Hurdling Alone

 I never found a companion that was so companionable as solitude.
-Henry David Thoreau

Sometimes you need to just get away from it all. The noise of people around you and the noise in your own mind. Sometimes you need to head out to the track and get a workout in by yourself. No coaches, no teammates, no friends to keep you company. Just you and the track. A lane of hurdles….

Generally speaking, I’m not a big fan of the idea of hurdlers hurdling by themselves. Especially when it comes to beginners, and even when it comes to experienced hurdlers who have noticeable flaws that need to be addressed. However, I do think that hurdling alone can be very beneficial for a number of reasons. I’ll get to those later in the article. Let me start by pointing out the reasons why hurdling alone can be counter-productive.

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In any technical event, which would include all field events as well as the hurdling events, a coach should be present when any technical work is being done. If you were to take an event like the discus as an example, you wouldn’t want a beginning discus thrower who is new to the spin technique practicing it by himself. Chances are, he’s going to do a lot of things wrong and ingrain a lot of bad habits. Not to mention he might hit somebody.

The same principle applies to the hurdles. Hurdling alone can create a lot of bad habits that can be very difficult to break once those bad habits feel right. When wrong feels right, there is much work to be done. While it is very encouraging to have an athlete who is eager to work out on his or her own, and while I’d agree that you don’t want to discourage that type of work ethic, as a coach you have to be careful about walking that line between giving your athletes freedom to explore on their own vs. giving them the guidance necessary to facilitate their progression.

Of course, there are some cases in which the athlete has no coach to speak of – at least not one who is knowledgeable in the hurdles, who knows what to look for, who knows how to develop drills and workouts that are hurdler-specific. Most of the emails I receive from people seeking technical advice come from athletes coaching themselves or from hurdlers’ parents trying to coach their kids through internet articles and YouTube videos. Because the hurdling events are little more than an afterthought in many programs – including some very good ones – hurdlers often find themselves in a position where they have to train alone or else not hurdle at all except in meets. In such cases, the advice to hurdle only when a coach is present is actually very impractical.

The other argument against hurdling alone focuses more on the importance of teammates. I know that in my coaching, I rely heavily on my hurdlers coaching each other – both verbally and by example. I know I don’t know everything, and I know that an atmosphere of collective striving and a collective sharing of knowledge is an atmosphere that leads to success and enjoyment for everybody. Then, on the competitive level, hurdling with teammates and against teammates in practice enables hurdlers to bring out the best in each other. You might think you have a fast start when you’re practicing by yourself, you might find out otherwise when you put the blocks down with a teammate beside you. In that sense, practicing alone too often can cause you to lose your race sharpness, your competitive edge, so you enter races unsure of your abilities to compete at a top level, and to generate the adrenaline needed to go into warrior mode. When you regularly do hurdle reps alone, you can get too comfortable with your own rhythm without even realizing it.

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But despite all the warnings mentioned above, hurdling alone can be a very valuable, enriching experience on many levels. When I was in college, I would hurdle by myself once a week. During the off-season, before the meets started, I would do it on Saturday. Then once the season began I moved my solo workouts to Sunday. On Saturdays in the off-season I would do the same workout every time – quick steps. I’d start with 2 sets of 10 over 5 over race height, for a total of 100 hurdles. From there I’d build up gradually by adding more hurdles. Two sets of 10 over 6, two sets of 10 over 7, then 8, then I’d skip 9 and go straight to 10 for a total of 200 hurdles. Once I got to 200, I’d switch to three sets – over 7, then over 8, for a total of 240 hurdles.

These workouts were experimentations. I’d have an idea, based on the previous week’s workout, of what I needed to work on, and I’d always start by focusing on that. Then as the reps added up, I’d find other things to work on, and add them into the mix. Through the course of the workout, I’d feel my limbs interacting with each other, conversing with each other. If I was hitting too many hurdles with my trail leg, I’d work on bringing around faster. If that didn’t work, I’d try leaning more deeply. If that didn’t work, I’d try holding my knee drive (with the lead leg) a tiny bit longer. Whatever worked, I went with.

I never doubted anything that came to me during these sessions. If my body was informing me that I had just discovered a more efficient way to get over these 42’s, I trusted what my body was telling me. I didn’t need a coach (not that I had one anyway) to give a nod of approval. My body was my coach.

My Sunday practices during the season gave me a chance to address any issues I needed to address based on the previous day’s meet. And even though I would continue this process upon rejoining my coach and teammates during the week, I treasured Sundays because, again, I could experiment on my own. I’ve always felt – as an athlete and now as a coach – that when it comes to technique, the athlete is the ultimate authority, not the coach. Only you can feel what you’re feeling, and the feeling is more direct, more immediate, than what anyone from the outside can see. And that’s a universal, timeless truth, as far as I’m concerned. No video footage, so slomo footage, no high-tech machinery, no coach’s eye and no Coach’s Eye app can provide more accurate, more instantaneous feedback that what you are feeling in the moment. When you learn to listen to your body, and to trust its feedback, now you’re on to something.

As a coach, I have absolutely no problem with my more experienced hurdlers hurdling on their own occasionally. Doing so raises their hurdling IQ, it leads to them becoming true students of their own style. Then when we come back together for practice, we can engage in dialogue that is more advanced. They become more heavily invested in their own development. Instead of asking, “What are we working on today Coach?”, they’re asking, “Can we work on this today Coach?” The difference is subtle, but the difference is huge.

Another advantage to hurdling on your own – and perhaps the most important one – is that it gives you a chance to leave the world behind and enter into a world of your own. With no coaches around and no teammates around, you can focus totally on yourself without feeling selfish. You can warm up at your own pace, without concerning yourself about the need to keep up with the group. And in those quiet moments between reps, you can hear the birds sing….

 

 

 

 

 

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