Horizontal force production

[Brookfine]

Miami has been brutally hot this year, so it's looking like I'm going to be focusing on strength training until October instead of sprinting.

In the past 3 months I moved from (365, 275, 405) to (435, 325, 515) on SBD while maintaining speed on one track workout a week. With the next few months I'm wondering if I should be adding a lift that might work horizontal force production more, but I'm not sure what that would be.

I'm curious if sleds might be a good idea but I've seen some horrifying ankle injuries watching videos of strongmen pushing sleds and pulling cars. Is there a barbell lift that trains that horizontal force production to the same degree?

[Mark Rippetoe]

How is horizontal force produced differently such that it needs to be trained specifically?

[Brookfine]

Surely, because you're generating force from a position that isn't directly above your center of mass you're going to have different parts of the range of motion emphasized as well as different stabilizers and different tendons being loaded, no? Otherwise we may as well say squat and deadlift are equivalent because we use the same muscles in both.

I get that sports specific training questions are annoying given that pitchers keep asking if they can throw dumbbells, but I don't think it's insane to look for broad strokes movements that focus on force development ahead of the CoM rather than above it.

[Mark Rippetoe]

If your squat goes from 135 to 315, and your deadlift goes from 185 to 385, what happens to your horizontal force production ability?

[Maybach]

If you really think about this, Brookfine, and I mean really put that wet pink walnut to work, I think you can figure out why you have the wrong idea here.


Here's something to get you started. The center of mass is a physical, not physiological, concept. When you are exerting "horizontal force:

1) Where is the center of mass?

2) Is the force applied by the human body in this case have any component which does not intersect this object? What happens to an object which experiences forces orthogonal to the line between the origin of that force and the center of mass? Hint: it is not translation.

3) What tendons and muscles are not loaded during the squat that would be helpful for "horizontal force production"?

[Brookfine]

I don't disagree that increasing the deadlift and squat has been helpful - but I also know that as progress as a whole slows down I should be looking to specialize.

1) the center of mass is gonna be somewhere a little below my sternum and a few inches from my spine

2) The force vector does intersect the center of mass with a big but, but, the force vector is not coming perpendicularly from the ground. In sprinting sports you're going to have a large vertical component, but it will also have a significant horizontal component. When I sprint I come away with a stride that's over 2 meters long and I'll have a vertical oscillation of about 10-20cm.

Gait-cycle-free-body-diagram.jpg

3) The squat is going to load all muscles but it won't load them in the same positions as you will when sprinting. While everyone has a mental image of sprinters being basically at a 45 degree angle to the ground, however in reality for most of the race a sprinters torso will be vertical and the peak of force production will be from a position where the leg is fully behind the hips and almost straight (see image). This position represents a portion of the ROM that never occurs in any squat or deadlift variation. In fact, the only lift I can think of that does work that extension in any capacity is a power clean, coincidentally the one singular lift that every single sprinter and speed athlete swears by. Bolt famously hated the weight room and this was the one lift he liked.


I guess we can be more granular: how do I best work my ability to produce maximal force from a position where my hip angle is greater than 180 degrees, particularly how might I do this in a non-explosive capacity?

[Brookfine]

I'm not sure if my post actually sent due to a login issue, in case it didn't here's the sparknotes:

In sprint sports force is being applied to the center of mass with both a horizontal and vertical component. The horizontal force component in sprinting largely occurs in a position where the runners torso is fully vertical and the leg is straightening behind the hips (see picture), with excessive torso lean only occurring at the first few and last few steps of a race. Force production in a squat and deadlift occurs with a hip angle that never exceeds 180 degrees, meaning this portion of the ROM is completely unworked. A power clean is the only lift I can think of off the top of my head that produces high forces with a 180+ degree hip angle, and it coincidentally is universally favored by sprinters and speed athletes.

sp-track-b-20160816.jpg

Having thought about it, I think it's fair to clarify what I'm asking for: Are there non-explosive lifts that will particularly improve force production in situations where hip angle exceeds 180 degrees?

[Mark Rippetoe]

I guess we can be more granular: how do I best work my ability to produce maximal force from a position where my hip angle is greater than 180 degrees, particularly how might I do this in a non-explosive capacity?

You squat and deadlift, and power clean to practice using the increased strength explosively. Do you think the angles must be the same for the increased strength to be applicable?

[Brookfine]

You squat and deadlift, and power clean to practice using the increased strength explosively. Do you think the angles must be the same for the increased strength to be applicable?

I'm more concerned with strength not being substantially increased for movement ranges outside what those exercises work. We wouldn't expect doing a bunch of rack pulls to greatly improve my strength off the floor right? And we wouldn't guess that someone who only trains half squats is going to have a fantastic full squat. I don't see that it would be particularly unreasonable to note that movements which don't extend beyond 180 degrees of hip angle may not be optimized for the production of a powerful extension at 185-200 degrees of hip angle

[Mark Rippetoe]

One more time: If you get your below-the-knees rack pull up to 495, what happened to your pull off the floor? It's not optimum, but it does go up, because strength is not specific to movement pattern or ROM.