Nick Newman Interview I

The jumps in track and field are very near to my heart as a coach. I have sought out information on the internet about training for high, long, and triple jump since I first learned about the Internet. While searching the Elitetrack forums one day, I found posts by a jumper I had competed against in college, Nick Newman. Nick was working with Mike Young of HPC sport, jumping over 25 feet and smashing his old personal bests. This was a guy who was only jumping around 22 feet when he was competing against me while I was in college.

Nick is a very well educated jumper and coach, and you can tell by reading his posts and articles on horizontal jumps. He has improved himself and his abilities immensely and this certainly wasn’t just by luck or accident. I wanted to ask him a few questions about training; so here they are in this week’s Q&A!

Just Fly Sports:

Nick, you improved your performance in the long jump immensely upon your graduation from college/university in the USA. What was your progression of improvement?

Nick Newman:

I first long jumped when I was 14. I only did it a couple of times and I jumped around 20 feet. When I first started jumping again at age 19 I jumped between 21-22 feet on average. I hit my first 23 foot jump a couple of years later while at Manhattan College. I graduated Manhattan with a best of 24’7. I first jumped over 25 feet a couple of years later and jumped 25’7 in Feb 2012. Unfortunately, as is very common with the long jump, I started fouling 26 foot jumps in 2009 and still have not legally jumped that distance. I am hoping that will change very soon!

Just Fly Sports:

Tell us a little bit about your background, and how your training changed from college to post-collegiate. What were some of the major changes in your training that brought out those improvements?

Nick Newman: It wasn’t until my junior year at Manhattan College when I started taking the long jump seriously. Until then I was kick boxing and doing a bunch of other things that did not help my development in the event. During my junior year I began researching the training philosophies of Tudor Bompa. For my last 2 years at Manhattan we would email each other regularly and I would design my training programs around his system. At that point I got many things wrong and was a guinea pig for my own mistakes. I improved but only gradually. Throughout college, my training centered around the weight room, something that is the opposite today. I was always very strong and powerful in the weight room. I power cleaned over 300 lbs after just a year or 2 of serious weight training. I lacked speed and as a result my best collegiate long jump came off only 16 strides.

After college I learned a lot and began to really understand how training worked and what was best for me. My training became speed and elasticity based and resulted in big improvements fairly fast. I created my own compete training system for horizontal jumpers in 2010. This system includes 2 jump/plyo, 2 speed, and 2 weight training days per week with 1 day off. I use 3-4 week cycles with specific testing at the end of each phase. I also use a reverse loading pattern throughout the phases where each week off the phase uses a lower overall load than the week before. This ensures the highest quality of training at all times. In 2012 every training number improved significantly and I jumped a PR in my first competition. Outdoor season competitions have not started for me just yet.

Just Fly Sports: What are some of the biggest mistakes you see present in coaching the jumps on the collegiate level?

Nick Newman: I see many mistakes in both high school and collegiate coaching especially for the jumping events. I will list the main issues I see:

Too much general training – General work is important and certainly has it place. However, improving long or high jumping ability requires a great deal of specific focus and training. The majority of coaches however are not exactly sure how to implement this type of training long term and therefore spend the majority of the time developing fitness, speed endurance, and strength and only minimal time on specific abilities. Fitness and speed endurance play a small role when developing a jumper. Strength is extremely important but must be periodized correctly. I am constantly seeing jumpers performing 6-10 moderate/ slow speed repetitions in the weight room for most of the training year.
Lack of speed work– Seems crazy to think that a jumper does not need speed development but many coaches I have seen do not seem to understand its value. It seems rare to find a program that focuses speed development around short accelerations and fly sprints. Most unfortunately perform their “sprint” workouts as repeat 150’s, 200’s or 250’s with very little emphasis on speed that a jumper actually needs.
Over use of plyometric and jump training – Yes a jumper needs to jump and yes plyometric training should be an important aspect of their training program. However, 1-2 hours of continuous bounding, box jumps, stadium jumps, vertical jumps, long jumps and hurdle hops will do far more harm than good. It seems to me that most coaches feel like good jumps coaches when they exhaust their athletes with endless jumping drills and exercises. Training a jumper requires very high quality training. Rarely should a jumper feel exhausted or even tired during a session. Specific long jumping activities should be limited to 1-2 times per week and plyometric training should rarely exceed 30 minutes of high intense training.
Too many competitions– This happens all the time it seems. A competition every week with the athlete main event being performed every time. It is very difficult to maintain the correct training load when competing all the time. Therefore, specific fitness is often and quickly lost. As well as this burn out occurs and often before the most important time of the year. It is best to use multiple short competition phases throughout the year. Each phase can have 3-4 competitions in it with minimal training lost over the long term.
Lack of weight training during competitions – I often see athletes who develop a level of maximum strength during the pre-season but then either completely stop lifting weights or stop lifting heavy during a competition or competition prep phase. A jumper’s ability to produce take off power is largely determined by his/her maximum strength and as this drops so does the ability to take off successfully. Maximum strength needs to be maintained throughout the competitive period and the development of explosive power should become the emphasis in the weight during this time.

About Nick:

Nick Newman, M.S. is a jumps expert, athletic performance coach, and top 5 ranked British Long Jumper with a current best of 7.80m (25’7). He was born and raised in Great Britain, where he graduated in 2001 with a two year A-level in Sport Science from Durham Community College. His bachelor’s degree is in Exercise Science from Manhattan College in New York in 2006 and in 2009 he earned a graduate degree in Human Performance and Sport Psychology from California State University Fullerton. Nick has been a lifelong researcher and contributor to sport science, specializing in the jumps. His most recent work has been authoring: “The Horizontal Jumps: Planning for Long Term Development”.

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