Over the coming months, CTF will be expanding and evolving in a number of directions I believe will contribute to improving the sport as a whole, as well as enhancing the experiences of athletes and coaches. We will continue to place our primary emphasis on coaches and athletes competing at the developmental levels. But, that…
Archives for Latif Thomas
Speed or Endurance in the 400m, 600m & 800m Races?
Track and field is a counterintuitive sport. That’s why most high school kids are terrible at it. I’m constantly reminding my athletes that their rate of progress is directly proportional to their ability to do the opposite of what feels natural. Push ‘down and back’ to go ‘up and forward’. Jump ‘away’ from the bar…
300 Hurdles & 400 Hurdles: Systems vs Philosophies
Some coaches have a system for training various event groups. This system is applied to all athletes in the group, regardless of whether such a system is best suited for that particular type of athlete. At the collegiate level this can work for knowledgeable coaches because they have the option of recruiting the types of…
(Video) How *not* to get recruited by college coaches
It can be difficult for high school athletes, as well as their parents and coaches, to understand how to get recruited by college coaches. This leads to well meaning kids and adults engaging in behaviors so inappropriate and unappealing to college coaches, they lead to the athlete becoming entirely uncrecruitable. RELATED: An Ivy League Coach shares 8…
See the Best of this Weekend’s Complete Track and Field Clinic
As you may know, this weekend is the 4th Annual Complete Track and Field Clinic, which is held at Harvard University. This year we have 450+ athletes and coaches (from 5 countries), 40+ clinicians (and 20 additional support staff) coming in. Because I’m so excited about the event, the quality of our staff and the amount of preparation…
Recommended Reading: The Speed Encyclopedia
A while back I was contacted by this guy, Travis Hansen, asking me to promote his program. I get this a lot and 99% of the time I’m all set. I rarely promote third party programs. But, I told him to send me his stuff and I’d take a look at it. I’m an information junkie…
5 Upgrades to This Year’s Summer Track and Field Clinic
After each season, successful coaches assess their results and make appropriate changes to their planning to ensure better results next year. We apply the same philosophy to our summer track and field clinic. It’s not our style to sit back and run the same exact event we did last year just because it was successful….
Top 5 Posts of the Week (4/12-4/18)
If I send out too many emails, people start losing their minds. So, unless you visit the site a few times a week, you’re missing some great (free) information. Here, then, are the Top 5 Most Viewed posts from CompleteTrackandField.com over the last 7 days: 5: Speed Training Starts Early by Marc Mangiacotti (Harvard University)…
Do Your Sprinters Have a Fumbling Problem?
I coach at a distance school where the distance coaches love watching sprinters do (what appears to be) aerobic work. I’m pretty sure it’s a commonly held belief among distance coaches that doing long repeats/intervals make sprinters ‘mentally tough’. It doesn’t. Special Endurance does. But, when structured correctly, it does improve anaerobic threshold and that’s…
3 Coaching Lessons for (Young) Coaches
I get asked a lot of questions so I thought I’d share three of the seminal lessons I’ve learned since I started coaching HS track and field at the turn of the century: #3 Stay Current If you want to be in the top 20% of coaches, you can’t allow yourself to become complacent by regurgitating…
The Top 3 Articles, Programs & Answers of February 2014
I understand you may not have time to catch everything I post each month. As I continue to increase the frequency of new posts across the spectrum of event groups and training modalities, I put together a ‘Best of’ each month so you can get your track nerd on. Below are ‘The Top 3 of…
3 Reasons Athletes Should Attend the 2020 CTF Summer Track and Field Camp
When you hold your track and field clinic at a school as prestigious as Harvard University, you better bring your ‘A Game’. It’s no accident the Complete Track and Field Clinic has become one of the most highly attended summer track and field camps or clinics in the United States. And we know you have…