SST Makes Another Trip to Ohio St.

Well, Larry and I took our second trip to Ohio at the end of June. The purpose was learning, not teaching, this time and the destination was slightly different but, like an old married couple, we set off on the long road journey again. I won’t bore you with all the gory details of the multitudinous food stops or the length of the day’s travels but I will say “Hey Anthony, looks like rain up ahead!!!”

We stopped in Columbus again for the promised tour of the 14,000 square foot weightroom that the Buckeye football team has to themselves. It is truly massive! The place is huge and has tons of platforms and racks. Of course everything is branded with the Buckeye logo … very cool! Even more impressive to Larry and I (more impressive than a 14,000 square foot weightroom?) was the football camp they were running. Every single square inch of field and turf was used to work with the 2200 athletes attending the camp! Yes I said 2200 football guys on indoor and outdoor turf and grass! We watched a drill run from the center of the indoor field with 4 QB’s throwing to receivers in the flat who would then turn up the sideline. Not one ball hit the turf! Not a single ball! We stood watching these high schoolers for 20 minutes until we were told we had to go if we wanted to make it to Marietta on time.

Marietta, Ohio was our final destination on this trip. It’s a straight shot south from Cleveland and right on the border with West Virginia – a fact that saved us about 2½ hours on the trip home! The conference was to be held on the campus of Marietta College, which is a very tiny but beautiful little college – treed courtyards, cobblestone walks, old brick buildings … really nice!

We were attending the national conference for the National Association of Speed and Explosion. Dr. George Dintiman is one of the major players in the NASE, a name most strength coaches will recognize from his book, Sports Speed. Friday night and Saturday was spent in an amphitheatre with presentations by a number of speakers, most of them college strength coaches with topics centering mostly on their off-season training programs. There were a few high points that came out of those presentations for me, though. Shawn Gaunt from West Virginia talked about his dynamic warmup and was on point with us at SST, not to mention I picked up a few things. William Hicks from Syracuse showed some video of an energy system thing he does with his guys and the last clip on the tape was of one of his athletes performing a power clean. Now, I’ve seen a lot of power cleans but the lead in caught my attention because Hicks said he had shown this clip at another conference and someone in the audience had commented that the lifter’s feet had gotten very wide at the catch. Hicks shrugged it off by saying, “Yeah, but it’s 400 pounds!” Incidentally, the lifter was also 6’7½” tall! Very impressive! The last thing about the first 2 days that made an impression on me was a little talk given by Butch Reynolds. He didn’t talk much about speed techniques or development but he did talk about having been to the Olympics, having set world record times in the 400m sprint, and pulled an Olympic Gold out of his pocket!

Most of the other coaches went out for dinner and drinks on the Saturday night – Larry and I went out and sprinted using our new Jump Stretch resistance band.

Sunday was a great day! We initially thought we might get on the road early and be home for dinner … and then Tom Tellez started his presentation. To say that Coach Tellez was fantastic is a huge understatement. At 75 years of age, he demonstrated every point he made. He ran around the podium, the screen, and the audience – talking the entire time, never puffing and blowing, missing a word, or even breaking a sweat! Coach Tellez has worked with some of the elite 100m sprinters in the world, including having coached Carl Lewis through his run of Olympic Gold medals. Tom Tellez has the same type of teaching style as we do here at SST – lots of tempo runs and very few drills, make the arms faster to make the legs faster, positive shin angles at ground contact, extend the hips. I found his presentation fascinating and it was, by far, the best of the weekend.

Dick Hartzell also presented on Sunday. He is the owner of Jump Stretch and is known as “the rubber band man”. We learned a lot about using bands to increase flexibility from a 65 year old man who can stretch his hamstrings to the point of touching his toe to the floor up by his head and can do the full splits! There was also some interesting information presented regarding not using ice on injuries and a way to use the bands to reduce time off after an ankle injury! Very cool stuff!

As we were leaving Sunday, Dr. Dintiman approached Larry and I to talk about some of the things that SST does to improve speed. After some informal discussion on our methods at Lightning Camp and hinting about some new speed development techniques that SST is working on, Dr. Dintiman told Larry that they should keep in touch. Well, I’m pleased to report that not only have they kept in touch but Dr. Dintiman has appointed Larry as the Canadian Director for the National Association of Speed and Explosion!

Another great trip! Thanks Larry!

Jeff Jensen