A Hurdle Mini Camp
by Steve McGill
Because my coaching duties at my school have increased astronomically since this time last year, I haven’t had the time (or energy) to do another hurdle academy. When a coach not too far from me in North Carolina emailed me to inquire about when the next hurdle academy would be, I answered that I wouldn’t be doing one anytime soon, but would be willing to come to his school to work with his hurdlers. On Saturday November 12, we made it happen. I visited Coach John Fitz at East Rowan High School in Salisbury, NC and worked with hurdlers for about five hours, giving them a condensed version of the instruction that I and my staff usually provide for the athletes who have attended our camps/academies over the past five years.
Five of Coach Fitz’ hurdlers showed up for the training session — three girls and two boys, none of whom were freshman, and all of whom had prior hurdling experience. Along with me came Ayden Thompson, the senior that I’ve been coaching privately over the past year and a half, and who is featured in many of my YouTube videos over the past year. Ayden and I meet once a week, so I asked him to come along so he could get his own workout in while also helping me to guide Coach Fitz’ athletes.
Working with hurdlers who already have ingrained habits that need to be corrected is always a huge challenge, and that’s exactly what Ayden and I were faced with when working with the East Rowan hurdlers. Before I got started with my Team Steve drill progression — the one that I use at my academies — I had each athlete just run over the first hurdle from the start line, from a standing start, just so I could evaluate their running mechanics and hurdling technique. In each of them I saw habits that we needed to address. One girl, Peyton, had good running form, but when clearing the hurdle, she would swing the leg from the hip instead of driving the knee up first. Another girl, Sadie, did a better job of leading with the knee, but she then would “kick” the foot out and lock the knee, causing some floating and a twist in the hips. The youngest girl, Ayana (I’m sure I’m spelling it wrong), had several issues, with the key ones being that her foot strikes landed on her heels and she elevated vertically when clearing hurdles. As for the guys, Cohen also swung the lead leg from the hip like Peyton, and he elevated vertically like Ayana. Carson, meanwhile, was a stomper who ran flat-footed, and his trail leg was very flat as well.
So we had some work to do. I started off by taking them through the basics — A marches and A skips. I emphasized dorsiflexion in the ankles, landing on the ball of the foot each stride, pushing off the ball of the foot, driving up the knee and heel, maintaining a slightly forward upper body posture, and swinging the arms in a forceful but controlled manner. That took about an hour before the group of them looked good enough that we could move on. In the interest of time, I didn’t have them do any side walkovers or over-the-top walkovers, but instead went straight to marching popovers — the drill that would most directly help them to grasp the downhill hurdling style that I teach.
As I had assumed based on what I’d seen up to that point, they all struggled with the concept of generating momentum by pushing off the back leg. I had brought my fold-up practice hurdles with me, so we did all of the popovers over 24-27 inch hurdles. With the oldest girl, Peyton, I saw rapid progress, and she quickly became the model for the rest of them.
After a short break for lunch, we picked back up after lunch with the quickstep drill. I kept the spacing that I usually use for that drill — 25 feet apart for the boys and 22 feet apart for the girls — but kept the heights discounted significantly. I stayed in charge of the girls, and Ayden took over the instruction for the two boys. Because Ayden has never been taught any style other than the style that I teach, I knew I could trust him to guide the boys effectively. Indeed, he also had the added bonus that he could show them how to execute the movements by doing them himself. As he said to me afterwards, Cohen and Carson started to improve rapidly after he started to demonstrate the drills. Instead of having to think, they could just try to mimic what they had seen him do. Ah, I miss the days when I could demonstrate drills myself!
With the girls, I noticed that each one needed her own set of instructions because they each had unique issues. With Peyton, I explained to her the 1-2-3 action of the lead leg — drive up the knee and heel, extend the foot without locking the knee, drive the heel back under the hip. With Sadie, I explained to her that she needed to lean forward more deeply from the waist so that her lock wouldn’t have room to lock. With Ayana, we started by simply staying on the balls of the feet the whole time. With each of them, I saw steady progress, and we had several “let’s goooo!” moments.
The boys, a few lanes over, were progressing too. Ayden was filming their reps, showing them the footage, and pointing out what they needed to focus on for the next rep.
The photo above, of Peyton, shows how she got better at leading with the knee instead of swinging from the hip.
The photo above, of Sadie, shows how she got the hang of extending the lead leg without locking it. Look at that downhill angle!
The photo above, of Ayana, shows that she was learning to push off the ball of the foot instead of stomping. She’s still high over the hurdle, but hey, one thing at a time. With a background as a competitive cheerleader, she had the most trouble of anyone when it came to pushing forward instead of pushing upward. What was really cool though was how, while we were doing quicksteps, she took herself out of the drill and did some A marches, and then some marching popovers. She understood innately that she had to go backwards, so to speak, in order to go forwards.
All in all, it was a very invigorating experience for me, as I needed to get back into my groove after coaching cross country the past three months. It was awesome to see Ayden develop an instant knack for coaching, because the hurdles will always need people who know the event and love the event and who can teach the event. Thanks to Coach Fitz and the East Rowan hurdlers for all the positive energy.
