Tony Holler is a track and field coach and a football and basketball physical trainer. He works at Plainfield North High School. He is also a member of the Illinois Track & Field Hall of Fame and co-director of the Track Football Consortium with Chris Korfist. Tony Holler is the author of the “Feed the Cats” training method, the fundamentals of which we will explain below.
In the world of sports the line between good and great often blurs, but in the 100 meters it´s definitive. They´re fast and then they´re sub 10. Running 100 metres in under 10 seconds marks an athelte´s entry into an elite circle. But in the modern era of sprinting athletes are breaking the sub 10 barrier more than ever before. This poses an intriguing question: Does running sub 10 still carry the same weight, the same awe that it once did?
In this post I’m going to discuss all those actions and habits that are detrimental to developing and improving your sprinting speed. Obviously if you want to run slower and slower, doing all of these things is the best way to go. Here’s a list:
What if your speed training was actually preventing you from running faster and reaching your true max speed? While it might seem surprising, turns out that all out sprinting over and over again might not make you any faster. If you have your athlete run 30 meters, or 40 meters or 50 meters, sprinting all out all the time, it’s been proven that will not help him develop their speed. That will help him remember their speed. You’re basically making them record their speed and repeat the same speed every single time.
Who is the world’s greatest athlete? There’s nothing more challenging or grueling than doing a decathlon. It’s the purest form of competition. It’s the ultimate measuring stick for all-around capability of the human body.
2 foot lengths to the front pedal. 3 foot lengths to the back.
The pedals should be at 45 degrees for the fastets angle of attack.
Once your blocks are set, you gotta take a few steps back.
Check your work. Make sure that they´re straight and aligned with the track.
Now push them into the ground, so they won´t move around.
If your blocks be slippin´, you´ll be trippin´ and face plant into the ground.
Put your strong leg up front when you take your marks.
If you´re not sure which leg that is, test both and get some timed benchmarks.
Your hands should be up to the line. Arms should be shoulder width wide.
The head should be straight with the spine.
Stay relaxed with no tension inside.
When you raise into the set position there are 4 things you can´t be missing.
The angle of bend at the knees. For the front it´s 90 degrees. 120º at the back when you freeze. This is the setup you need.
The shoulders over the hands and slightly ahead of the line. Keep them lower than the hips and you´re ready to run a fast a time.
Now you know the basic setup, but every sprinter is unique. Take time and make adjustments that work best with your physique.
In a sport known for pushing the body to its absolute limit, one event stands avobe the rest. A race where no amount of talent or training can spare you from the crushing pain at the finish. A blend of technique, speed and endurance. That´s run right on the razor´s edge of phylosophy and grit. Welcome to the beauty and the brutality of the 400 m.
No other sport tests the extremes of human performance like track and field. The physical demands of each event are so confused and singular that athletes must push their body and training to the very limits of what is possible.
In the same arena you´ll see the pinnacle of human strength and power by a 320 lb behemoth while a wiry runner half his size test the limits of aerobic capacity. Just by looking at track and field athletes you can see how their event shapes their bodies. Obviously lifting heavy weights builds muscle and running hundreds of miles sheds body fat. But the really fascinating adaptations are less apparent. In the pursuit of faster-higher-farther the body transforms in some incredible ways.
Just as there is Maslow’s pyramid and the food pyramid, coach Tony Holler has developed his own pyramid aimed at performance in situational sports. Tony Holler is a track and field coach and a football and basketball physical trainer. He works at Plainfield North High School. He is also a member of the Illinois Track & Field Hall of Fame and co-director of the Track Football Consortium with Chris Korfist. But above all, Tony Holler is known for being the author of the “Feed the Cats” training methodology.
In sprinting form makes function. What does this mean? It means that the sprint technique is highly dependent on the differences in muscular balance between agonist and antagonist muscles.
Kelly Baggett distinguishes in his book “No-Bull Speed ​​Development Manual” two types of runners based on the predominance of one muscle group or another, with its consequent implications in the biomechanics of sprinting.