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Increasing speed and acceleration?

larchitecturel

Obviously some people are gifted with pace but for the rest how do you improve your speed and acceleration? :confused:

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Get in a car.

How very useful...

At a guess I would suggest improving fast-twitch leg muscles by doing anaerobic sports such as sprinting or other exercises where fast & furious is dominant. Otherwise, use a balance board to improve your reflexes and co-ordination in order to get a quick start in a race? :confused:

I really don't know...

Reply 3

Sazarina88

I really had no idea, hence my completely useless reply. Would increase speed though...

Reply 4

Crimson Black

Sazarina88

I really had no idea, hence my completely useless reply. Would increase speed though...

Hehe, the OP meant that he needed help running away quickly from dogs with rabies and ex-girlfriends (often synonymous) rather than driving along in his automobile, dum-di-dum-dum, dum-di-dum-dum... :p:

Reply 5

larchitecturel

Dschingis

running away quickly from dogs with rabies and ex-girlfriends (often synonymous)

Maybe thats the training i need :p:

but seriously i want to improve my speed for sports mainly and have no idea of what to do...

olympic lifting?

Plyometrics.

practise. get in shape. I mean the best thing to do would be to talk to someone who knows what they are on about.

I think that calfs are for short bursts of speed ie accelleration and hamstrings are for the longer more endurance style races. To be fast you need both. I would suggest doing some exercise that builds them up.

Apart from that just keep practising running

Reply 9

gorgeousguy

Interval sprint training. I have to do this for rugby. Find somewhere like a cycling track etc, which is between 50 to 100 metres long. Sprint flat out to one end, and depending on how you are feeling either walk or jog back. repeat this for as long as you can.

This will make you fast, although remember for a lot of sports your deceleration is also important. Remember to do loads of stretching on your legs before you try this, or they will fall to peices.

Oh yes, i forgot. You are not going to get fast in the gym. All the musle you need to be fast and have a quick start can be got from runnning. IF you do stuff like squats with heavy weights you run the risk of slowing yourself down, as the extra mmusle will weigh you down. This of course is only valid if you are playing in a sport which does not require amazing power in the legs, for instance like rugby props and second rows.

Reply 10

larchitecturel

I play in the back row... so just sprint and walk in intervals? How long should i do this for? I cant see myself doing it for more than 20 minutes... anything else i could do?

Reply 11

Bigbrotherjx

Sprint 30 seconds, jog 30 seconds. Repeat for x amount of minutes. x is unlikely to exceed 10 minutes before you are collapsed on the floor if HIIT is being done to the correct intensity.

Reply 12

goodLife

larchitecturel

Obviously some people are gifted with pace but for the rest how do you improve your speed and acceleration? :confused:

What times can you get?

You need to train you fast twitch muscles so do sprints (about 60m - 150m) combined with strength training to build up your power. Try to avoid endurance excersise though.

Reply 13

larchitecturel

goodLife

What times can you get?

You need to train you fast twitch muscles so do sprints (about 60m - 150m) combined with strength training to build up your power. Try to avoid endurance excersise though.

not sure what times but id say im a little above average whatever that means

Reply 14

Crimson Black

Run 100m with someone stopwatching you... then try to get better times on that initial baseline time by doing the fast-twitch exercises already suggested.

EDIT: Over time of course - not within the same session.

Reply 15

gorgeousguy

I would say to do it for as long as you physically can. However once you get an idea of what you can do, set yourself high goals. I.E. if you know you can do 20 sets of running aim to do 25, as this will push you a lot more, plus if you just do it on how you feel you will not push yourself hard enough.

As a back rower you will need great overall fitness. So if I were you (i'm a openside lanker/center) i would do a long jog on monday, of about an hour which goes hard enough to make you sweat (this will help your base fitness loads), then on wednesday do your sprinting which is going to be the hardest part of your training, finally on either friday/saturday/sunday do a medium length hard/fast run which should be hard enough to get the whole of your shirt covered in sweat.

Make sure you dont train everyday, as this will just mess you up. Leave at least a day inbetweek workouts.

Reply 16

Zafda

speed = distance / time

v = u + at

Reply 17

dh00001

Zafda

speed = distance / time

v = u + at

thats velocity..... :p:

to increase your speed you can only keep running and aiming for faster times for a set distance every time.

Reply 18

Bigbrotherjx

Part of improving your sprint times is to do with learning how to drive from the blocks, learning how to run a bend, learning how to make the transition from bend to straight. But the most important thing is that you have the legspeed there.