what is the best way to start off track practice?

Question

would like to hear from coaches and athletes that have been in track. i am a first year coach. my athletes moan and groan with the things i try and want to revert back to the way things were last year. anyway, i have been starting with a short warmup, stretch and form running with some jump rope in there. what else might i try? what other form drills are good? i have them do high knees, skip for height, stride out, kick butts, and karoake. any help would be great.

Answer 1

I incorporate a lot of these in my workouts and vary them depending on the day/phase period of workouts, we may be doing special endurance, tempo endurance or a speed/sport specific day.
Warming up may consist of the following:
5 to 10 minutes jogging - to increase body temperature
10 to 15 minutes dynamic stretching exercises - reduce muscle stiffness
Assisted stretching
Partner stretches
10 to 15 minutes general and event specific drills -
Mach drills
Then a couple of these
Side strides crossover-to increase flexibility and range of hip movement
Skip and clap - to increase flexibility and range of horizontal leg movement
Skip for height- to develop rear leg drive
Hurdle Hopping/Bounds/Single Leg Hoppin
Box Jumps/Tuck Jumps/
preparation for the session or competition. e.g. for a runner
Lower leg drills
Leg drills
Technique drills
4 to 8 easy run outs over 30 to 60 metres
Throwers may do/sprinters may do these in phase 1 of our periodization
Medicine Ball Exercises
Standing torso twist/Hamstring curls/Chest push/Lay back double arm throw/Double leg kicks/Straight arm standing throw/Abdominal curl

Answer 2

Have them jog a couple laps for a light warm up, stretches are a must, and they should do plyometrics. High knees, butt kicks, skip for height/distance, karaoke, bounding, and a few others that I can't remember right now. Basically what you have them do except the jump rope. They might moan and groan but those are activities that will benefit all track participants.

Thats the routine I had in high school having gone through three different head coaches. That was a mess I don't want to relive, especially the part where I had to learn all the technical events on my own. Learned it from my seniors when I was a freshman and used the same method every single practice. Good luck with the coaching though, its rough for team if the coach switches every year.

Answer 3

Why not stick to your guts and keep going with what you're doing?! As long as you're enthusiastic and doing it along side the kids, they have no reason to complain. Kids complain because- well, that's there job.

I ran track in hs on the varsity level for 4 years as well as varsity college for 3. At the end of the school day you're tired and sometimes track is the last thing you want to be doing but honestly, those kids signed up for track and are there to be a part of the tteam. If they want to complain tell them to leave! You really ought to take a different approach to this; YOU aren't the problem, the kids are. Your warm up sounds very similar to ours in hs. Perhaps they miss their old coach and are giving you a hard time? Don't let them get to you! If you change things up they know that they have the power. Stand firm on your ground, enjoy doing what you're doing and if they have a prroblem, start handing out extra miles- I'm sure that will make them quiet down a bit!

Good luck!

Answer 4

On my track team we do two laps around the gym, then two more laps incorporatin the drills you mentioned. we then lift weights for at least half an hour, this also include ab workouts. then we run a warm up 800 and stretch. My coach does alot of motivational speaking... about alot of mental and physical things that can help us.
We do alot of neat work outs, for distance:like running on a nearby flat trail for 2 miles, and through our small town. things that take your mind off of running. A good thing for both distance and sprints is doing hills OVER AND OVER.
some good websites for you and your team are runnersworld.com, runningtimes.com and coolrunning.com.

Answer 5

When I ran track, this is what we did for warm up as an entire team:
~2 laps around the track (running, of course!)
~20 jumping jacks
~50 sit-ups
~20 push-ups
~donkeys (when you're down on all fours and you stick your leg out to the side and rotate them forward and backward, to strecth out the hips)
~rollies (it's complicated to explain; let's just say that they were stretches that are like sitting on the ground with your legs making a V and you stretch to the right, middle and left)

From there, we would break up into our groups and then continue to stretch as our events dictated. As a sprinter, I remember glute kicks, high knees and stride outs...I never saw the shot putters doing that. Haha. Honestly, we just a generic warm-up for team bonding. It served its purpose.

Karaoke? Sounds like fun to me!
8-)

Answer 6

I would skip the jump rope. I like to use Mach A and Mach B drills and what you are doing is fine. We also do balistic stretching at the begining and static stretching after practice.

Answer 7

We start out with stretches and calisthenics and then we jog a mile for a warm up. After that we usually break into groups (sprinters, middle and long distance runners, high long and triple jumpers, and shot putters and discus throwers) and do training for that. (I'm a long and triple jumper and we do lots of box drills and jump roping) Then we end by working on our events and stretching. Good luck with your team. :)

Answer 8

Running, Long runs around the track as a group- 1 to 2 laps.
Wind sprints. Mostly to keep them in shape or in better shape than the competition. they may not like all this running UNTIL they start winning all the time.

Answer 9

They should do a light jog and then easy stretching. Then get them into their workout. You are wasting a lot of time doing things that simply take up a lot of time with a very low payback. You can work on form while they are doing their workout, correcting technical errors while they are jogging between reps.

Answer 10

personally i dont think jump rope helps much but u can do it if u want besides that 2 warm up laps and a nice stretch is pretty much all u can do to warm up. after that the real practice is the key.