Keys to Speed Training
Physical capacities are essential for the proper development of the body, as well as for carrying out daily tasks. Now, it’s possible to improve in every ability. In this article, we’ll be giving you keys for speed training since it favors different areas of the body when it comes to practicing a sport.
The importance of speed training
Speed is considered one of the most important physical abilities for sports practice. No matter what you do, your speed when executing a movement or technical gesture can determine whether you’re able to achieve your goal or not.
This, of course, has to do with other physical abilities. For example, strength, endurance, and balance. For this reason, you must strengthen all of them in order to work on speed.
Speed training favors reaction capacity and execution time. If you don’t carry it out, you may show signs of lethargy and excessive tiredness. This, as a result, would not only affect your sports performance but also some of your daily tasks.
On the other hand, the development of this capacity depends on various factors. For instance, genetics, age, the muscular system, and the nervous system. Because of this, training all physical abilities is of extreme importance.
Speed training: exercises to carry it out
As with the other physical abilities, there are keys to speed training, which we’ll be sharing with you.
Before that, we must mention something important. It’s vital that you find an appropriate environment where you can perform these exercises freely. The most suitable place is an athletic track but we’re aware that they’re not always available to everyone. In that sense, you can use smaller tracks, a flat field, a park, or a court.
Physical conditioning
Before you move on to speed training, it’s vital to take into account that your body must go through physical conditioning. This will depend on your individual needs. It’s safe to say that each individual can improve their aerobic and anaerobic condition in a different way – this is determined according to their physical and psychological conditions.
In addition, as previously mentioned, conditioning exercises should include strength, resistance, and balance exercises. This will give way to adequate speed training.
Jumping race
In order to perform a jumping race, you’ll need to go somewhere with at least 20 straight and flat meters. This favors the momentum of the body when speeding while running.
- Execution: do wide strides by raising your knee forward and up. This will force your body to jump. You must do this consecutively: first a stride with your left leg, then with the right, and so on until the end of the race.
Agility ladder
This object is great for speed training since it stimulates capacity, agility, and explosive strength. In order to exercise with an agility ladder, you need strength, balance, and coordination. However, any athlete can use it.
- Execution: the performance of this exercise depends on the routine you establish since it’ll be the foundation for the stride rate, intensity, laterality, and movement. In general terms, this is all about skipping in a frontal or horizontal way from right to left and vice versa.
Sled drag
Speed training requires many different skills. In this case, we’ll talk about sled drag, a very common exercise in CrossFit. Of course, in order to do this, you need a lot of force. This will help maximize your power and explosive force.
- Execution: you must find a surface that doesn’t interrupt the sliding of the sled (so it must be flat). On the other hand, the weight must be according to your ability, both to generate resistance and not to impede mobility.
- It’ll be tied to a harness or a rope at the waist, start the race trying to drag the sled at least 10 meters flat.
Speed training can boost your performance
The body is a set of physical and psychological capacities that you must keep in good condition, especially if you aim to improve sports performance. There are many methods that can help you achieve this, a very popular one is, of course, speed training.
As a final recommendation, don’t hesitate to consult a professional to plan a specific routine according to your goals and needs. After all, there’s never too much knowledge when it comes to carrying out physical exercise the right way.
All cited sources were thoroughly reviewed by our team to ensure their quality, reliability, currency, and validity. The bibliography of this article was considered reliable and of academic or scientific accuracy.
- Montero, A. (2003). LA VELOCIDAD. Departamento de Educación Física IES Padre Moret.
- Mirella, R. (2001). Las nuevas metodologías del entrenamiento de la fuerza, la resistencia, la velocidad y la flexibilidad. In libro. https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781107415324.004
- Gonzalo-Skok, O., & Tous-Fajardo, J. (2014). La velocidad en el cambio de dirección en los deportes de equipo: Evaluación, especificidad y entrenamiento. Departamento de Fisiatría y Enfermería.
