Speed Enhancement

Coach, I'm with you on this one. OUr team speed is SLOOOOOW! We have improved a great deal this offseason, but still nowhere close to being fast. We cut down our amount of lifting time and worked more on quick feet, running form, acceleration/deceleration drills, agilities, etc.. The arm pump is probably the most overlooked aspect of speed. Our athletes had horrible arm pump and we work it every day in some fashion or another. Ladders are good, Shutttle runs, dot drills, starts, starts from varying positions (on stomach, on butt), 3/4 speed runs emphasizing form, and you can create tons of different acceleration/deceleration drills. To make it more fun, have relay races for your drills, or one on one battles. We use one on one races through the agility ladders. We have shaved on average two tenths of a second in our 40 times. (We keep track of Dot drill times, 10 yard times, 20 yard and 40 yard times)

I would suggest that you find the weaknesses of each athlete and attack it in his weight training, as that weakness can lead to a running form problem. For example, an athlete with poor knee lift or excessive forward lean usually has weak hip flexors, an athlete whose toes point out too much probably has weak abductors. Some weight programs do not individualize enough for each athlete's weaknesses. Some athletes need to work their hamstrings more than others, some their lower back, some hip flexors.

I look forward to hearing the replies on this, we still have much work to do here on speed.

It takes time to set up individual workouts, but the athletes benefit more. I forgot to mention that we do all speed work at the beginning of the workout and more heavily at the beginning of the week. Our effort is better at the beginning of the weak and it is not good to work speed with tired muscles as it leads to form breakdowns and bad habits. None of what I have is original. The weaknesses knowledge comes straight from Westside Barbell Club. Checkout elitefitnesssystems.com. Great site for strength gains. It is more for the powerlifter, but their ideas are better than any others I have ever seen. I used their theory of attacking weaknesses coupled with running form problems and the results have been great. We are hoping we can manage to knock 2 to 3 more tenths off the average 40 time by August. Good luck, I know too well what lack of speed gets you.

optioncoach or whomever,

do you do your Speed, agility, and quickness training before or after you "hit the iron". Also, you may have posted this and I didn't see, but how many days per week do you do speed training? Would you do it on the same days as you do plyos or not? I'm sure I will have more questions later. Oh, is the BFS program worth the money?

Coach, we do Abs, agility and quickness before we lift. (Typical drills: dot drills, agility ladders etc.) We incorporate sprinting in the workout. For example, after each lift is completed (we generally have 5 lifts a day, 2 core, 3 auxiliary) the athlete will run 2-5 20 yard sprints. A few times early in the week we run longer sprints of up to 80 yards for some endurance. Most times later in the week we perform 5 starts (10 yards at most) after each lift up a ramp for starting power (The ramp we use is the standard ramp in schools that meets the Disabled Act rights). As the week progresses we cut the sprinting down, as the more the muscles wear down, the more poor form will take over.
As for BFS, it is a solid program, but sometimes too much of a cookie cutter program, particularly for the advanced lifter. It doesn't target each athlete's weaknesses like it should. The only way an athlete will get stronger and faster is to attack his areas of weaknesses. BFS hits the hamstrings/glutes hard, which is where most younger trainiers are weak, so that is good. The record keeping is good, but with work, one can create his own program record keeping system.
An absolutely terrific site for training info is www.elitefitnesssystems.com. This stuff is cutting edge and known by few. Read every article, especially those by Louie Simmons, Dave Tate and Jim Wendler and DB Hammer, study every morsel of info they have and you will be amazed. The major concept that I have come away with is the importance of being fast when you lift. Some of it gets complicated, so don't rush into it and incorporate it right away, be patient (I learned the hard way) until you know the systems. WEndlers articles on Beginner's mistakes are great.

Coach,
We have been fortunate enough to have a year-round conditioning program. During the summertime I run a strength and speed camp that our entire program attends (60+ players). I have been doing this for the past 9 years and have found the one constant that leads to success and top speed and quickness. TEACH YOUR PLAYERS HOW TO RUN AND CHANGE DIRECTION! It is not a magical formula. If you educate them, FILM THEM RUNNING, you can show them what they can do to improve. Go read the literature - try stuff from track & field, use the NSCA information (www.NSCA-lift.org), get books and videos from Perform Better and Power Systems catalogs, and attend strength and conditioning clinics. If the players know that you are knowledgeable, they will come to workouts. Best of luck to you.

Coach S

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Originally posted by: Titanftball
The BFS program is a great program for high school athletes. It is organized and its set/rep system stops the dreaded plateau. As far as it being "cookie-cutter", I believe the IDEA of BFS is to incorporate a school-wide system of lifting, which in smaller schools, where kids move from one sport to the other, is a great concept. Athletes move from sport to sport and always have the same stretching, set/reps, record keeping, core lifts, etc. The only thing that would probably change are the auxillary lifts. IF all the coaches will commit their athletes to the program, then the kids learn only 1 system, and never stop. We have a lot of problems here because a lot of the other coaches do not participate or push their kids to participate in the weight program. BFS also offers great motivational and now, nutritional clinics as well.

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TitanftBall -

I agree with you. The "cookie cutter" label is really unfair to BFS. Any program that follows a template is a "cookie cutter" program. BFS has a lot of critics, but Greg Shephard and Co. must have done something right - they have been at the top of the high school iron game for more than 30 years now.