Sacred cows are ideas and concepts passed from generation to generation of coaches that no one questions or challenges. They may have made sense at some time in the past, but are now more likely to get in the way, still they persist. Some sacred cows are so entrenched that they are actually taught in coaching education/certification programs.
Here are some common sacred cows:
Need to build an aerobic base for sprint and intermittent sprint sports
Sprinters paw the ground
Sprinters actively dorsiflex the foot just before ground contact
The arms in sprinting stay at a forty-five degree angle
Lactic acid causes fatigue
Lactic acid causes soreness
Recovery work after competition “flushes’ the lactic acid from the system
Don’t look at the board in the long jump
Hamstrings flex the knee
Quads extend the knee
Abdominals flex the trunk
Training in-season must be a maintenance program
They may have made sense at one time, before we knew any better, but they did not evolve and change as our knowledge of sport science and performance expanded. Some of them sound quite convincing. They come with elaborate pseudo scientific explanations. Don’t be fooled and blindly follow. Do your homework, read the research. Study your sport. Slay the sacred cows, challenge yourself to stay current and question.
terry
Which muscles flex the knee if not the hamstrings?
Paul A. Davis
Conventional wisdom = opinion repeated often enough it is presumed to be fact
naive question = if we weren’t doing it this way already (conventional wisdom), we would still do it this way (or, why ARE we doing it this way?)
As coaches we need to be asking more naive questions and relying less on conventional wisdom.
j johnson
The hamstrings are biarticular muscles. They play a large role in energy transfer.
Terry
I know the hamstrings are biarticular, but my question was ‘Which muscles flex the knee if not the hamstrings?’
So, can anyone answer this please? It is a genuine question. Thanks.
phillip
Terry,
Your question is fair, one I did not understand until watching Gary Gray’s “Hamstrings” dvd where he clearly illustrates the difference between cadaver function (hamstrings flex the knee, extend the hip) and performance function (hamstrings in gait steer the body like reins on a horse, and help decelerate hip and spine flexion).
Hope that helps. Frankly, it didnt at first for me, but in time I got it and now just smirk when I see textbooks still teach cadaver function.
Terry
Thanks, so do you think it would be a fair to say that the hamstrings flex the knee but also have other functions also?
phillip bazzini
Sure thay flex the knee, when you do a traditional leg curl machine, but readers of this blog probably don’t do that exercise much if at all knowing its functional carrying is abround zero.
The question is whats the hammy’s role in function when ground reaction forces, gravity, and proprioception are involved which are all absent in the cadaver anatomy/leg curl machine example. At this point, the rein’s on a horse example I think really illustrate well what is going on. As far as knee flexion goes in gait, that’s largely momentum.
Steven
Watching the sprinting drills most coaches recommend delivers enough sacred cow to have quite the barbecue.
And don’t get me started on why sprinters need to do bicep curls (according to many coaches I’ve spoken with).
Derek Redmon
Hamstrings are very important 🙂 I should know 🙂