speed and weight training.

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I'm in somewhat of a disagreement on another website about the amount of speed a player can gain by weight training. My view is speed is a gift from God, you can increase your speed , slightly , with weight training but you can't take a slow footed person and make them fast with weights. notice I did NOT say proper technique with running speed improvements, just weight training. Weights can improve explosiveness, but not in the way of speed. Am I right ? MD

 

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also I'm talking general HS weight lifting , not some olympic training regime .

 

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I'm in somewhat of a disagreement on another website about the amount of speed a player can gain by weight training. My view is speed is a gift from God, you can increase your speed , slightly , with weight training but you can't take a slow footed person and make them fast with weights. notice I did NOT say proper technique with running speed improvements, just weight training. Weights can improve explosiveness, but not in the way of speed. Am I right ? MD

Yep - I agree (with your disagreement ). Insane speed is a gift. I've seen "speed-gifted" kids run with horrible technique, and still be the fastest on the team. We went through several clinics to improve on technique and explosiveness. One was put on by a former OSU running back - and was fantastic. As with all things, improvement only comes when kids actually put what they learn to good use.

It's also common sense. As teenagers, a 90 pound kid better be able to easily out-sprint the 180 pound kid, which is nearly always the case. That's just genetics. As kids get older and the committed ones start serious strength training and conditioning, the gap will narrow.

For the serious athlete, there is no magic involved, and taking shortcuts will show in the finished product. The majority of the gains are from improved running technique, but strength training - especially LEGS - will enhance those gains. Strength training alone, without learning great technique just gives a kid... strong legs.

 

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Proper training can bring out whatever your upper abilities are. Fast with no training? You will be faster with proper training. However there is only so much speed that everyone has hidden in them.

 

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If your strength training is purely based on getting stronger, similiar to a power lifter it may actually make you slower.
Agree MD strength lifting can have little to no impact on your speed.

 

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In order to have great speed, you need to also have proper balance. Proper balance comes from a strong core. Your core cannot (really) be strengthed by weights. There are a ton of exercises that you can do for speed training, but they do not include weights.

For speed, I suggest speed and agility training. I also enourage a lot of planks and core balance exercises.

For explosion, plyrometrics works well. Strengthing the quads and hamstrings helps too. But this can be done through squats, lunges, wall squats and jumping exercises. (These also help with core strength all while strengthing the quads and hamstrings). I also LOVE high knee exercises for speed.

I will agree that incredible speed is a gift. But these are usually incredible born athletes. You CAN train someone to be a better athlete by training the "whole" athlete. This includes diet too, BTW. But I don't believe that weights alone can make someone faster.

 

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High School + weights = disaster. Open lifting that has a teacher present that dosent know any more about wright lifting than the kids he is monitoring.

Kids 16 and below have a huge amount of growth plates that are still open and vulnerable to damage from something as stupid as an English teacher telling a kid to max out on their lift.

I agree with MD AND Sammy on this. There is one skill you cant teach and that is speed. If a kid wants to work on that skill there are way better drills to do than pumping iron.

It never failed every year in HS softball we had one kid hurt in the weight room. Let the teachers do what they are supposed to do and teach the kids reading writing and arithmetic. If you want to work on getting quicker go to an accredited trainer. The money you spend will be saved in the long run on Dr visit co-pays

Tim

 

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Have to agree with most of the above, but mili28 has some very good points. We have a trainer in our high school and we lift weights based on the PEP program. So yes Swifty lifts each day at sokker practice. So if done correctly you will improve your core and improve your speed and agility. She has went thru the entire PEP program and if you read some of the information that Marc Dagenais has on his web page you will understand how to improve speed. DD got to work with him at one of the Hawk's clinics and she was impressed. This is one topic we spend time working on, since it's the dd main thing she brings to the table. Last night she beat at kid in a game that is going to college to run the 100 and 200 meters in track, just because she is quicker.

 

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There are programs, which isolate and strengthen an athletes "fast twitch" muscles. That does make the athlete faster, I saw this personally with my youngest daughter (who does not play FP) who is a runner. In 24 weeks, she increased her speed over 4 sprinting distances an average of nearly 7%, with the shortest distance being the largest improvement of almost 7.5%. The techniques used did include weights, but was not a "weight lifting" program.

