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 MONDAY, FEBRUARY 25, 2008
Houston, We Have Lift-off
It’s a documented fact that I dislike celery. I like the look of it, seems nice and crunchy, and fresh, and cool, and sweet but it just tastes wrong. And it smells wronger. And if you make it warm and add it to any meal, the whole meal smells of celery. Wrong upon wrong. Wrong, wrong, wrong.
More than celery, I hate the cliché (look it up). A cliché is a word or phrase which has been used so much, usually out of context, that almost no-one remembers what it meant in the first place and so it has lost all, or at least its original, meaning. People use clichés as a substitute for actual thought. So while they seem cool, fresh, sweet, clever (hey, just like celery!) they’re just wrong.
Here’s a cliché you might hear now and again: “Well, it’s not rocket science.”, which is usually used to suggest that something is fairly simple. Someone might say, for example, “How do you bake a cake? Well, it’s not rocket science!” Or, “How do you use the internet? Well, it’s not rocket science!” (it kind of is, actually, but never mind).Or, “Long jumping? It’s not rocket science!” Aha! Celery time!
The long jump is usually broken up into four parts: approach, takeoff, flight, and landing. What I would disagree with, in terms of meaning rather than the word itself, (because it’s a nice word, and makes me feel good), is “flight”. Long jumpers don’t fly. We don’t have wings, like birds or aeroplanes. We are propelled into the air, stay up there for a bit then fall to ground. What else does that? The Space Shuttle.
Here’s how it works.
The shuttle has two types of rocket on it: a giant orange one, and two smaller white ones. At lift-off, only the big orange one is working, which fires until it runs out of gas, then falls off. At that point the little white ones fire, and the shuttle gets an extra little boost which kicks it into orbit. Once in orbit the little white ones fall off. The shuttle then hangs around for a bit (being in space helps – not much gravity up there) before falling back down to earth. The rocket scientists have it worked out so that it will fall at an angle to the ground, that is, it doesn’t fall straight down. Although it looks like it is flying, it is really falling. The tiny wings and tail are only there to adjust its position as it falls so that it lands at the right angle and everyone gets out alive. This is important for the astronauts who, no doubt, value their lives.
The long jumper has two types of rockets on it: a giant one at the knee and a smaller one at the ankle. At lift-off the big muscles in the thigh combined with the tendon across the knee fire and produce a large amount of thrust. This continues until the knee is almost fully extended and the hip is projected beyond the board. At this point the calf muscles and Achilles tendon fire, the heel comes up off the board and the jumper gets an extra little boost which completes the take off. The jumper then continues into the air, eventually reaching a high point before falling to the ground. Like the shuttle, the jumper falls at an angle. Unlike the shuttle, small bearded men in white coats and horn-rimmed glasses have no influence here – the landing angle has already been set at take off. So all the jumper can do to control the landing is use “flight” technique, usually a hitch-kick or hang, to ensure that his or her body is positioned correctly to hit the sand in the optimal way. If the body is correctly aligned with the angle of fall, with arms, legs and body in the correct place, then the landing will be a good one and there’ll be a degree of celebration. Maybe some whooping or dancing. A bellow or two.
Reassuringly, I think I’ve proved my point there, viz, that the long jump really is rocket science. Yes, yes, I know it’s a bit more complicated than that (what, more complicated than the science of rockets – what next?) but throw me a frickin’ bone, I’m trying to make a point about muscle timing and co-ordination. Jeez. Tough crowd.
I’ll try to bring this model through in future blogs, and at the same time answer Niall Counihan’s question about eccentric hamstrings, but as it was an idea that only just occurred to me I felt it was important to share immediately in blogworld. Even if you don’t immediately get the abstract sciencey bit, you will hopefully have learned something about clichés and, more importantly, celery. Did I mention how wrong it is?
SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 24, 2008
My First Blog
Hello!
It's Sunday night, 24th February, and yet another rainy night in Edinburgh. Plus ca change, plus c'est la memsahib, as an Indian friend of mine once quipped. You probably don't get the joke. I don't blame you. It's not even funny.
Moving on...before I launch into a long-winded ramble about training and life in general, I think it might be a good idea to set the scene a bit and talk about where I am and how I got here. You will no doubt have had a quick look at my bio so you'll know I'm a 7.51m long-jumper from Cork. That covers everything from my birth up to about October this year, so no sense in going back over that. I'll just quickly go over the intervening period.
Winter training began in October, as ever. Unusually, this year I started the Winter with one or two minor issues. Firstly, I was carrying a hip injury (slight dislocation), which had caused me no small amount of trouble over the summer season. Secondly, I was coming to the sharp end of a large project at work, which was going to cause no end of trouble wih my training over the Winter. So the plan was to get fit slowly, skip the indoors and prepare for the Summer.
Well, I kind of followed the plan. I built up slowly, doing lots of rehab on my hip. Then work, as predicted, went a bit crazy so I missed a couple of months of good quality training. On a whim, I decided to do the national indoors, surprisingly won it, got picked for Cardiff and got invited to the UK Champs. Which was good in a way, as I found out what kind of shape I was in for the Summer. Bad shape, as it happens! Slow. Weak. Rusty.
So here I am now, a couple of weeks back into training. So far so good. My speed, strength and jumping power are gradually returning, and I feel a bit like my old self. Strangely, I spent the last week labouring under a heavy cold, but managed to get a PB in the hang clean, and just missed one in the clean, as well as doing some good running and jumping sessions. Key now is not to get excited and try to continue building for the Summer.
For those of you curious about how I train, here's a quick snapshot of the week. I never keep a diary so this is just based on memory:
Monday
Cleans, deep squats, incline bench, eccentric-hamstrings, hurdle jumps, ab circuit.
Tuesday
Short sprints over 30m & 50m
Barefoot hurdle jumps in sandpit.
Wednesday
Drills
Long jump takeoffs @ 12 strides
Medicine ball
Thursday
Tempo running over 90m, 120m & 150m.
Circuit training.
Friday
Hang cleans, incline bench, eccentric hamstrings, abs.
Saturday
Rest
Sunday
Long jump take-offs @ 12-14 strides
I should point out that this is not completely what's in my programme. I tend to modify sessions depending on how I'm feeling but I rarely skip the really important stuff.
So there you go.
Feel free to ask any questions (if this blog thng allows) and I'll try to answer.
Otherwise, I'll just keep typing now and again until I get bored or someone tells me to stop!
Cheers!
Steve
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