The Finnflier® Goes 100m

December 10, 2019 By Atwood Duncan

The Finnflier® Goes 100m/328’

Since I began importing the Finnflier® seven years ago, I’ve been on the receiving end of reports about how throwers are using this versatile training javelin. Middle schools, high schools, college, open and master’s athletes all seem to be able to get something out of it. My original observation was that it seemed to save the arm while enhancing the learning for making a javelin fly right, and that’s what I’ve been mostly hearing from our thousands of users over the years.

Super far throws with the Finnflier® have been reported to me over the years, with the best results I’d heard of being an 88m throw a few years ago. But things changed on Wednesday November 27th, when Michael Shuey (shoo-ee) tossed one an incredible 100m. That’s really, really far. Turns out he’d thrown a Finn 90m (296’) last year.

Shuey, currently the USA’s top male thrower at 83m, attended an NSAF javelin clinic in Birmingham, Alabama, the weekend prior. Also in attendance were the top US women throwers, last years Pan Am Games medallists Kara Winger (Gold, also 5th at Worlds) and Ariana Ince (Bronze). We also had many of the top US high school throwers, and a great group of post-collegiate athletes, all under the direction of javelin legend Tom Pukstys. Tom pulled off one of the best javelin clinics I’ve ever been to, all the way down to good weather on the main day.

Mike threw the Finnflier® about 82m in a casual session and looked…well, pretty darn good. I was impressed with his consistency and his appearance of knowing what he was doing – these weren’t lucky throws. We had some good technical discussions, and he seemed psyched about getting to hang with the other top throwers.

Then on Nov. 27th I got a video clip text message from Tom showing Mike’s big throw. I recognized it as a cousin of what I saw in Birmingham – reminiscent of the great Raymond Hecht, featuring an early “catch” of the throw for the “Reverse C”, a “Bump”, and enormous right arm elevation, internal rotation and pronation at release to produce a huge “Forward C”. Mike’s a big fellow at 6’5” 235 lbs, so this type of throwing is available to him. The elbow sleeve is a load measuring device, not injury related.

The big “Reverse C” The “Bump” The “Forward C” The Finnflier® takes off!

I’ve always heard of great javelin athletes throwing underweight implements really stinkin’ far, so this is no huge surprise. It can be an incredible confidence builder and teacher of what happens at very high speeds.

These two views have been synchronized to the moment of left foot landing.

I interviewed Mike and learned a few things:

He started throwing the Finnflier® as an elbow rehab tool at Penn under the directionof Coach Lucais MacKay. He characterized throwing the Finns as “A complete contradiction to the heavy weight training for javelin common in many NCAA programs” and that this was good for him.
He said throwing the Finnflier® has allowed him to focus on finesse throwing and that it was far easier to train confidently after his elbow injury.
On this day, he said he felt he could adjust his timing and speed and still hit the point well. This matches what I experienced and heard all my javelin career – some days are great and those days can allow for breakthroughs.
When he first threw the Finnflier® at another NASF clinic a few years ago, he struggled to throw it straight all of 48m/150’. Tom Pukstys was there also and told him he needed to work on this! Looks like Mike listened and got the hang of it…

So what are the takeaways for the javelin community?

