February 22, 2017
Hurdle Drilling and Block Starts
All hurdle coaches have their “go to” drills that they like to use most frequently with their athletes. My personal preferences have evolved over the years, but one that has been a mainstay since I started using it about twenty years ago is the quick-step drill, which involves setting up anywhere from 4-10 hurdles spaced 18-21 feet apart (females) or 21-24 feet apart (males). The athlete approaches the first hurdle from a standing start, usually with a six-step run-up to the hurdle, speeding up the last three strides. Then he or she continues to maintain the quick tempo between the rest of the hurdles. I love this drill because it can serve so many purposes, depending on how many reps I want the athlete to do, and how much recovery time I want him or her to have between reps and sets. The drill, when done as a workout, can help to address technical flaws, can also serve to ingrain the race rhythm into the athlete’s muscle memory, and can also serve as a very good hurdle-endurance workout. Not to mention, it also strengthens the muscles the athlete uses to clear the hurdles.
Another favorite drill of mine is one I call the “three-step marching drill.” Several years ago, when I grew frustrated with the hurdling style that emphasizes lead leg snapdown, and began to notice that hurdlers like Liu Xiang, Allen Johnson, and Dayron Robles placed a heavy emphasis on the trail leg action, I began to phase out side drills from my repertoire. I felt that side drills allow the leg that’s not clearing the hurdle to “cheat,” so side drills can actually create and ingrain bad habits. I still use side drills for teaching beginners the function and flight of each leg, but that’s about it. As a warm-up drill, I now prefer the marching drill.
In this drill, 4-10 hurdles are set up somewhere in the range of 12-16 feet apart. I usually have the hurdles set at least one click below race height. The athlete marches with high knees to the first hurdle, then clears it, then continues marching between, and jumping over, the rest of the hurdles. “Jump” is a word I used to never use in my hurdling vocabulary, as the idea, when hurdling, is to take an elongated sprinting stride that causes minimal disruption to the rhythm established on the ground between the hurdles. But what I’ve come to understand is that the hurdling action is a jump upon take-off. But it’s a jump forward, not a jump upward. The idea is to propel yourself to the next hurdle, while bending deeply from the waist. When you do so effectively, you create speed and don’t have to work as hard between the hurdles.
So, with the marching drill, you can’t generate speed by sprinting. The only way to generate speed is to push off the back leg with force upon take-off. The push off the back leg propels you toward the next hurdle. When the drill is done properly, it becomes increasingly difficult to maintain the marching rhythm. Because you’re creating speed and forward momentum with each take-off, you accidentally end up “running” between the hurdles.
The video below shows one of my athletes – a 14-year-old youth hurdler – doing the marching drill, followed by the quick-step drill, followed by full-speed block starts over the first two hurdles, then over the first four. On this particular day, our workout, which lasted about 90 minutes, followed this progression.
With the start, I like always first do at least one rep with no hurdles so that the athlete can focus on exploding out of the blocks with a sprinter’s mentality. Hurdlers tend to fixate on the hurdles when coming out of the blocks, causing them to pop up too soon, to short-arm the early strides, and to have too short of a first stride. So, at least one start with no hurdles – even for experienced hurdlers – is an approach I like to take when it comes to time to work on the start.
From there, I’ll add the first hurdle at a low height to maintain the aggressive mindset with a hurdle now in place. Then we’ll raise the hurdle to full height. From there, we’ll add a second hurdle and work on the transition from hurdle one to hurdle two. From there, how many hurdles I add depends on how well the session is going, and on what I’m trying to accomplish in that particular session. If my goal is to get up to as many as six hurdles, then I might jump from two hurdles to four hurdles, then to six hurdles. By adding two hurdles at a time instead of one, I can reduce the total number of reps. But if the athlete is in struggle mode over four hurdles, I’m not going to force-feed the six hurdles. That’ll just have to wait for another session.
Back in the day I used to employ a lot of five-step stuff, a lot of one-step stuff in my drilling. I liked to mix up the rhythms. I’m not as big on that anymore. While I still recognize the value of five-step drills and one-step drills, my approach now is to do all drills to a three-step rhythm. That’s the race rhythm, and I always want my athletes visualizing that they’re in a race. With the marching drill, and with the quick-step drill, the athlete can feel the rhythm of the race. So, when it’s time to put the blocks down and go fast, all they have to focus on is executing the start and staying aggressive. When it comes to the hurdling technique and the race rhythm, they don’t have to burden their mind with thoughts. They can trust their instincts, and run freely.
