Sprint Mechanics: Improve Speed & Prevent Injury

Sprinting is the ultimate form of human movement. If you can sprint well, you can build muscle, strength, power, and mobility all at the same time. This is what we focus on at Functional Patterns, getting people to a closer approximation of good sprinting mechanics.

Why Sprinting?

Should we all aspire to be able to sprint in some shape or form? We believe so. The reason being is that sprinting is one of the most fundamental tasks the human body has been designed to do. Unfortunately, for a lot people the idea of sprinting is a scary one with potential injury seeming likely if they have come to be somewhat deconditioned in their body.

Imagine for a second watching a nature documentary where half of the lions being filmed couldn’t sprint effectively without causing themselves an injury? This would seem crazy, simply hurting themselves doing the thing their bodies are designed to do. This is the human equivalent of what we are seeing today.

People have many training goals when it comes to exercise. Increasing strength on a particular lift, becoming more flexible, or building muscle via bodybuilding style training. However these don’t always result in moving better relative to sprinting. And while it’s not to say these other goals are not useful, if you truly want to improve the way you move, training relative to the mechanics found in sprinting is a good place to start.

Isolation vs Integration Training

While it’s impossible to say that bodybuilding style training the way it’s done today has no benefit in terms of your overall movement and sprinting mechanics, it does not have as much benefit as focusing on the movements themselves. Obviously most people suffering from pain are not in a position to go out and sprint. For this reason we have to recreate the sequences found in sprinting in the weight room and slowly build up to it.

If we focus on training in an integrated manner like this we can use resistance training in a way that allows us to correct imbalances found in our bodies. By doing this we can build the strength needed to sprint over time, while making sure we don’t compound any existing issues. This is hands down the most useful way to improve our ability to sprint.

Conclusion

So if you are reading this and thinking, I don’t care about sprinting I just want to build muscle and look good, that’s absolutely fine. However, most of the people who come to see us are looking for a solution to movement issues that are causing them pain. That or they are people who rely on needing to sprint well for their sport. In either case optimizing the mechanics of sprinting is the most useful way to go.

Ironically, this is also a a great way to build muscle and look good long term. It just may not seem like the quickest, although it is certainly the most meaningful. (Just look at Olympic sprinters for reference)