![]() ![]() From there, the athlete focuses on driving his arms back, swinging at the shoulders and aiming his hands for just outside hip level. The block position shortens the athlete’s arm, allowing him to quickly move it from a somewhat awkward starting position to synchronize with extension of that same-side leg. He swings his up arm forward into a “block” position, elevating his forearm and bending at his elbow so that his forearm crosses in front of his head. This push creates an aggressive split of the legs, which he mirrors by concurrently splitting his arms the opposite way. The athlete simultaneously pushes off both feet, punching his back leg forward as the front leg drives back into the ground, fully extending. The 40-yard dash start is an orchestration of several movements occurring at once. (See figure 7.8 on page 108 for a photo of this position.)įigure 7.8 Setup for acceleration from a three-point stance. His other arm, referred to here as the up arm, reaches back to hip height with a slight elbow bend. ![]() The forward body weight is evenly distributed between the athlete’s front leg and lead hand so that if he were to pick up his lead hand from the ground, he would fall. This forward lean should result in the hips being in a higher position than his shoulders in the starting stance. Shifting his body weight forward allows the athlete’s shin to move forward over his toes, a term referred to hereafter as shin angle. ![]() His weight shifts forward, but he maintains some weight on his rear leg, a distribution of 75 percent weight forward and 25 percent on his back leg. The athlete then raises his hips, maintaining only three points of contact with the ground: front foot, rear foot, and lead hand. His lead hand should take the full starting line by placing the inside of his thumb and index finger as far forward as possible, right along the very edge of the line. Now in a kneeling position with one leg back and one forward, the athlete places the arm opposite his front leg-referred to here as the lead arm-rotating his hand so that his biceps points toward the finish line. He wiggles his back foot on the ground back about 3 to 4 inches and drops to a kneeling position with the toes of both feet remaining in place. Next, he moves his back foot out to the side so that he is standing with his feet hip-width apart, with his front foot’s heel and back foot’s toes still aligned. The athlete again moves one foot back, creating the same heel-to-toe relationship with his front foot. ![]() From this position, he steps back with one foot so that his feet are in a heel-to-toe relationship, then brings his other foot back to meet it so he is standing a full shoe’s length behind the starting line. The athlete approaches the starting line with both feet together and pointing straight ahead. The back end of the 40-yard dash indicates the athlete’s ability to maintain his speed. The 20-yard split reveals how long an athlete can continue to accelerate, and at what point he begins to transition into top-end speed mechanics. The split recorded at 10 yards-indicative of lower-body explosiveness and pure acceleration-is critical across all position groups. The test contains several valuable metrics that football teams rely on to gauge a prospect’s general athleticism. The 40-yard dash (figure 3.3) is regarded as the crown jewel of combine testing, and for good reason. This is an excerpt from All-Pro Performance Training by Loren Landow & Christopher Jarmon. ![]()
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