Sprinting

less. For me as a coach one of my tasks is to help the athlete create the foundation of this in training in order to move to that place in competition

Most athletes remember their personal bests as not being lung-busting, crippling, painful experiences but ones of balance. They might talk of ‘flow’, or ‘being in the zone’. Everything just clicked and it felt almost effort

One of the reasons you must train repeatedly is so that you become more efficient and skilled at this speed of motion and eventually master the skills required to improve your performance. When this performance becomes so natural or automatic that you do it without consciously thinking about it, it becomes intrinsic as opposed to extrinsic. When a performance becomes intrinsic then there are other finer points that can be addressed, although these are broadly in the domain of the elite sprinters. We should focus here on mastering the mechanics to help us acquire the intrinsic skills, after which we can look to influence other factors such as neuromuscular response, reactions, timing, and flexibility

For you, the aspiring sprinter, understanding your own biomechanics is about describing, analyzing and understanding the concepts, techniques, movements and force production involved in speed of motion and the sprint race. As a sprinter your prime movements will be linear forward motion, both in a straight line and around a bend

Biomechanically some of us are more gifted genetically than others, but we can all make big improvements in this area. It is generally through increased training, repetition or injury that we become more aware of our own biomechanics, which will either hamper or help us to achieve certain performances – we just need to give ourselves the best opportunity to do so. When testing athletes for biomechanic function, the aim is to identify where imbalance or obstruction occurs that is hampering or even preventing efficient action or function of the muscles. The athlete would then work with certain exercises, as part of regular and repeated training, to make the relevant improvements to their biomechanics

Biomechanics’ is the study of human movement, in terms of the forces acting on the musculoskeletal system. For efficient biomechanical movement all muscles must be free to act without impairment. Most of the time we are unaware of the many adjustments our body makes to allow this to happen, as the body is a master at correcting and compensating so that the muscle and joint actions are completed.

Important Joints
The three joints described here are the key joints of concern for the sprinter.
HipsHip flexion and extension is instigated by the muscles of the glutes and lower core. The hip flexor muscles, which link the hip and core to the leg muscles, will be mainly responsible for flexion of the hip.
KneesThe knee joint flexes in extension and flexion. The pennate fibres in the hamstrings and gastrocnemius muscles will redirect a great deal of energy, as well as using stored elastic energy, when the knee is driven into the extension action. Add this to the ground reaction force (GRF) and you have a great tool to make best use of the power generated from the glute muscles around the hip joint, whether going in a straight line, around a bend or over hurdles.
AnklesThe ankle joint has the least amount of muscle surrounding it, or rather above it in the calves, but it has an array of nerves and tendons that help create the right responsive balance, called proprioception.
The body experiences a point of triple extension when the hip, knee and ankle joints are aligned. At that point the body can make the best use of productive forces between the body and the ground

The intensity of our activity has a bearing on these muscle fibres; the higher the intensity, the higher demand of fast twitch, the lesser the intensity the higher demand of slow twitch. Genetically we are set up with approximately 50 per cent of both fast- and slow-twitch fibres in the muscles responsible for movement. It is in the balance of type 2a and 2b that makes the difference for the sprinter

strength or speed; these fire at the highest rate of contraction but can fatigue more quickly; they are perfect for you, the sprinter.
There is a belief that we can change fibre type through training. Some studies have shown that some can change from fast to slow, but this is a matter of on-going research – we are still finding out things about muscle fibres that we hadn’t known before. Indeed, we still don’t know the limits of the human body or what it can achieve. It was only in 1954 that Roger Bannister was the first recorded athlete to run the mile in under four minutes. Since then it has been done and bettered many more times. How long will it be before the 100m is lowered further than Usain bolt’s 9.58 seconds? Although most athletes are born with a pre-disposed talent to sprint, we can all train harder to enable us to go faster than we are currently able

Fast-twitch (type 2) fibres fire more quickly. The 2a type uses both the aerobic and anaerobic systems to create ATP. The 2b type only uses the anaerobic (without oxygen) system to generate ATP for short bursts of