Speed Workout To Improve Acceleration A thread of drills &...

Speed Workout To Improve Acceleration

A thread of drills & exercises I use with 1000s of athletes to improve both their short & long speed

Let’s dive in ⬇️

Philosophy

You must dedicate time to training speed if you are an athlete

Minimum 2x/week

Ideally 3x/week

In those sessions you MUST include:

1) Plyos
2) Resisted Sprints
3) Unresisted Sprints

200-300m of daily volume seems to be the sweet spot to improve all qualities

1) Spring Ankle

You need to be strong throughout the entire system if you want to be good at acceleration

Including the feet

Weak feet will collapse & lower your speed

Love the spring ankle drills as an accessory to our main sprint work to strengthen the feet

2) Projection Drills

If you want to be good at acceleration, you must be able to project your body forward

I got this from @EatSleepTrain_ & it is a staple with our athletes

Pair this with some isometric holds & you have a great priming series prior to sprints

3) A Series

I love the A series for athletes of all ages

Will it do much by itself for speed development?

No

But it acts as a great way to work key positions needed for improving speed

- March
- Skip
- Run
- Single A

Staples for us on speed days

4) Heavily Resisted Sprints

I like to load athletes heavy to improve force/projection in acceleration

Over 50% VDEC (velocity decrement)

I believe the heavy resistance forces the athletes to but force into the ground helping improve the first 10m of the sprint

5) Lightly Resisted Sprints

I like to add in lightly resisted sprints to build the back end of acceleration

Less than 10% VDEC

The higher we can produce power with lighter loads, the faster we will be

6) Unresisted Sprints

We use unresisted start variations to work the skill of acceleration for the first 10m

We will then use unresisted sprints around 30m to develop all aspects of speed (force, power velocity)

We time a lot of our unresisted sprints

30m being my favorite

7) Broad Jumps

You can place these either before or after your sprints

Jumps act as a great secondary tool to develop speed

I love using horizontal sprints on our acceleration days

- Broad Jumps
- Double Broad Jumps
- Triple Broad Jumps

TL;DR

7 Ways To Improve Acceleration

1) Spring Ankle
2) Projection Drills
3) A Series
4) Heavily Resisted Sprints (50% VDEC)
5) Lightly Resisted Sprints (<10% VDEC)
6) Unresisted Sprints (Timed)
7) Broad Jump

Frequency: 2-3x/week

Volume: 200-300m

That’s it

Speed development is simple when done correctly

If you enjoyed this thread can you:

1) RT the tweet below to share with others on training speed

2) Follow me @keithjferrara to learn more about becoming a better athlete

View Tweet

If you are an athlete looking to improve your speed

I offer a remote training program that will help you improve both your acceleration & max velocity

Using PROVEN methods I have used with 1000s of athletes

If you are interested DM me SPEED to get started ASAP