I'm all up in the Olympics as usual with the sprints always the highlight for me and back when I started this blog in 2009 (!) I posted p-lenty on the subject of speed, it's importance in sports performance and how dedicated speed training is severely lacking at all levels of local/amateur football...and it still is.
I'm going to show you a real-life example from last year that shows how little you can do and the great speed benefits you can get from it.
At various points of the year I do some coaching work in the football private sector and last year I was involved with a 4 week program.
The program consisted of 20 - 25 junior football players of about 9 - 12 years of age and each session lasted 2.5hrs for memory.
Within that 2.5hrs I had 15 - 30mins to do some strength and conditioning with them either as a full group (30mins) or with them split in half (15mins).
As always I had great plans but managed to only get through about half of each session that included exercises focusing on change of direction, plyometrics, sprint technique and of course actual sprinting.
For each of the 4 weeks I did manage to get sprints in every week and timed them of which these were the best performers as far as improvement was concerned:
MAX
Week 1 - 5m x 1.64secs + 10m x 2.53secs + 15m x 328secs + 20m x 4.09secs @ 4.8 meters per second
Week 4 - 1.50 + 2.35 + 3.02 + 3.83 @ 5.22m/s
CHRISTIAN
W1 - 1.61 + 2.38 + 3.08 + 3.80 @ 5.26m/s
W2 - 1.39 + 2.33 + 2.94 + 3.65 @ 5.48m/s
MILES
W1 - 1.61 + 2.41 + 3.13 + 3.85 @ 5.19m/s
W2 - 1.39 + 2.22 + 2.87 + 3.63 @ 5.5m/s
OLI
W1 - 1.58 + 2.35 + 3.02 + 3.72 @ 5.37m/s
W2 - 1.40 + 2.22 + 2.84 + 3.56 @ 5.62m/s
SPENCER
W1 - 1.76 + 2.47 + 3.13 + 3.75 @ 5.33m/s
W2 - 1.37 + 2.12 + 2.68 + 3.34 @ 5.98m/s
RYAN
W1 - 1.74 + 2.68 + 3.58 + 4.45 @ 4.49m/s
W2 - 1.48 + 2.51 + 3.29 + 4.20 @ 4.76m/s
HUGO
W1 - 1.55 + 2.31 + 3.02 + 3.70@ 5.4m/s
W2 - 1.38 + 2.09 + 2.71 + 3.32 @ 6.06m/s
DOM
W1 - 1.77 + 2.70 + 3.65 + 4.46 @ 4.48m/s
W2 - 1.55 + 2.48 + 3.41+ 4.28 @ 4.67m/s
TOM
W1 - 1.58 + 2.38 + 3.13 + 3.83 @ 5.22m/s
W2 - 1.39 + 2.18 + 2.81 + 3.48 @ 5.75m/s
HARRY
W1 - 1.54 + 2.31 + 3.00 + 3.63 @ 5.51m/s
W2 - 1.38 + 2.13 + 2.77 + 3.39 @ 5.9m/s
LUCAS
W1 - 1.70 + 2.52 + 3.31 + 4.01 @ 4.99m/s
W2 - 1.34 + 2.28 + 2.99 + 3.78 @ 5.29m/s
CHARLIE
W1 - 1.57 + 2.43 + 3.16 + 3.87 @ 5.17m/s
W2 - 1.39 + 2.18 + 2.84 + 3.52 @ 5.68m/s
NOAH
W1- 1.78 + 2.77 + 3.75 + 4.60 @ 4.35m/s
W2 - 1.67 + 2.61 + 3.48 + 4.39 @ 4.66m/s
The last reading is a meters per second metric so if we take Noah from above he is essentially 31cms "faster" - is that enough to get a loose ball earlier for a cleaner pick up, creating more time and space for effective decision making and thus technical skill execution?
Yes.
Yes it is.
The image at the top of this post is of the 200m Men's final last night where Degrasse won by .06sec over Bednareck but look how far that actually is at 10+m/s speed, and with football being a game of inches at times, this clearly show the need for speed and couple that with game intelligence and knowing when to move first, you're simply unstoppable.
And takes bugger all really, even in youth and adult footballers, although young athletes can have dramatic improvements as their nervous system is still in early development and a fully fresh sprint set or 2 is a huge electrical charge to their CNS and that can stay with them if they do it regularly enough.
My program was very basic over the 4 weeks and here is...
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