This channel is all about the hurdles. Here you will find a lot of drills performed by my athletes as well as instructional videos about specific aspects of technique, all of which are designed to help hurdlers clear the barriers without wasted motions and extraneous effort. As the coach of three high school athletes who have gone on to become NCAA national champions (Johnny Dutch 400h 2010, Wayne Davis 110h 2013, Keni Harrison 100h 2015) and one who has gone on to become a world record holder (Harrison 2016), I have spent my whole coaching career experimenting and improvising in order to discover ways to help my hurdlers to be fluid and graceful while also being aggressive. The style of coaching that I now teach, which I call "downhill hurdling," emphasizes putting the body at angles that cause the hurdle to feel small, so that speed is created off the hurdle the same as it is when running down a hill. My plan moving forward is to upload one video per week, on Saturdays or Sundays.
The quickstep is basically a sped-up version of the cycle drill. Spacing increases and the height of the hurdles increases. I’ll do quicksteps at race height, but will never do cycle drilling at race height. Increasing the speed increases the risk factor, and could expose flaws that remained hidden in the cycle drill.
Because of her gymnastics background, she never had any fear of the first hurdle, as it mimics one of the events in gymnastics. But generally, to answer your question, I’ll address fear by starting with the hurdle being lower than race height, or maybe I’ll just put a cone there, so they learn to focus on driving and sprinting instead of fixating on the hurdle.
Steve, I like to think that I'm a pretty good hurdle coach...10 state champions, blah, blah, blah, but your ability to dissect, conceptualize and clearly explain each element in ways that never even occurred to me is truly amazing. Thank you many many times for your thoughtful hard work.
I really appreciate that, Mark. Being an English teacher has helped me learn to break things down in ways that people can understand them and apply them.
@@stevemcgillhurdles sounds great that and unitizing/rotary/cycling both knees at the same time would be a real help for people that are fighting the hurdles.
Liu Xiang lead arm descend at takeoff. The Japanese Izumiya is a Xiang clone mechanically, except shorter. Will be interesting to see how fast he winds up going
I’m a junior in high school and have my first meet of the season this Saturday. I’m on 110m and 300m hurdles this meet, but I haven’t done 110m since freshman year (my time is 20 seconds, awful I know) and my 300 time just isn’t where I want it to me (47.58 seconds) My coach and teammates keep telling me to lead with my knee and bring my trail leg to my armpit but I have no idea what those mean, any advice?
I’d say for the meet just run as fast as you can and don’t worry about anything else. But after that you need to ask your coach what lead with the knee means and maybe ask one of your teammates to show you how to do it.
For the first part of the video they were doing block starts, so the hurdles were at race height and moved in one foot from race spacing. For the popover drill I keep the hurdles at least one click below race height, and often two clicks. The spacing there is usually 12 feet between the hurdles, maybe up to 14 feet for males.
What would you recommend I do as a high school coach over 300 hurdlers for the first week with athletes who have never done it before? Most of them are very new to track in general. @@stevemcgillhurdles
@@user-nk5bw8ml4z a whole lot of stuff. Some speed-endurance work so they can handle the distance, some hurdle drilling to improve their hurdling technique, some full-speed hurdling over the first 2-3 hurdles to get them a feel for the rhythm of the race.
The foundational principles are the same, I would say, even over 42’s. But yes, it’s a lot easier for women to put their bodies in the most effective positioning. The most important foundational principle in this video is make sure the lead leg knee is higher than the crossbar before extending the foot.
Sounds like there’s something going wrong in your sprint mechanics. Trail leg problems are almost always caused by flaws in sprint mechanics. Are you keeping your ankles dorsiflexed? Are you running on the balls of your feet? Check there first and get with a sprint coach who can critique those things for you.
Hey coach i can my 100 meter in 10.98 but then also i face difficulty in hurdles I can’t accelerate in between the hurdles i have my personal best of fastest flying 10 meter 1.02 seconds . Then also i’m not able to run below 15 seconds From block to first hurdle i run 2.24 seconds without reaction 3 hurdles electronic i run 4.7 but then also i finish my race like 15.5 on 91 cm i run 14.4 On 99 i run 14.4 But I always feel I’m reaching the hurdles like I’m not accelerating Almost i all the drills which you showed in the video , And also sir i put between the hurdles 10 meter to practice 3 step so i can accelerate in 9.14 but its not working and i practice hurdles height of 1.18 meter that’s help to build confidence on the 1.06 so i don’t fear from hurdles i have confidence Give some advice so i can accelerate in between the hurdles
Sounds like there’s something going wrong with your start, and/or with your angle of take-off into each hurdle. Send video to my instagram and I’ll take a look - @artofhurdling.
I was a hs soph at Penn 1978 when Nehemiah anchored Maryland's 4x200 and 4x400. Come back wins in both. 19.3 and 43.9 And the weather was awful. Cool, misty and wet. He was just 19 years old. A college newbie.
Nice videos. My daughter is a hurdler and wondered why you didn't show the still shot of them going over so that she can see the the lead and trail leg formation over the hurdle.
I would really encourage her to do whatever is necessary to learn not to allow the lead leg foot to come up internally rotated (she does this when leading with her right leg). This is a bad habit that girls/women, especially, develop because they oftentimes have a lot of hip ROM. But it’s inefficient and allows unhealthy knee mechanics. The lead leg must come up either neutral or externally rotated. This allows the athlete to lean slightly to the lead leg side, for easier trail leg clearance (and better running mechanics). IMO learning to keep the leg neutral or externally rotated will also help to prevent ACL injuries (if the athlete is also playing, say, soccer or basketball).
Yes we worked on that in our drilling after the workout, and will continue to work on it. The right leg is her weaker lead leg and we’re trying to develop it for when she needs to use it in the 300 hurdles.
