Does hurdling make a sprinter faster in the open 100?
Hurdle work sharpens the pieces a flat sprinter also needs, and leaves the one piece, top-end speed, that it was never built to train.
Plenty of programmes run their hurdlers in the open 100 and plenty of sprint coaches wonder whether a block of hurdle work would help their flat sprinters. The honest answer is partly, and which part matters.
What transfers
- The drive out of the blocks to the first hurdle is, mechanically, the same early acceleration a flat sprinter needs: trunk lean held down, no standing up early, the hips driving out rather than climbing.
- Hurdling punishes a late or lazy knee lift immediately, since a low knee means a clipped barrier, which builds a habit a flat sprinter benefits from without ever touching a hurdle.
- Running a fixed rhythm between barriers trains discipline in stride pattern that shows up as more consistent cadence in the open sprint.
That covers the first 15 to 20 metres and the middle of a race reasonably well, which is why the crossover between the two events is real and not just tradition.
What does not transfer
Top speed is a different problem. A hurdler's stride between barriers is constrained to a fixed number of steps over a fixed distance, which trains a shortened, repeatable rhythm rather than the longest stride the athlete can actually hold at full speed. An athlete who only ever runs that constrained rhythm can get faster at hurdling and stay flat in the open 100, because nothing in hurdle training asks the legs to turn over at maximum, unconstrained stride length.
That piece has to be trained separately, with flying sprints run for top speed rather than for barrier spacing.
The Film Room's start setting reports drive-phase lean and whether the hips climb early, which is the piece hurdling and flat sprinting share, so it is a fair way to check whether that part of a hurdler's acceleration is actually sound. The sprint setting's top speed number, once two marks a known distance apart are set, is the one worth tracking separately to see whether open speed is moving at all.
A single 2D camera can tell you whether the numbers moved between a hurdles block and a sprint block. It cannot tell you why, or how much of the change is hurdling and how much is simply getting older and stronger over the same stretch of a season.
Time your next meet with the phones you already have
Timing, the Film Room and the speed gates are free forever, with no account. A Club plan, $71 a month, puts your meets on your own results page, and one plan covers every phone.
Related
Why does my sprinter run faster in a relay than in the open 100?
A flying handoff removes the one phase of a sprint an open 100 cannot skip, and that is most of the gap.
Read →Is a steeplechase barrier the same as a hurdle?
The clearance looks almost identical to a flat hurdle from the side. The barrier not falling, and the water jump at the end of it, are what actually make the event different.
Read →How far forward should a sprinter lean?
A lot out of the blocks, very little at top speed, and never by bending at the waist, which is the version that gets taught by accident.
Read →Try it: Sprint timer app: 40-yard dash and flying sprints with one phone