An athlete and coach has started innovative training sessions at Manchester based facility.
The Extra Yard, a group first developed by Keith Hutchinson and Paul Hewitson, aims to bridge a gap in the market, offering grassroots athletes the same training as their elite counterparts
The idea that first started as a conversation in a kitchen provides local athletes in various cities with an opportunity to develop their speed, endurance, agility, power, technique and explosiveness.
Keith, 43, started his running career to raise money for leukaemia following the loss of his father and joined a trainer who did track and field classes and noticed how much the speed training helped.
“I wish I’d done this 20 years ago when I was playing football, could I have played at a much higher level than what I did? So I thought, you know, I’ll talk to Paul about it and he said, ‘why don’t you give it a go and we’ll advertise and see who comes along?’
“It’s basically just grown arms and legs and we’re pretty much all over the place, but we’ve got about six or seven different venues now and Middlesbrough is probably the biggest one where we are at the moment.”.
The journey started off relatively similar in Manchester where trial sessions were run at Longford Park in Stretford. The group now runs three sessions a week on Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday to help people get a taste of speed work and athletics. This training is not just for athletics with it proving beneficial to a variety of athletes in sports such as netball, rugby, cricket and football.
The service at the Park started up three months ago and has made a successful start.
” I’m really pleased that Longford Park’s taken us, and I hope it really goes a lot bigger than where it is, because the facilities there are fantastic, as Paul said, the staff there are great.
“I think people see us as a running club, we’re not a running club, we are a service that will help them, as individuals or groups get faster at their sport, so I think once people realise that and see that, there’ll be a lot more come along and take advantage of it.”
The location below is where the training takes place.
Find out more at The Extra Yard – Speed Coaching