How do I strengthen quadriceps for intense sprinting? I got it pulled 3 times in 3 months.

Some things which might be different from the way you have thought about Athletic Training and about Overall Fitness, so far… Likely your Coach/es too, do not look at these issues, in this manner!!!

  1. Your regular Training program is likely the best at getting you good in your Sport (Sprinting). It is the same for any sport, for that matter…you need to spend a lot of time training/playing the sport, to get excellent at it.
  2. Spending significant time training your sport, is perhaps, also the best Conditioning exercise/s that suit your sport. Granted there are other ways to improve Conditioning, (such as the Prowler, which is the best there is for Conditioning), this will largely depend on how much and how intense (Volume and Intensity) you train for your Sport and time/s available for Recovery.
  3. While the above are TRUE, it is also true that they do not by themselves make you STRONG beyond a small beginning. That is, Sprinting will make you Stronger than you were before you started Sprinting, but Sprinting makes you run faster and faster, but not necessarily Stronger and Stronger (beyond a short period of time, initially).
  4. Just as you need to Sprint to get Faster (and you need to play Basketball to get good at Basketball, and so too with Tennis, Swimming, Boxing etc), you need to STRENGTH TRAIN in order to get Stronger. Strength Training is a SPECIALTY just as a Sprint Coach’s specialty is to coach his/her athletes to Sprint. You would not want a Sprint Coach to teach you Boxing would you? In the same way, understand that STRENGTH TRAINING is a SPECIALTY too.
  5. Strength Training will get you Strong. This will lead to Elimination (or at the very least will result in Significant Reduction) of Injuries.
  6. Strength Training will also help your Conditioning to a good extent, (but will not be enough by itself, to excel in your Sport).
  7. Getting Stronger through PROPER Strength Training, will also help IMPROVE your Sprint Performance perceptibly.
  8. We did mention above, the importance of a PROPER STRENGTH TRAINING Regimen. Do NOT look at your body as individual muscles (Quadriceps, Biceps and such). Proper Strength Training will comprise whole body Compound Exercises. Not Body Part Splits…that’s only useful for Bodybuilding…which is a completely different sport.
  9. A proper Strength Training Regimen, will program for Compound Whole Body Exercises, and therefore, ALL muscles in your body will get strong. As a small example, Squats, Deadlifts and Presses will get your Quadriceps, your Hamstrings as well as all your body’s Stabilizer muscles strong. Working out only your Quadriceps (as Body Builders do), will create muscle imbalances. Getting your Quadriceps strong, while not getting your Hamstrings strong, will lead to severe Hamstring injuries. Again, this is just one example of what can happen without following a (PROPER) Strength Training Regimen.
  10. Working out like a Bodybuilder such as Isolating Body Parts for working out via Body Part Splits, working out with lighter weights and larger number of Repetitions for instance, will produce a lot of Muscle Hypertrophy (Bulk) without proportionately significant increases in Strength…not what you want for your Sport of Sprinting.

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Additionally,

  1. Your Diet is EXTREMELY important too. Good Quality Protein in Adequate Quantities (much higher than for non-athletes) is a MUST. Your Carbohydrates, Fats and Micro-Nutrients are ALL EXTREMELY important as well, of course.
  2. Rest (and therefore, Recover) is IMPERATIVE too. Many athletes and their Coaches think that training without breaks (R & R) will provide results. Rigorous hard training is absolutely required…but, then, so is ADEQUATE Rest and Recovery. That means NO WARM-UPS, NO YOGA, NO TREADMILL/STATIONERY BIKE…. NOTHING… R&R = TOTAL REST and RECOVERY.