Elite coaching special - Clyde Hart coach to Michael Johnson and Jeremy Wariner

Targeting the 400m World record
Clyde told us the tale of the 400m world record that many thought Johnson was capable of long before he broke it. From it comes the story of another of Hart’s tricks to boost fitness.

Clyde said: "In 1999 he decided he wanted to break the world record. But he got injured and didn't run another race before Seville - so it shows you can race train and not race to run your best. He had run 43.39 at Gothenburg in his seventh race so he could have broken the world record. In Seville his splits were 21.2sec and 31.7sec. In the semi-final his splits were 21.0sec and 31.5sec and then he walked in. The way he ran on that could have been sub-43sec. But he'd decided that he wanted to do it in the final.

"So [in order to help break the WR] in 1999 we put in an additional drill. He'd run 37/38sec to 300m, then take 1min and then have to run under 12sec [for 100m]. He'd take 5min rest and do three. He got down to 11.2/3sec. We had started it early in the year because your body learns and adapts.”

But Clyde also knows that more is not always better.

"Once we were in another catch up situation. We went to three work outs a day getting ready for the championships for about 11 days. He would work out in the morning, do running in the early afternoon and lift after that."

But after that 11 days Johnson was cooked and went back to a more normal routine.

Clyde learned other ways of getting extra fitness out of his athletes. He took pieces of knowledge from one area and applied them elsewhere.

"When a guy I coached said he wanted to break 4min [for a mile] I said you have got to know what it feels like to run at that speed so he ran 15 x 200m in 30sec off 30sec rest. It got his body settled at running at 30sec pace, he got to doing 24 at that pace.”

Hart adapted this for use by Johnson to add endurance to his training given even he could not sustain three sessions a day!

"After practice we would do a 30sec 200m as part of the cool down for Michael. Then he did a 30sec 200m, 30sec rest and then another one. He said that hurt more than the workout! That little extra push made a difference. You don't have to be 10% better than your opponent, you just have to be 1% better. We even got to a point of doing 3 x 30sec 200m and two sets.

"The Australian scientists have come to the conclusion that the 400m is more aerobically demanding that people had ever thought.

"Only 10% of the 400m is anaerobic. But the more aerobic work you do the more training you can do and that comes out in competition.”

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