Monday, August 27, 2012

Giving the Gift of Slowness

Another good bit from Mike Boyle.  The BLUF:  The world is full of slow people.  If you want your child to optimize his/her athletic potential, do not let them "train" for slowness by running long distances.  By definition, if you are running more than a minute or two, you are running slowly.  

If you want your child to perform poorly this winter I have the answer. The answer is cross country. I have had countless parents 
over the years tell me that they can't figure out why little Janie 
or Johnny had such a bad winter sports season. They worked so hard 
in the fall, running all those miles.

Lets get some facts straight. There are no team sports where you 
run for miles at a time. 

Even if you actually "run" miles in a game, those miles are actually 
a series of sprints interspersed with a series of walks or jogs. In 
the case of a rare sport like ice hockey, you actually sprint and 
then sit down. Running long distances does not prepare you to run 
short distances. 

There is a concept in sport called sport specific training. The 
concept basically means that from a conditioning perspective the 
best way to condition for a sport is to mimic the energy systems 
of that sport. If the sport is sprint, jog , walk, than the training 
is sprint, jog , walk. Makes perfect sense

There is another very large concept to grasp here. 

It is simple. 

Train slow, get slow. 

The reality is it is very difficult to make someone fast and very 
easy to make someone slow. If you want to get an athlete slow, simply 
ask them to run slower, longer. Simple. They may be in shape, but it 
is the wrong shape.






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