is the single leg hop. You're simply going to be hopping off one leg and trying to get off the ground as fast as possible. This is going to turn it into a cyclical motion similar to a regular bound where you're trying to push for as much distance as possible. You're simply just going to do that on one leg. The goal is to avoid letting the hips and the ankles collapse excessively. This is going to make the ground contact times even longer and have less transfer over to sprinting or even vertical jump. So, if this exercise is too intense for you, try lowering the amount of height you go and just make it a simple baby hop. Over the weeks, you can make the ground contact time faster off the ground and make the height you actually jump higher off the ground. This is awesome for developing that early acceleration power that we were talking about earlier.
But here's the issue. Single leg balance won't do much for late acceleration. I'm going to analyze 10 people in one of my new videos for sprint technique. So, make sure you click the link in description to join the newsletter to get a chance to get analyzed from me. because the ground contact times in this exercise fall in the slow stretch running shortening cycle category for most athletes if you're not at the elite level of stiffness needed.
So for late acceleration, we're going to switch it up and do something called straight leg balance. So for this drill, we're going to try to get off the ground as fast as possible, but this time we're working with smaller joint angles that are much more specific to sprinting. You're not going for a big knee drive or exaggerated push for distance like you would in the single leg bound. Instead, we're focusing on pushing off the ground with a fast ground contact time, usually under 0.15 seconds. This exercise is going to improve something called thigh angular velocity and build the explosive power you need from the posterior chain for late acceleration and even max velocity.
Now, in my online speed program, the Speed Academy, I like to progress to a combo bound exercise. We're going to start off with a 10 to 20 yard sprint, then immediately transition to a 10 to 20 yard bound. while focusing on keeping the ground contact times under 0.2 seconds. Now, this combo hits everything. It trains early acceleration, late acceleration, and even qualities you need for max velocity.
And if these pometric exercises are too intense for your lower limbs, then you need to build your ankles for speed and explosiveness. So, watch this video right here to learn how to train your ankle complex to be a faster athlete.
Now, if you want more plyometric exercises to increase your sprint speed, hop on the speed academy. I have the best pytric progressions in the world to help athletes sprint faster, whether it's track and field, football, or even basketball.