Sprinting In The Cold

How we train sprinters in the dopamine-starved state of Michigan.

Spring is a happy time for 2/3 of the country. In Michigan, sleet, ice-cold rain, and bone-chilling wind is the norm. While Texas boys are clocking fast practice times on pristine outdoor tracks, my Monroe Michigan cats are shivering and cussing waiting for their opportunity to get a few frigid block starts in.

During the first year as an assistant coach for the outdoor team, I told my boys to bundle up and get tough. This may work for racehorses, distance runners, but cold sprinters are slow sprinters. This year, I’m taking a new tack — screw the track, we’re going to do things differently.

Quick note: Last indoor season, I didn’t have access to a track — period. I trained my guys at the local YMCA and did drills in the racquetball courts. My team always got on the podium for the 60M. We lived on hex-bar deadlifts, single-leg split squats, and enough box jumps to ascend Everest. Nothing can replace 10M/30M high-velocity sprints but we got darn close.

Here’s what we are doing:

#FeedTheCats is Weather-Proof

Our minimum-effective dose #FeedTheCats approach automatically restricts the amount of time and distances we need for practice. Sprinters rarely run more than 400M a practice, so we can get by with 40–50M of straight track. We rely on the 10M fly and 30M Fly to train at max velocity. It’s working.

Here’s the kicker —

Our new 77.8M track is the 2nd-floor high school hallway.

When you focus on the negative, it’s easy to miss the positive right in front of you. In my case, it was a hallway that runs the length of our high school building. There it was — enough room to do 10M, 30M, and even 60M sprints. We’re in business.

Some caveats:

I told my coaches that overtraining injuries were unacceptable (yes, even for the distance squad) which means I closely monitor how much we run the hallways at full speed. Hard floors and concrete will tear athletes apart if you train like a volume obsessed fool.

Our 10M Fly times may be slightly slower than normal because we aren’t in light-weight spikes. However, the guys feel that they are blazing so all good for now.

Our practices are from 5:30–6:30 PM so we won’t rattle teachers catching up on paper grading or detention!

Begging for college indoor track facilities

We have Eastern Michigan University 40 minutes north of us. I’ve begged and cajoled the track coordinator to open the track to us once a week. I’m happy to barter for time on the track by offering to allow other teams to use my Freelap timing system and blocks. The coordinator been great and often times we are the only ones on the track. This is a bonus and may not be something you can pull off but it’s worth checking.

Cafeterias and Gyms

We’ve turned our cafeteria and gym into an extension of our weight room. The cafeteria is used for drills and plyometrics. We move to the gym when we can work around the basketball team.

Weight Rooms

We have a decent sized weight room but its still too small to handle a large team. We use a tightly choreographed shift schedule to move groups through weight room workouts in manageable chunks. We’ve found that its best to group kids by strength and gender. Weight rooms also often have boxes, kettlebells, and bands needed for a decent plyometric workout series.

50˚ Snap Practices

During the preseason, we’ve set-up a standing flash practice alert on any day where the temperature gets over 50˚. Our team knows that I may pull call an audible and have practice at our outdoor track. We use Snapchat to communicate (we added with Twitter this season) so word spreads quickly. This may not work for large teams but its an option.

We pride ourselves on being scrappy. I believe that poor track programs have an advantage if they have dedicated kids and creative coaches. I make a point to never complain about something we don’t have. Complaining just gives the team a ready-made excuse for poor performance. If you make the practice fun, the kids will ignore the limitations.

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