Sprint Short Distance And Run Bases Faster In A Week For Baseball & Softball Athletes | Rotational Core, Speed, & Power Body-Weight Exercises Done At Home
Discover baseball and softball athletes can sprint short distance and run the bases faster in a week with David Weck’s ‘head over foot’ technique and ‘pulsers’. Learn how to do rotational core, speed, and power body-weight exercises and drills at home.
The Biggest Lie In Teaching Hitters How To Run Faster & Move Better
The purpose of this post:
- How to make hitters faster, and
- How to apply David Weck’s “Head Over Foot” technique and “Pulsers” to hitters?
Most sprint coaches will teach athletes to get faster by using a “braced core” (instead of a Coiling Core), and “hip to lip” arm action. This is DEAD WRONG, and one of the biggest lies in teaching athletes to run faster and move better. These coaches aren’t understanding the basics of human locomotion. Consider the following…
How to Make Hitters Faster
Here are a few notes from the video above:
- To balance on one foot most effectively, we need head over “ground” foot. Try balancing on one foot bending spine and head far outside or inside ground foot. You can probably balance, but not as effectively as head over foot. Under the body’s “plum line”.
- We want the forces transferring cleanly throughout body. When you don’t land balanced (head over foot), compensation is the end result. Back pain has been linked to head not being over foot.
- Side bending is key to rotational power, and is what most coaches DO NOT understand or choose to ignore. Imagine throwing without a side bend.
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Watch this Facebook video from David Weck looking at how the runner moves “head over foot”, and side bends while stealing second (You can also CLICK HERE to see an interview I did with David Weck here)…
Which brings me to how to train this. CLICK HERE for a Facebook video post where David Weck explains the how of his sprint “Pulsers”. And CLICK HERE to get the “ProPulse Speed Trainers” at David’s website.
How to Apply David Weck’s “Head Over Foot” Technique or “Pulsers” to Hitting
Do you consider yourself a think-outside-of-the-box type of person? Please sound off in the Comments below, on how you can apply this technique or Pulsers with your hitters (thanks in advance!!)…
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Joey, this is by far in my view one of your best teachings!!!! I can’t agree with you more on these teachings. I quickly discovered some easy drills and a better way to communicate what I think I know. Thank you…
I do still feel like the swing goes from many transitions… An easy way to describe it without being bound by theory or the whole process, from your rear foot to both feet to your lead foot and a return….
Man!!!! I love this article…..Thanks!!!!
I dont want to go off but if you see how he adjust and explains and just incorporate the swing…. one can feel the right tensioning and so on……..
Thanks again.
~DM
Joey, you continually amaze. Thanks for another wonderful way to help our hitters and runners!
You got it Bill! Keep up the great work yourself 😀
Joey, this is a “powerful” video. Can you explain how this applies to the baseball swing? It seams like Mr Weck is showing a side bend for the back side, like shot put or discs throw. With the down hill shoulder angle the side bend is on the front side for the swing? Like you’ve side the swing is front side propelled not back side. Just trying to understand how to apply this correctly with the spinal engine. Thanks for posting this.
Mark
Mark, you’re absolutely correct! The hitter gets to that same point, but at the start of the turn. What we’re doing before stride landing is compressing and pre-loading the springy fascial glue. It’s like twisting a semi-deflated volleyball sized balloon…if you hold it with palms facing each other, and each hand twists their side of the balloon in opposite directions (building torque), what happens to the air pressure inside of the balloon? It increases. This is what we’re doing to the body before the ‘Weck’ move. We’re taking the ‘slack’ out of the system beforehand.
Joey, nice to hear I’m on the right track. That’s a new way for me to think of this and will help me to explain to others.Thanks for the detailed explanation and for replying to my question.
You got it Mark! Keep up the great work with those hitters.
Joey, “were taking the slack out of the system beforehand”…. I like the way you communicated that point. Excellent and thanks…
Question???? How would you communicate the fact that we have to bow or round out to get the spiral lines in place? And everyones posture is uniquely their own…
Have you given that any thought ?
