Letter from the Editor, August 2014
Welcome, readers, to the 12th issue of The Hurdle Magazine. As most of us have concluded our competitive season and taking a short break before cranking it up again in preparation for the 2015 indoor and outdoor seasons, the lead article in this issue is “Off Season Training,” in which I discuss the ever-increasing tendency toward year-round training, and what kind of working out to do during the “off season,” which basically consists of the month of August for most of us.
This month’s profile features the ongoing career of post-collegian Niklas Rippon, who graduated from Oakland University in Michigan in 2013 and continues to compete as a 110 hurdler. With a personal best of 14.31, the 6-7 Rippon has improved significantly from his collegiate personal best of 14.72, and he continues to improve. My interview with him turned into a lengthy discussion about hurdles, life, and the sacrifices that hurdlers like himself are willing to make for the sport they love. Rippon is the training partner of Breanna Peabody, who was featured in last month’s issue.
The third part of a four-part series entitled “Go Where the Hurdles Take You” is also one of the lengthier pieces in this issue. In it, I continue to tell the story of my personal journey as a hurdler and hurdle coach; this installment covers my early years as a coach and the challenges I faced in gaining confidence in myself as someone capable of guiding hurdlers to high levels of success. It also covers the years when I coached stand-outs Johnny Dutch, Wayne Davis II, and Booker Nunley.
I have also begun a new series with this issue – “Seven Steps to Hurdle Heaven.” The title is adopted from a Miles Davis song called “Seven Steps to Heaven.” This series delves into the evolutionary stages that all hurdlers go through on their way to mastering the event to the best of their ability, and using the sport as a vehicle for personal growth. Part one of this series (which will also be a four-part series) appears here.
My once and future athlete Keare Smith returns to The Hurdle Magazine in this issue after being away for a couple months. In this issue, he continues to probe into the benefits of healthy dieting, providing us with much information and insight regarding the vegan lifestyle that helped Carl Lewis to achieve extraordinary success late in his career.
This month’s workout, the “200 Doubles Workout,” is designed to help 400m hurdlers to deal with late-race fatigue. It can be used as a pre-meet workout with hyper speeds and low reps in the championship season, or as a conditioning workout with moderate speeds and high reps in the winter.
This month’s instructional video takes a closer look at the “shoulder lean” style of hurdling that I blogged about once regarding David Oliver and Roger Kingdom. One of my athletes, Arthur Njemanze, has adopted this style. In the video he does a few reps over two hurdles demonstrating where he is now with the style, and he also explains how it benefits him.
Special thanks to all who have made contributions to this issue, including Keare Smith, Niklas Rippon, Arthur Njemanze, and Lamar Brewer. I’d like to point out Rippon in particular as someone whose total, unwavering commitment to his hurdling endeavors serves as an inspiration to me, and hopefully to my readers as well.
Big thanks to web designer Chris Brajer for being so reliable when it comes to solving technical problems and for putting together all of the articles and the video into the magazine format.
Biggest thanks of all goes out to all of you, our subscribers. You’re the ones who keep us going.
Peace love and hurdles,
Steve McGill
