Please Go To My Updated Website!

I am going to be switching over all my blog posts to my newly updated website from now on. This will help simplify my life. Also, my new business name is Reality-Based Fitness (www.realitybasedfitness.com) but the www.coachkeats.com domain name will still work. The podcast is now at www.realitybasedfitnesspodcast.com

Thanks!

Keats Snideman

NEW FACILITY IS OPERATIONAL!

Just wanted to let everyone know that the joint venture facility between my friend and colleague Patrick Ward and myself is up and running! I will now be doing all my training and soft-tissue work out of this awesome facility (minus the few in-home and track sessions I still do). Here's the address:

2009 E. Fifth Street, Suite #12 Tempe, AZ 85281
My contact #602-738-0562

I will be starting small group (and maybe large group as demand grows) kettlebell conditioning classes very shortly for those readers who live in the Phoenix area so stay tuned for more information on that! When groups get big enough, Patrick and I will work together to ensure quality instruction and exercise performance/technique.

Here's a some pics followed by a video of how the place is looking right now! Video:


Also, here's a collection of progressive photos on a flickr page made by Patrick's wife!

Thanks, and I look forward to seeing people at the new facility! We will have a grand opening party sometime in September after all our equipment is in.

Keats

Minimalist SprintAthlete Drills

One of my favorite aspects of fitness development is the development of speed. More specifically I am referring to sprinting speed. You see, I have this theory, (which I feel is based on a pretty solid platform of both anecdotal and scientific evidence) that maintaining your ability to lift heavy objects, perform explosive movements, and even sprint, that's right sprint, will maintain the body in a much superior way than those methods which focus on endurance type of activities (i.e. slow jogging or "plodding" marathons, etc...).

Yet, it seems as people age, that is exactly what they are drawn to: slow, long-distance type of activities such as marathons and triathlons. Now don't get me wrong here, if you are one of the people that just love endurance type of activities I wouldn't try to take that away from you; I'm just not convinced that it's healthier than more brief, explosive type of activities such as sprinting. As a master's sprinter myself (I'm biased of course!), I find that performing regular sprints and conditioning work called "tempo" training, along with heavy and explosive free-weight exercises, keeps me pretty fit and strangely enough, allows me to perform endurance type of activities quite well without having to train for these activities specifically.

My theory is that the better you get at repeating high-intensity bouts of exercise, the easier it become to do activities that are relatively lower on the intensity scale by comparison. Indeed it is not uncommon for elite level endurance athletes to possess some pretty decent strength and speed due to the increased amounts of speed and power work that are being done these days.

In order to perform speed work though, you must have a basic clue of the proper running mechanics. To help learn and feel the proper technique involved with faster running, it is often helpful to perform sprint drills to help learn and rehearse the mechanics of proper sprinting form. The following video demonstrates, via the help of my Friend and colleague Patrick Ward, the basic "minimalist" drills that one could do prior to a sprinting or even just a running training session:


Enjoy! They'll be many more videos coming soon about my thoughts on this most important topic.

Keats