Sprinting and the Nervous System

 

Greetings from TrackMom, today I will turn the post over to Coach Henry to address a question regarding the nervous system and your youth sprinter.

Question:   I am hearing a lot about Sprinting and the Nervous System can you explain the connection?

  The Nervous System has a limited capacity to recover from certain types of training activity. Most coaches understand this when planning training and especially when the adjacent competitions lead to championships. Sometimes in the days after certain types of training an athlete is unable to run with as fast a cadence as usual, often also accompanied by lower maximum power output. It is in this situation that an athlete is said to be “flat”.

 Young athletes have nervous systems that are very limited in their capacity. Because of this young athletes will be unable to sustain maximum cadences or maximum power for very far at all.  Some respected authorities state this may be as short as 3 seconds and maximally 5 seconds. In training they may be able to do about 3-6 experiences of maximum speed in a session at the most before they are flat. The time to recover after nervous system flattening sessions will likely be at least 72hrs. This makes it only possible to train for maximum speed once a week if the athlete is racing that week or twice a week if they are not racing.  

  Steve Bennett Author of, “Training Kids for Speed” States that training to minimize the effects of neural fatigue by improving its capacity could involve a range activities:

 Focusing on acceleration over 20m with total volume of sprints up to 200m

• Focusing on maximum speed development over 40-50m with total volume up to about 300m. It is very important that proper mechanics be used and reinforced. They don’t all have to be at maximum effort.
• Multiple jumping and throwing.
• Short hill runs of 30m.

 The most important thing to recognize is that athletes cannot develop more maximum speed by attempting training at maximum speeds when neurally fatigued. They simply would be practicing bad habits and an inferior motor pattern. They would also be prolonging the period of flatness. Racing requires Nervous System freshness for optimum performance.   

 The best way to find out athletes tolerance to training and times required for recovery is to monitor it carefully. Avoid doing any maximum speed work in the 4 days prior to important races. Racing in more than 3 events is always a compromise because of nervous system fatigue.eg. If young athletes compete on a given day in a 100m, 200m, 400m and they will almost certainly have significant nervous system fatigue for at least 4 days.

Coach Henry Williams

“Lauren’s Dad”

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