I suggest reading this before AND after watching the video on building a Sprint Training Calendar.

First, this year I will actually be changing my aerobic power days in the first and second weeks to anaerobic capacity days. In the spirit of always learning and evolving, I should emphasize that this type of work is one of the most important things sprinters need to do. To not include it at all until week three has probably been a mistake on my part. Fortunately, my athletes have bailed me out on this. Those were the same days they tended to go faster on their own anyway. So, reality may not change much, but those two dates on my plan will.

Second, not all athletes go to all of our meets. In Kansas, each athlete can only compete in 8 track meets before the regional meet. You'll notice times where the calendar has two different workouts on the same day. It all depends on which meets an athlete is attending.

MIDDLE SCHOOL DISCLAIMER: Note that there are two different training phases charts. The middle school one is different due to prepubescent athletes responding much less to anaerobic work and having a greater focus on neuromuscular work.

Do your 100 runners and your 400 runners do the same workouts?

Sometimes. The type of workout on a given day is almost always the same, but I'll slide the specifics to one extreme or the other. You can see a quick example of this on March 29, 2016 (see Season overview example). It's an anaerobic capacity day, but while my short sprinters did 100s, the long sprinters did 400s. At the end of the day, this is also the art of improvisation. Even two equally talented 400 runners may have different training needs. One may work better with higher volume and lower intensity while the other needs higher intensity and lower volume.

What's an "agility" day?

Agility refers to change in direction which is great for all athletes to work on (even if they only race in straight lines), but I also use it as a quick label for my easy days.

If they have a field event, they will go to that first on these days. If they don't, their day might look like this:

Warm Up and full sprint drill routine
Ladder drills
Cone drills
4-6 x 10m block starts
4x150 @ 70%, walk 250 recovery
Hurdle mobilities

It again comes down to quality! Give them quality work, target the things you need to target, and keep them healthy!

What's a pre-meet day?

Obviously we're talking about the day before a track meet. I'm often okay with this even being slightly tougher than an "agility" day.

Warm Up routine
Relay exchanges
Field events (if any)
Block starts (if not)
Strides on infield or 4x150 again
Review film if time

Strength Focus

As with everything, we can do all elements at any time provided the dosage is appropriate. This is just the progression of our primary focus in strength work throughout the season. This isn't the focus of this course and, unfortunately, it's something we don't always have a lot of control over if athletes have a weights class as part of their normal curriculum. Make sure you know what you're doing here. You wouldn't, for example, do a power workout on the same day following an anaerobic capacity workout.

General Strength / Strength Endurance - Body weight work, stabilization/balance work, high rep

Power - Producing force quickly, speed and resistance

Absolute Strength - Heavy weights, low-moderate reps, speed not a factor

Elastic Strength - Plyometrics, jumping, sprinting

Training Phases

General Preparation - "Training to train." Focused on general athleticism rather than on sport-specific exercise. Preparing the athlete for sports training in general.

Specific Preparation - Introduction and practice of sport-specific activities. Workouts begin to be more technical in nature.

General Competition (Pre-Competition) - Training includes early season meets that are of less importance and allow specific practice for important end of season meets.

Specific Competition (Main Competition) - Championship season. Intensity is high, volume is low as athletes peak for the end of the season.