I was inspired by the winter training article written by coach Mangiacotti two weeks ago, so I wanted to put in my two cents concerning what I wanted my young people to do for winter workouts. As a young high school coach I was determined to write workouts for everyday of the break and even…
All posts by Tony Veney
Sprint Hurdle 101
In this prep for the Master class, we are going to cover the basics of what hurdling is and what hurdling isn’t. First, hurdling is not gathering together everyone that isn’t fast enough to run the short sprints or gain a spot on the 4×100 relay. If you will avoid this first No-No, you will…
Annual Planning for High School Hurdlers (Part II)
In Part One of the annual planning for your high school hurdlers; I covered 8 questions that every hurdle coach should be concerned with as they plan for the coming track season. In part two I will cover how to model the hurdle race so your boy or girl will go into each race ready…
Annual Planning for High School Hurdlers (Part I)
Since the high school track season in some states can be as short as 11-12 weeks, the purpose of this article is to assist those coaches who struggle with organizing their high school hurdler annual plan. The first part of this article will ask questions: How long is your high school hurdler’s season? The number of…
How to ‘three step’ in the sprint hurdles
At the end of the day, if we can’t get our athletes to three step their race, we’re not very good hurdle coaches. But, the reason they’re not three stepping between, say, hurdle three and four, isn’t because of what they’re doing between hurdle three and four. In the jumps, we know that every problem…
Speed Endurance for the Sprint Hurdles
Every sprint race has a period where the ability to hold off the effects of fatigue hurts overall performance. In the 100 meter and 100 meter sprint hurdle races, the transition from acceleration, to top end and speed endurance are almost identical. Both races hit max velocity at almost the same location in sub-elite and…
Development of the Sprint Hurdles
One of the difficult areas to manage as a coach is the development of your sprint hurdles (110H/ 100H). The books out there will give you plenty of technical things to learn and what I want to touch on is the practice session itself. One of the biggest problems continues to be the fact that…
Coaching the Dual Hurdler
Having been a high school, community college, and 4-year coach at all three levels, I have had to deal with the dilemma surrounding how to make the best use of the dual hurdler, the hurdler who can go both ways. If your boys or girl can run 14.1 in the highs but can’t bust a…
Hurdle Nitty Gritty
It’s time to get down to the hurdle nitty gritty. My hurdle practices often resemble a borderline disaster. Sure, I have some kids who have finally developed the ability to three step, cut step and pull their trail leg through. But it’s hard to help them when I’m so distracted by the nightmare taking place…
Want more hurdle drills? (Watch)
When I was a young(er) coach, I thought the key to developing good hurdlers was to teach a lot of hurdle drills. Trail leg slide this. Walk overs that. Five step trail leg half hurdle this. One step lead leg half hurdle that. Then I started talking to Tony Veney. He said to focus on…
Sprint Training – Energy Systems
Sprint Training – Energy Systems By Tony Veney At the beginning of each track season, you sit down and evaluate the returning and the incoming talent. The thoughts eventually shift to the top sprinters and the expectations we both have for the upcoming season. If girls or boys ran 12.5 or 11.0 last year, you…
The Start Position
The Start Position By Tony Veney We’re going to get Adonis to stand in front of the start line. In front of the start line facing this direction and I’m going to want him to take two nice high double knee jumps to get himself ready, go ahead. This is really exploding the legs and…