Coaching and Care of Athletes

THE QUARTER-MILE AND 400 METRES of a runner, not have a view of his opponents until the whole field is approaching the finish. In these circumstances the distri– bution of energy and the judgment of pace, so that one's own pace can be adjusted to that of one's rivals, become matters of supr~me importance. The coach should carefully impress upon his team that a runner's speed at the beginning of the race-that is to say, in the initial sprint-must depend largely upon his own ability. This problem will be affected, however, by the circumstance of whether the start is made with all the runners in a level line or is staggered, as is always the case when lanes are used. Another influencing condition is the position of the draw; and, finally, there is the distance to the first bend in the track to be considered, because obviously if that distance is a short one, th_en the athlete will need to run a good deal faster to reach the bend in good shape and in a commanding position. Very few runners can resist the temptation to accept the chal– lenge which comes from the whole field at the start of the race. None the less the man who knows that he must conserve his energy for the finish will do well to strengthen his will in this connection. When a challenge comes in the body of the race it should always be met, unless the athlete feels that he is already travelling at his optimum rate of speed, and by increasing that speed momentarily to meet a rival's challenge he will destroy his chance of producing his finishing burst. Athletes should be taught to guard against accepting a challenge levelled at them just before running round a curve. Generally speaking, the athlete must accept all challenges during the last quarter of the race. The athlete who is constantly accepting challenges must as constantly change his rate of speed, and this will bring on premature fatigue, besides destroying the rhythm of his action. If there is to be a proper distribution of energy throughout the race, then the runner must try to stick to his preconceived plan and to preserve his optimum speed as long as possible. A suggestion, put forward by American coaches, has already been made for the distribution of energy. But the coach should never forget that the ideal to aim at is the maintenance of uniform cadence and stride-length throughout the entire race, after optimum speed has been established. One realizes that there are but few athletes who can fulfil this ideal, but certainly the first four men in the Olympic 400 metres fin.al in 1936 went very near to doing 213