Learn to hit the point. Whether or not you throw the Finnflier®, you’ve got to be confident and in the groove of flying the javelin at low, medium and high speeds. Mike has found the Finnflier®’s easy-to-read flight characteristics helpful to learn flight.
Throw so it doesn’t strain anything. This allows you to pile up the reps and really get good at the action, along with building power exactly in the throwing action. Mike mentioned something he learned from reading about Men’s American Record Holder Breaux Greer’s training when he was working with Finnish coach Kari Ihaleinen – throw a lot. Mike varies the implements and runups in his sessions, from heavy ball throws standing up to full runs with light implements, but the daily totals can be 50+. He says his focus is on mechanics. Again, the Finnflier®’s light weight and high flexibility allow lower strain throwing.
Mike said he was trying to “flow through the throw” and be very aware of a target in the distance. These are classic, classic javelin concepts. It’s so good to hear these valid ideas getting put to such good use.
The big question: what does a 100m Finnflier® throw “translate” into for, say, an 800 gram javelin? No one knows. There’s only one data point! But at the shorter distances, we know more. I’ve observed at the 60m (200’) level, it seems to be about 20 – 25’. So if you throw a Finnflier® 225’ (68m), you’ll probably throw the 800 about 200’. For women throwers, I’m hearing a 50m 600g throwers can throw a Finnflier® about 55m. Results vary pretty widely. But I’m going to predict that Mike likely to have a big PR with the 800.

Thomas Rohler Phoenix Javelin Clinic 2018

December 10, 2018 By Atwood Duncan

With Olympic Champion Thomas Rohler and Javelin Great Raymond Hecht

What a great chance to hear and see these top javelin athletes show and tell about javelin. At least 60 athletes and 20 coaches were in attendance, soaking up tons of great info over a 3 day period in November of 2018.

Here’s a clip of Ray explaining what happens when you “go forward” (shoulders overtaking the hips) in the throw – essentially he boils it down to these points:

When you don’t make a strong effort with the right leg/hip, you will fall forward onto the left leg.
When you fall forward onto the left leg, the right arm (this is all for a right-handed thrower) will drop off of the javelin flight line. We call it dropping the arm, and it’s an effort to stay balanced.
With a “dropped arm”, the path of the hand dips as the throw is made. Ray makes the point that it takes more time to move your hand along a curved path to the release rather than driving the hand along a straight path.

So what to do about this? Falling off the right leg onto the left and going forward is one of the most common faults in javelin throwing, and it can’t be fixed by simply “trying not to do it”.

This is why it happens:

As the right foot lands, this thrower is in good position.

The right arm is high, the right knee is ahead of the right hip,

the body angle is about right, and the left leg and arm are reaching

out well. These features are seen in good throws.

The good trends mostly continue as the right arm stays back and

the left leg reaches out. But the right leg and hip aren’t actively

driving onto the block.

Here’s the problem: The right leg extends (instead of turning

onto the block leg) and she has to

drop her right arm for balance. It’s a

fall onto the left leg rather than a drive.

Now she’s badly forward and it has taken extra time to drive the

right arm from it’s low position to this higher position. She is also

very late in completing her torso turn – she’s nearly over her left

foot instead of turning well behind it. Since these pictures were

taken, this athlete has corrected these faults and gone on to

become a world class thrower.

Often the problem has to do with a big angle change at the end of the run up (The Pendulum Effect), or jumping up too high in the final crossover. But she looks good in both those points. This athlete’s issue is a lack of actively using the right hip to get the left down sooner and “catch” the throw earlier.

But many throwers land off balance after the final crossover. The right foot is usually too far behind the Center of Gravity (CG) and the athlete gets driven forward before they can do anything about it. The solution is to experiment with where to put the right food down. The ideal spot depends on the runway speed – slow speed, the foot is only a few inches ahead of the CG. But was the speed increases, the right foot needs to land farther ahead to ensure there’s no”fall” onto the left foot.

This is good right foot placement for the speed of her approach.

This thrower has a similar non-block leg placement ahead of his CG.

The problem is that he’s running twice as fast! Consequently he

pitches forward under the throw.

The Takeaway: Do your run up so that you can drive your hip onto your block without getting driven forward, as we see Thomas Rohler doing here. He turns from sideways to forward-facing well behind his left foot. This is what Ray is explaining in this clip.

Of course there was tons more great information, funny stories, and good moments in this clinic, far too much to include in one article. But this one point can be quite helpful for most throwers.

Javelin Comparison

September 21, 2018 By Atwood Duncan

Video comparison of throwing styles.

