I am always looking for ways to develop speed in athletes. There might be something out there that is brand new and could really develop the speed in a way that we’ve never seen before.

Recently, we’ve decided to add an exercise to our arsenal that I think is really going to help our athletes. Or at least our high school athletes because they will be the ones we will be implementing this new exercise with.

It isn’t necessarily something brand new, it is just something that we haven’t offered in the past. That has changed.

If you haven’t been to our facility recently, we have rearranged some things around to make some space for this exercise. We also purchased some new equipment in order to do this exercise right.

This new exercise we will be doing to help your athlete get faster is the DEADLIFT!

Getting athletes stronger is one huge factor in improving speed. The deadlift will give us another way to get our athletes stronger. With a new lifting bar and bumper plates, we now have the means to start some of our athletes deadlifting to build the type of strength we feel these athletes need to be fast.

What really helps acceleration is relative strength.  Basically, this is your max strength compared to your body weight.  A man who is 150 pounds and deadlifts 300 has a 2:1 ratio of strength to weight.  If you can get between 2-3 to 1 then you will have some pretty good acceleration.

Not saying this will be our goal for our athletes, but it is something to shoot for. If they are relatively weak to begin with, just getting 1:1 will be an accomplishment.

It only makes sense, the stronger you are the more force you can propel off the ground to make you fast. Eventually with our athletes we will get to a point where we will do a set of 4-5 reps of deadlifts and then do bodyweight squat jumps immediately after as a contrast. The combination of the two exercises should develop the speed the way we want it to.

If you aren’t in high school, I’m not saying you can’t do the deadlift. Just make sure you are focusing more on the technique then the weight. When your body matures, then you can focus on the weight since your body can handle the load and your technique is already sound.

Absolute strength is how strong you are regardless of bodyweight. The higher this number is, the more it will help you with the sprint speed. Improving your absolute and relative strength will definitely make you a faster runner.

I’m not saying the deadlift is the absolute end all to be all exercise to do. But, it will definitely be a good addition to our strength program and get you faster. If you aren’t doing deadlifts, put them in your program. Remember to learn proper technique and then have at it.

Photo courtesy of Adrian Valenzuela on Flickr: https://www.flickr.com/photos/adrianv/