 

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Uncle Bubba is correct and why I posted quicker. The getting out of the gate or blocks is where you see the big improvements. Why dd could beat the kid to the ball last night even though the other kid was a track star. We attend many slap clinics and work on the point of contact and getting out of the gate. BGSU had a good one this summer working on this one thing. It is how you lift weights to build the core. Why I agree with Tim that most high schools mess this up.

 

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Any of you that have been to the Busto's clinics will remember that we talk a lot about balance and the ACL and engaging the core muscles. We use Dr. Marshall as a source for our information and well as the Santa Monica Sports Med program or PEP.

I have attached a link for Dr. Marshall that explains why the girls are more at risk for ACL injuries. Most coaches do not even understand the anatomical differences in the female and never maximize their ability to hit harder, run faster or throw correctly or even get the female balanced.

We have been saying this for years and it has fallen on deaf ears in my opinion. When we see girls who can not throw the ball at 12 to 15 years old it makes you wonder why and who was teaching them to throw.

Take the time to listen to his presentation and draw your own conclusions.

Do your own research and understand the differences in how the female and male glutes fire and why the hamstring is the main stabilizer to the ACL in females.

Then ask what you are doing to increase the hamstring strength if you do anything at all.

http://video.answers.com/learn-about-acl-injuries-133324245

Listen carefully to how he explains HOW the female knee works....the swing in males and females is similar however how you teach the female is different because she does not work like us nor does she feel it like we do and many coaches do not know the differences either in my opinion.

If you want to run faster understand what role the hamstring plays and how it is under developed in the female from birth and more balanced in the male.

I am coming across strongly because ACL surgery is no joke!

It is sad when a high school basket ball or sockker coach have no idea what role the ACL plays in jumping, landing or running or cutting.

If my daughter were playing I would copy the PEP program and hand it to them myself.

Howard

 

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I agree. Great points being made. WM 83 really says a mouthful.

Agility training might be a better term and can help if you target to improve the correct muscles. Example; Jump rope done correctly will help most female athletes while strengthening the ACL is a preventive measure most of the time. Just food for thought but a lot of good input here!

 

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Strength training, core training and plyo training will increase speed! Don't confuse strength training with body building. Body building (making muscles as big as possible)and power lifting/strength training (drug free) are two totally different things. My daughter goes to a trainer who said to increase speed you need to increase strength. Speed can be increased with strength training. 3.1 home to first to 2.7 over a couple years of hard work. Females do not have the chemical make up to get large mass of muscle (which can be counterproductive to hitting and speed), but they can get stronger.

Howard: Your research/teachings have not fallen on deaf ears with me, it is the core of what I teach with fantastic results.

I want to take this opportunity to say THANK YOU for all of the research you have done...it is invaluable and works very well for my students.

Coach Jack
WorkhouseFastpitch

 

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Fastpitch is an "explosive" sport. Home-to-first is all about figuring out how to improve on a 20 yard sprint time. Not to split hairs, but there is a difference between quickness and speed. It's been proven time and again that the largest gains come from improving starting technique (out of the box time) and running technique. Strength is important, but technique trumps. Get the center of mass LOW, and get the momentum shifted as quickly as possible. Strong legs will help with that initial push, but from there on it's all about technique. Stride forward, not up - arms relaxed, elbows in tight - hands "pocket to ear". Look at a sprinter. LEAN muscle mass in both upper and lower body... which comes from great conditioning, not "pumping iron".

Improving quickness pays off in all areas. Reacting to the ball off the bat is huge - and speed has little to do with that, it's quickness. Again, it's about efficiency using proper technique (Kobata). Pitchers can learn a lot from this by learning how to get the weight going forward and not up.

 

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From the net...Speed, agility, and quickness are qualities that all athletes work very hard to maximize. By definition, running speed is the interaction of stride frequency and stride length . Stride frequency is how fast one can move the legs back and forth while running. Stride length is related to body height and leg length, making it unique for each individual, and is also determined by the force generated when the foot comes in contact with the ground. As running speed approaches maximum, frequency changes more than length and is therefore more important in determining final velocity.

