All-Pro Performance Training by Loren Landow

Author:Loren Landow
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Human Kinetics

The partner or coach holding the belt should treat the A-run similarly to the A-march. His goal is to hold the athlete up and move at a pace that maintains the athlete’s starting body lean throughout the drill. His resistance should force the athlete to push back into the ground but should not prevent the athlete from moving forward. Meanwhile, the athlete should focus on his posture, position, placement, and patterning rather than trying to pull his partner forward like a sled or a parachute. This drill is about practicing the four Ps, and it should look like a smoothly moving wall drill with fast-paced leg action and arm swing.

The athlete completes an A-run for 5 yards moving out, then switches out of the belt and holds it while his partner completes a 5-yard repetition moving back to the starting line. Each athlete completes 3 or 4 A-runs for a single set. If the coach is holding the belt, the athlete gets rest intervals similar to those he would get if he had an active partner.

Coaching Points

Although the patterning of this drill is not quite the same as an unresisted sprint, it begins to approach that level of tempo. An athlete who can pattern well during a resisted A-run will generally be able to do the same in true acceleration.

TWO-POINT ACCELERATION START

Execution

Landow Performance combine preparation athletes typically use a two-point starting stance to practice acceleration. This position is more applicable to football and to sport in general. Although three-point stances are certainly common in football, they are much more sport-specific and do not fully mimic the starting position for a 40-yard dash. In competition, football players start from a true three-point acceleration stance only during their combine and pro day testing. Accelerating out of a three-point stance is more difficult, so the two-point start is meant to groove acceleration pattern acquisition and build relative strength that can then be transferred into the three-point start during 40-yard dash preparation. Athletes who struggle with other drills should still practice two-point starts because sprinting can often help them work through problems that don’t make sense to them in drilling.

To set up in a two-point stance (figure 7.7), the athlete stands tall with both feet together at the line and his toes pointed straight ahead, emphasizing posture. He brings his right foot back behind his left and opens his back foot out to the right side so that his toes point to the right with his heels meeting at a 90-degree angle. From here, he keeps his left foot in place and pivots his right foot on his toes to swing his right heel out and bring his feet parallel again but now a foot’s width apart. He wiggles his right foot along the ground another 6 to 8 inches back, based on comfort level and limb length. (Athletes with long legs should lengthen the distance between their front and back feet to accommodate their dimensions.)

Figure 7.7   Setup for acceleration from a two-point stance.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.