Is Your Athlete Getting Faster The Right Way?

 



Why speed training isn’t about what drills you do… It’s about how you do them.

 The Truth About Speed

Every athlete wants to get faster.  Every parent wants their kid to be the one who stands out — the one who breaks away, gets open, and finishes the play.  And the truth is this: if you do almost any type of speed training, you’ll probably see some improvement.  Your athlete will look faster. Their times might drop a little. Their acceleration might feel sharper.  But that’s not mastery, that’s adaptation.  Getting faster is easy.  Getting fast and staying fast,  that’s a different game.

Speed Isn’t a Drill — It’s a Skill

You can’t “copy-paste” speed.  It’s not about copying someone’s Instagram drills or doing the same workouts as an NFL player.  Speed is a neuromuscular skill.  It’s how efficiently your brain, muscles, and nervous system work together to produce and control force.  That means it’s not just what you do, it’s how you do it:

  • The precision of your first step.

  • The rhythm of your arm swing.

  • The timing of your ground contact.

  • The angles you hit at every stride.

Those micro-details separate an athlete who gets a little faster from one who becomes consistently explosive.

 Mechanics Matter More Than Mileage

A sprinter who runs 10 reps with bad mechanics is just practicing inefficiency 10 times.  An athlete who performs three high-quality reps with full intent, rest, and technical precision builds the right neural patterns that translate to real game-speed.  In speed development, more is not better; better is better.

Think of it like this: If you type on a keyboard with two fingers, you can get faster over time. But until you learn the proper technique, you’ll always hit a ceiling. The same applies to sprinting.

Speed is technique + timing + tension control.
If those three aren’t dialed in, no amount of “extra drills” or “conditioning” will make a meaningful difference.

 The “Drill Trap”  and Why Most Athletes Fall Into It

One of the biggest mistakes we see, even among elite programs,  is drill chasing.
Athletes jump from one popular drill to another, believing there’s a secret formula.  Here’s the truth:  Every one of those drills works, but only if done with the right intent, cues, and purpose.  You can’t just go through the motions.  A drill is simply a vehicle to teach a specific position, rhythm, or force pattern.  If you don’t know why you’re doing it, or what the goal is, you’re not training speed, you’re just exercising.

Intent Is Everything

Two athletes can perform the exact same drill and get completely different results.
The difference? Intent.

  • Athlete A is just “doing the drill.”

  • Athlete B is focused on driving the knee, hitting the right angle, snapping the arm back, and feeling the ground reaction force.

Athlete A gets tired.
Athlete B gets faster.

Every sprint rep should feel intentional, not rushed.  The goal is not to sweat, but to move with precision and purpose.  That’s why elite speed programs use full rest periods, video feedback, and constant cueing.  Speed development is a science, not a circuit.


The "Science" of How The Speed System Trains

Most programs run drills.  We build speed from the inside out — using biomechanics, intent, and nervous-system precision.

At The Speed System, every rep an athlete takes is rooted in science: physics, force application, posture, sprint mechanics, and coordinated movement patterns.  We learn from our athletes.  We don’t train “harder”, we train smarter, because real speed is a neurological skill, not a conditioning workout.

Here’s the science behind the way we train:

1. Posture, Projection, & Positioning (The “3 P’s”)

Before an athlete ever runs a full sprint, we teach them how to position their body to produce and transfer force.  The Speed System trains athletes to:

  • Maintain a stable posture under pressure

  • Create the correct shin angles for efficient acceleration

  • Keep the pelvis neutral so the hip flexors and glutes fire correctly

  • Hold alignment from head to toe through every stride

Clean posture = clean force = clean speed.

2. Ground Reaction Force & Force Direction

Speed comes from one thing: maximal force production with minimal ground contact time

That’s physics.

We coach athletes to:

  • Strike the ground back and down during acceleration

  • Produce horizontal force early, vertical force later

  • Use the glutes and hamstrings to project forward

  • Minimize braking forces (overstriding, heel striking, tall posture too early)

Without mastering force direction, no drill in the world will make you fast.

3. Rhythm, Timing, and Frequency

Speed is not stiffness and power alone, it’s rhythm.  It’s timing.
It’s the ability to sync arms, legs, and ground contacts into one fluid pattern.

Our sessions teach:

  • Step rhythm progression (A-march → A-skip → Switches → High Knees)

  • Arm timing that complements leg action

  • Stride frequency without “spinning your wheels”

  • Relaxation in the shoulders, hands, and jaw to unlock elastic speed

When an athlete learns rhythm, they stop forcing speed and start expressing speed.

4. Elasticity, Stiffness, and Relaxation

The fastest athletes in the world are not the strongest, they are the most elastic.

We train athletes to:

  • Increase stiffness in the ankles and tendons for better bounce

  • Absorb and release energy like a spring

  • Stay relaxed in the upper body so energy flows forward

This is where we separate fast athletes from athletes who “try to run fast.”

5. Technical Model + Individual Model

The Speed System has a clear technical model,  the biomechanical standard of how a fast athlete should move.  But we also coach the individual model, how YOUR limb length, hip mobility, posture, and strength levels impact your sprint pattern.  No two athletes sprint exactly the same.  We train what the athlete needs, not what a drill requires.

6. Max-Velocity Neurology, Not Conditioning

A real speed session gives the nervous system time to fire at 100%.
That means:

  • Full recovery between reps

  • Low volume, high quality

  • Max intent, max precision

  • No conditioning masquerading as “speed work”

Most programs fatigue athletes.
We refine them.

Speed isn’t how tired you can get, it’s how efficiently your body can produce force.

The Result?

Athletes don’t just get faster for a season…They become technically sound, biomechanically efficient, and neurologically optimized to stay fast throughout their careers.  This is why The Speed System produces athletes who move differently,  smoother, sharper, more explosive, and with fewer breakdowns.

But Coach Tee, Can’t You Just Give Me a List of Drills?”

Of course we could.  But that’s like asking for a recipe without knowing how to cook.  A great speed program is less about what’s written and more about what’s coached.  If we gave 10 different coaches the same list of drills, you’d see 10 completely different outcomes, because the execution, feedback, and detail all change the result.

Drills are tools. Coaching is the craft.

The Athlete’s Responsibility: Be a Technician

The fastest athletes aren’t just strong, they’re students of movement.  They pay attention to the details. They film their reps. They ask questions.

They train with intent.  They don’t rush the process; they master it.  Speed training is repetition with precision.  Every step is a signal to your nervous system: This is how I move fast.  If that signal is sloppy, you’re training yourself to be slow.

The Bottom Line: Speed Is Earned in the Details

Every athlete gets faster.  But not every athlete learns to move efficiently, repeatably, and powerfully under pressure.  That’s what separates a “good” athlete from a great one.  That’s what turns raw talent into measurable performance.

At The Speed System, we don’t just train you to move fast, we train you to move right.  Because when you learn how to control every stride, every inch, and every force vector(horizontal or vertical)…Speed becomes a skill you own, not something that fades when the season ends.

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