Weck had another video I saw that talked about the top of your head which I thought is another brilliant point that is extremely important in baseball…
Side bending and the top of your head…I thought were interesting. I would love to hear your thoughts and how you would communicate the top part of the head… so many have the head wrong…and it’s extremely important and always neglected….
Obviously this can get complicated or sticky really fast…Your thoughts are always appreciated… Thanks again…
~DM
Djura, are you referring to the “hunch” or “hollow” position when you say “bow” or “round” out? If so, then click the following post on that: https://hittingperformancelab.com/baseball-hitting-drills-off-tee/ Thinking about the top of the head and side bending has to be “long”. Dr. Kelly Starrett refers to this as the one-joint rule. When you flex forward like doing a crunch, then you think about crunching around a barrel and making your head and spine long as you crunch. Ideokinesis is a new book I’ve been reading about cueing.
Let me give some thought on how I want to explain this as the details are important and easy to miss…But the hollow thing is to me side bending g to get the spiral in the right position and doing it in both sides makes it look like just a hollow position but I have to give this more thought…
As for the ideokinesis… this is interesting… my wife always talked about how my whole family walk weird… something I though about is how some cultures just have there mannerisms… well… I got my moms big time… And she was a sheep herder with back pain and all kinds of things… but man I was observing everyone in extended family and man we all do walk similar…
So improving posture through structured guided imagery… It seems like we just follow what we see most…So I’m a big believer of people copy what they see… good or bad…
There seems to be something regarding ideokinesis…
Perhaps the best reason to have great posture and walk and sit functionally is your kids will copy you… we see these as mannerisms but perhaps posture, alignment and fluency of movement through imagery is a better explanation…
Interesting…
~DM
Joey I’m confused about the whole head movements and braced core comments… I thought the spirals are moving the head not the core… I thought that we want to brace outer core and that would include any part of the core controlling the head but we should let the spirals move freely…. Did I miss something or did wreck miss something… Or have we not given my point consideration until now… any comments would be appreciated… hope all is well. Later.
~DM
Weck breaks taught sprinting styles down into the Spiral Core and Braced Core. The latter is what top of food chain sprint coaches still teach…don’t let shoulders move (both laterally or axially), keep core braced maintaining the “T” shape of the spine and shoulder line. This is DEAD WRONG when making athletes faster. All the Braced Core is good for is the weight room. A Braced Core to sprinting is equivalent to teaching hitters to ‘load & explode the hips’, looks good on paper, but is ineffective movement and is missing the forest for the trees.
Thanks Joey. This bracing of the core and the rest of it gets pretty complicated…along with stacking…
One thing big I like is trying to get the tension right… one thing I like is swallowing… and where the tongue hits the top of your month is a point of interest… Have you ever heard of that angle…
For me it gets my head in the right spot…
What say you Joey?
~DM
Tongue to the roof of the mouth connects the head to the core, and is a MUST when doing supine core work (on your back) and lifting upper half off the ground.
Is there anything good with the tongue positioning regarding the baseball swing… I do it in my stance…. Am I just correcting bad posture or am I doing something else to get into a good position or both? Do you ever do it in your stance…
Is it possible to make a test with and without tongue positioning… and would people laugh at the idea???? ??….
~DM
Tongue to the roof of the mouth is more effective when in the supine position. Not sure it has as much effect when in standing position.
By the way, when I say tongue to the roof… it’s a slight movement than it gives and goes back… but yes, when I do this it’s like the last part of my stance where I feel everything in my body very well…. It’s extremely hard to explain but it’s a strong feeling….I don’t know how to explain it because once my tongue is there I take a deep breath and it relaxes to my rear but I’m strong…Any thoughts ?
If it makes you feel better, then do it Djura 😀
Joey, I believe it sets your deep front line… so when I say sets… it perfects that posture, so now it’s in the best position to be used… So setting it doesn’t mean bracing it…it’s more of a stacking thing…
I can be wrong…
~DM