A Chat With Jan Zelezny

September 19, 2018 By Atwood Duncan

First Installment

My long time friend Dr. Rich Ulm contacted me the other day to report on a very cool conversation he just had with the King of Javelin, Jan Zelezny of the Czech Republic.

Jan’s incredible career spanned three decades and has left him in possession of three Olympic Gold Medals, one Olympic Silver Medal, and an amazing World Record that holds to this day. Easily the best javelin thrower ever.

That’s Rich on the left, Jan on the right. A lovely day in Prague.

Rich was a successful hammer thrower, was a college coach and is now a chiropractor/super trainer. He was giving a lecture in Prague (yes, he’s that smart) and managed to get 45 minutes with Mr. Z. Rich and I met at the Ironwood Throws Camp over 10 years ago and have stayed in touch, sharing perspectives and information on throwing and training. And a few jokes..

As Rich filled me in on this unique meeting, he was abuzz with the thrill of hearing the remarkable insights and ideas of this true champion and artist of the event. Here are a few takeaways:

1. Resting Before Competitions

If he was feeling clear in his concepts (“I know how to throw..”), Zelezny would take as many as TEN (10) days OFF of javelin throwing before competitions. Ten (10)!!! Now, he wold do other things, including running, runup work and medicine ball throwing, but NO JAVELIN THROWING. This is very unusual!! In 45 years of doing the javelin, I’ve never heard of so much time off. Five days is the most I’ve heard of. Jan said he did this before the Olympic Games as well as other important meets. He said he needed to feel his best to throw his best. Makes sense to me.

2. Weightlifting

“Important, but not more important than the other training”. He said that moving with the bar was “too limited” to have dominance over the other types of training like ball throwing and getting the runup just right. I’ve also heard of this by way of US Olympic Team Throws Coach and former American Record Holder Tom Pukstys, who told me his sampling of the top coaches in the world agreed – in fact the consensus was it was hard but necessary to keep the top throwers OUT of the weight room. They trained hard, and trained to high levels of strength, but in modalities other than weights.

3. Short Runups in Practice Only

This idea is a perfect example of how you can’t always blindly follow what the top people do. I’ve seen college and open throwers adopt this idea, with – disastrous results!

Zelezny said he used 9 and 7 step approaches only. Well, that’s not really all that short, and his ability to accelerate was, in a word, “unusual”, as in really amazing and impressive. His best 200m time is 21.7. Not really ANY javelin throwers in the US within a second and a half of that, in my guess. So Jan’s speed at the end of 9 steps was likely high enough to have enough momentum for the throw, whereas ordinary mortals might not be able to accelerate enough to reach 6-7m/sec for a good throw.

So be careful with this one. The problems throwers encounter with short runs only in training is that they are untrained at controlling the speed achieved with the full run. They can also get the idea that all the runup is for is setting up to throw hard. This is not good. It can be a problem that many athletes confuse full runup with full SPEED runup and full EFFORT of the throw. It’s good to train the ability to do a COMPLETE runup and a relaxed, easy throw. It’s part of making sure your steps come out right.

Ok that’s the first chapter of this cool story. More to come next time.

Impressions of the 3rd World Javelin Conference, Kuortane, Finland, November 2014

August 24, 2018 By Atwood Duncan

Impressions of the 3rd World Javelin Conference, Kuortane, Finland, by Duncan AtwooA series of fortunate events this year made possible for me a terrific opportunity – to be a speaker at this wonderful conference in the heart of javelin country. I’d heard about the other World Javelin Conferences and dearly wanted to go, but like so many, it was out of my budget.

But I was invited to speak at a weekend clinic in England just before the Finnish conference, so it made sense to piggyback the two trips. I felt very lucky indeed.