When one thinks of "speed", what usually comes to mind is how fast an athlete can cover a standard 40-yard dash test or complete a 100-meter sprint. Thus, linear-speed, the ability to achieve high velocity while running in a straight line, is often the quality spoken about and exaggerated among athletes and coaches. Linear-speed is not any more important than possessing the quickness and agility needed to excel in most sports. Linear runs of 40 yards or more are rarely performed while participating in any sport except track and field.

Agility (the ability to explosively brake, change direction, and accelerate again) is often more important than simply achieving and maintaining high velocity. Agility and quickness are determined by one?s ability to stop and change direction while maintaining balance and velocity. Many athletes and coaches underestimate the strength and skill needed to make rapid stops and changes in directions. Athletes need to dedicate more training time to drills that will improve their ability to decelerate their body in a proper and efficient manner, decreasing the risk of non-contact injuries to the knee or ankle joint. A training program that includes exercises to improve agility, quickness, balance, strength, and coordination should be emphasized along with drills that will improve pure linear-speed.

Sammy in my opinion technique is very important! Especially when it comes to the female body. Their center of gravity is lower and they land as much as 5 times their body weight . So to be able to change direction is critical and it comes back to programs such as the PEP program that have studied this through the CDC and NCAA.

Howard

 

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Sammy: "pumping Iron" is how you get "explosive" increases. I agree technique will trump all because if you have terrible technique nothing else will matter. Almost all college softball programs incorporate "pumping iron" with squats and deadlifts as a part of their conditioning. It really is not an either /or proposition to reach your maximum, it should be both...starting by having good technique. A good trainer will focus on hamstring strengthening for females and creating a good balanced body with all muscle groups strengthened.

 

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Sammy: "pumping Iron" is how you get "explosive" increases. I agree technique will trump all because if you have terrible technique nothing else will matter. Almost all college softball programs incorporate "pumping iron" with squats and deadlifts as a part of their conditioning. It really is not an either /or proposition to reach your maximum, it should be both...starting by having good technique. A good trainer will focus on hamstring strengthening for females and creating a good balanced body with all muscle groups strengthened.

Jjen - very familiar with this, as DD went through 4 years of college workouts. She consistently set the team bar for leg press, which no doubt helped her explosiveness and pitch velocity. I just don't like to call it "pumping iron", because it conjures up pictures of women body builders on steroids . DD was shocked at how ill-prepared many of the incoming college freshmen were - several had never experienced a REAL strength and conditioning program with free weights. A few were just not in good enough physical condition prepared for college ball.

I have heard that some girls will shy away from weight training thinking it will make them "bulk up" and lose their feminine figure. What they don't know is that females can properly weight train and not fear looking like Mr. Universe, because without testosterone and other steroids the gains in muscle mass are limited. So, it's really the best of both worlds - get reasonably strong without bulk, and still retain a feminine look.

As always, good stuff, Howard!

 

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We agree...I thought you were against the idea...after I looked at your first post and then your last we are saying the same thing...Good stuff.

One of the challenges I have is convincing girls that the muscle head females they see in magazines do not represent strength training DRUG FREE!

 

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Without a doubt this is important. I can promise all of you weight training is going to become more important in your daughters near future at the higher levels. Dont know if any of you have been paying to the baseball side of the house but they are now implementing less explosive bats with smaller sweet spots. It is my opinion that this will soon come to softball. I could be wrong on that but it would only make sense for the kids safety.

So that means for your player to hit it harder they are going to have to be stronger in their core and arms. If your going to have them work out make sure they do it with a certified professional trainer. I have recently started doing performance training as part of my business with a young man I have known for many years. I have seen what this does for players and its something that will differentiate your child from the kid next to her trying to get that position or scholarship. Weight training does improve speed. Both running and pitching. The stronger the legs the faster and more explosive they will be on the ground and in the air.

 

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Two great articles that helped convince my DD to start lifting. Now we are on a 5-6 day a week program
http://www.bodybuilding.com/fun/berardi12.htm
http://www.naturallyintense.net/blog/tag/female-bodybuilder/