Hey guys it's JP Gloria and today we're going to analyze Christian Coleman as
he broke the world record for the 60 meter race in a time of 6.34 seconds.
He's known for his incredible stride frequency as well as the power he
generates through his legs which is ideal for a world-class sprinter. Now,
let's jump into the analysis and take a closer look at the way he sprints.
Before we look at specific parts of the body as he runs, let's first take a look
at his start during the race. Coleman definitely has a solid start; however, even
though this was was the fastest official 60 meter ever ran... this was not his best
start compared to other races! To see the difference, I'll show you a snippet of
him having an excellent start, which was at the world finals in Birmingham. If
you compare both clips at one second, you can see the difference and see how
Coleman covers a bit more ground during that race. Anyway back to this race... first
let's take a look at how quickly he gets his first step in compared to the other
sprinters. As you can see it is slightly delayed compared to some of the
sprinters to the right. One of the reasons why is the way he came out of
the blocks during this race. If you look closely... during this moment, instead of
staying close to the ground and trying to get that first step in. He seems to
push off the blocks a bit more vertically instead of horizontally.
Pushing off slightly more vertically also decreases the amount of time spent
in drive phase. Sprinters usually want to stay in drive phase with that forward lean
to really utilize this position for increased force production through the
legs, which results in quicker speeds. Now, let's look to see if there's any path
deviation as he starts off the blocks. Ideally, you want to sprint in a straight
line as this is a quickest path to the finish line. If you look closely, Coleman
does present with a slight deviation to the right as he pushes off the blocks,
but this is very minimal and after a few steps... he maintains a straight path
toward the end. Now, I want to play this clip in this view again as you can
really appreciate how fast Coleman is able to move those legs! Playing this
clip, you'll see he runs almost 30 steps in this race. This is actually around the
similar amount of steps with some of the other sprinters here;
therefore, these sprinters may have a similar step length compared to each
other. Since speed is equal to stride length x stride frequency and step
length seems to be similar... the real differentiating factor for increased
speed is stride frequency, which is ability to take steps quickly.
Now, we are going to take a look at specific parts of the body starting at
the feet and see how Coleman is able to maximize force production and maintain
that high leg turnover. Starting at the feet, let's take a look
at how his foot lands. As you can see, he lands right around the forefoot area.
This allows for decreased stress on the joints and improves active push off from the
calf muscles. Also landing in this area allows for decreased distance the foot
has to roll over compared to mid foot and rear foot landing, leading to
slightly increase foot turnover rates. As I mentioned before, while this type of
foot landing may slightly help with improved ability to take steps. What
matters even more is where the foot lands relative to the body's center of
mass. While it may not be possible to land right onto the center of mass, unless you
are accelerating, landing closer to it allows for even quicker transition from
foot contact on the ground to pushing off leading to increased stride frequency.
As you can see, Coleman does this very well as his foot lands very close to
where his body center mass would be. Now if you compare this to the elite
long-distance runners we have analyzed before, you'll notice that they land
slightly more forward. Landing slightly forward in this fashion allows for the
elastic properties of the legs to be utilized leading to more efficient
movement. In Coleman's case, due to landing so close to his center of mass, the
foot contact time on the ground is so short that the elastic properties of the
muscles cannot fully be utilized. Basically what is happening is an
exchange of efficiency for increased speed! Next, let's move up to the knees.
I'm not going to talk about how much his knees are able to bend. If we're going to
look at some of the reasons why he has such quick turnover, we will look at the
knee during the moment Coleman's foot transitions from toe off to swing phase.
With some sprinters, they tend to over push, which is exerting more force
vertically than necessary. One way to notice this is to take a look
at the knee and see if it begins to lag during this portion of the running cycle.
With over pushing, the knee and thigh tend to move slightly backwards in
relation to the body as the foot leaves the ground. With Coleman, this is not the
case. You can see he does not over push with the legs at all as immediately
after toe off, his knee and thigh are already moving forward to take the next
step. This technique contributes to his incredible stride frequency. Next let's
look at the hips. Drawing a line through the pelvis what we will look at in this
region is a vertical displacement, which is basically how much bounce he has
in his stride. Due to how much power that is going through his legs, you would
probably expect him to have a decent amount of vertical displacement as he
runs; however as you can see, there is actually not much of it going on.
Of course he needs some vertical force directed upward as he pushes off the
ground otherwise he would collapse and trip on
his feet. Since the vertical displacement is not that much, most of the force seems
to be directed more horizontally... adding to slightly increased stride length
leading to quicker overall speed. Now, moving up to the upper body you can see
he maintains an upright trunk throughout the race with a good forward lean of the
body at around 20 degrees. This lean aids in improved momentum forward as
well as improved utilization of the hip muscles for increased force production.
Also looking from the front of the body, you can see that most of the movement
occurring at the trunk is symmetrical side-to-side and rotational movement,
which is key as the body is supported by each leg. What is also great to see is
the coordination of the upper body and lower body. You can see when the
shoulders fully bend or flex on one side, the hip is maximally flexed on the
opposite side. With proper timing, the rotation from the arms and trunk
counteract the high levels of rotational force produced by the legs, allowing for
fluid movement and maintain a straight path as he sprints to the finish line.
Finally, looking at the head, he keeps it pretty stabilized with most of the
movement occurring at the head is the side-to-side motion similar to what is
occurring at the trunk. While does take extra energy to maintain this position,
it does not matter as much as this race is very short. The stabilization at the head
helps with increased core stability, which is key to decreasing energy
leakage as high levels of forces produced at the legs. And that's all for
the quick running analysis on Christian Coleman! I hope you guys enjoyed this
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