The Last Stride before the First Hurdle
by Steve McGill
I think we can all agree that the most important part of a 100/110 meter hurdle race is the start. By that I don’t mean that the first hurdler out of the blocks will win the race, or even that the first hurdler to clear the first hurdle will win the race. What I do mean is that the start sets up the rest of the entire race, and determines whether you’ll be able to execute your race plan like you want to, and need to. One could argue that the first stride out of the blocks is the most important stride, because if that stride is too short, or if the body posture is too upright, or if the heel raises too high, then there is no way to establish the necessary forward momentum needed to push through the first hurdle.
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But for the purposes of this article, I will be focusing on the last stride into the first hurdle — the eighth stride for most athletes, or the seventh stride for seven-steppers. A lot of hurdlers make mistakes when taking this stride, and a mistake here can ruin all the things done well for all of the previous strides.
When I work on the start with my hurdlers, we will make sure we have the first hurdle just right before we add a second hurdle. This holds true for every block-start session, even with advanced athletes. The logic is, the approach to the first hurdle needs to look the way we want it to look; otherwise, I’m setting up the athlete for failure if I add the second hurdle too soon. The athlete needs to be pushing through the first hurdle, not just making it to the first hurdle. That means the last three strides in the approach to the first hurdle — regardless of whether the athlete is seven-stepping or eight-stepping, should establish the quick 1-2-3 cadence that we want between the hurdles for the rest of the race. That’s why I emphasize “powerful strides early” — for the first two or three strides — and then quicker strides as we get closer to the hurdles. The last step must be the shortest of the steps (it is often referred to as a “cut step”) so that the athlete’s momentum can and upper body positioning can propel them forward toward the next hurdle.
But a lot of athletes do funky things when they should be taking that cut step. Some will relax a little bit, take their foot off the gas a little bit. Some will land flat-footed and stomp, sending themselves upward instead of forward. Some will twist their upper body and start swinging their arms across their body. All of these moves are done because the athlete thinks that now is the time to “hurdle.” I say no to that. Don’t hurdle. If you’re already sprinting, just continue sprinting over the hurdle. When hurdlers think that they must “hurdle,” the very concept of using that word as a verb leads to the unconscious assumption that now that I’ve reached the hurdle, it’s time to do something different. But no actually, you don’t want to do something different. You want to continue doing what you’re already doing. Just in an exaggerated manner. You’re already pushing off the back foot every stride; now, just push off with more force. You’re already slightly leaning forward every stride; now, lean a little more deeply. You’re already driving your arms up and down; now, drive them up a little higher, and drive them down a little more forcefully. Again, don’t change what you’re doing; exaggerate what you’re doing.
In that last stride, don’t prepare to hurdle, don’t prepare to jump. Stay disciplined. Stay dorsiflexed. Stay on the balls of your feet. Keep pushing the chest forward. To slow down in front of the first hurdle, or to shift to a posture that’s too erect, or to shift the body weight to one side or the other, or to take off flat-footed, is going to make it impossible to accelerate through the first hurdle. And the aim is to accelerate through the first three hurdles before reaching top speed at or near hurdle four.
When I was coaching Ayden Thompson the past two years prior to this year, before he went off to college, we worked a lot on refining his seven-step approach. At first, he was taking an evenly distributed seven strides, which was okay, but without the big strides in the first four strides, we weren’t getting the quickness with the last three strides, and we weren’t getting enough of a cut step in the seventh stride. All of this meant that he wasn’t accelerating through the first hurdle, he was too erect too soon, he was reaching top speed too soon, and he was decelerating for the last four hurdles. So it looked like he was kicking ass for the first half of the race and then falling apart for the last half of the race. Both of which were illusions. When we made adjustments to his start, and got it to where he was quick for the last three strides and his cut step was clearly evident, then he was rolling through hurdle one and finishing strong in the latter stages of the race. And this was someone who wasn’t making any mistakes, but just needed to master the seven-step approach in order to reap the benefits of it.
A girl I’m coaching now, Grace, always slows down in the last stride before the first hurdle, and it drives me crazy. Just when she needs to be increasing her aggression and leaning forward more, she relaxes and shifts to a more upright posture. This is inspire of the fact that she has a very good drive out of the blocks and for the first seven strides. It’s like when she gets to the eighth stride she’s thinking, okay, I got it now, let me take a little break before I hear up again for the next hurdle. That’s what I refer to as “running hurdle to hurdle” as opposed to running to the finish line. If you’re thinking run to the finish line you’re not gonna ease up at any point.
So, hurdlers need to be very cognizant of what they’re doing that last stride into the first hurdle. And coaches need to be nitpicking sticklers in making sure that there is no relaxing or twisting or stomping in that stride prior to adding a second hurdle in any block start session.
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