The conference took place at the Finnish Olympic Training Center in Kuortane (QUAR-ton-hey) Finland, about 3 hours by fast train north of Helsinki. It’s a somewhat rural setting with perhaps two dozen buildings ranging from huge indoor track/sporthall setups to smaller, specialized buildings for things like spa-type therapy. In the hydrotherapy building, they have a cold-dip pool. It’s cold – the water is about 40 degrees. Makes you tough.

Most of the presentations were made in a very nice, modern lecture hall, with seating for perhaps 100+. This was attached to the Sport Hotel complex, so for me, it was a 3-minute walk from my beautiful room to the lecture hall.

The organization was perfectly fine, with the organizers working tirelessly but always seeming to be relaxed and approachable for any questions that might come up. They were as accommodating as you could ever hope for.

As the time came for the first speaker, the distinguished Dr. Frank Lehmann of Germany, I got to get my first look at the conference attendees. A big group of javelin enthusiasts! Many nationalities and experience levels were represented. Many coaches had been sent to the conference by their home sport federation, but more than a few paid their own fares. Some very dedicated people, to be sure.

The conference language was English, which meant it was time to be impressed again with Europeans and their amazing language skills. Dr. Lehmann began by apologizing for his English, which was excellent, but he said it wasn’t so good because it was his 3rd language, after German and Russian. He was able to express complex ideas in English about javelin that are hard for native
English speakers. Quite impressive.

Much of his presentation (the first of two) included technical discussions of javelin biomechanics. What they measure, how they measure, and what it all means were discussed in enough detail to tell the story but not so much that it bogged down. He talked fast to get it all in.

He was meticulously prepared and had tons of information. For such complicated subjects as this, you have to study the printed summary of his presentation. I’ve worked in the biomechanics world, and it was part of my undergraduate degree, but he lost me a few times… nonetheless, of course it’s interesting and valuable to see what’s being studied and what’s being left out.

My presentation on Javelin Flight was next. It was focussed on methods to help throwers learn how to make accurate flights with javelins and so avoid the trap of working hard to generate a lot of power only to give away meters to the competition by having an inefficient flight. After Dr. Lehmann’s talk, I felt like mine was a little on the light side, but feedback I got afterwards included comments that the audience appreciated the practical aspects of learning good flights.
It was great to have my talk out of the way so I could just soak in everything else.

The other presentations included:
Medical Aspects of Training for Javelin – Dr. Ilkka Tulikoura, surgeon to the top throwers in Finland. He presented a discussion of the various medical issues for throwers. Lots of stories of big injuries and how they recovered. All the top throwers love this guy for saving their careers. There was a big show of appreciation from some of Finland’s javelin “royalty”.

Technical and Training Discussion with World Champion Aki Parvianen. Aki doesn’t speak so much English, so his points were translated, but we still got a look into how he trains his European Champion, Anntti Ruuskanen. I noticed that not everything seemed to match – it seemed that Aki was saying one thing but the films show Ruuskanen doing something else. Maybe it was lost in the translation, maybe it doesn’t matter, maybe…

Technical Demonstration. We all walked down to the indoor track, to the javelin area at the end of the second turn. Aki explained (via translator) various technique points while the demonstrator athletes were warming up. I observed the athletes, well off to the side of the main area, undergoing a very complete and impressive series of upper body and torso stretches before throwing, like we used to do back when I was throwing in the 70’s and 80’s. Surprisingly, no mention was made of this.

My guess is that it’s assumed by the Finns that everyone knows how to do this, like tying one’s shoes. But there is a trend now, at least in the US, to do only a dynamic warmup and no stretching before throwing. My opinion is that the studies that say stretching is detrimental to performance are missing it when it comes to the big ranges of motion needed for javelin, and that eventually there will be a return to attaining that range (we used to call it “stretching out”), like the Finns do, before throwing as part of a javelin warmup.

The audience was diligently videotaping nearly everything, including each other videotaping each other. Lots and lots of posing for pictures, lots of postings to all kinds of social media, lots of discussions about those postings. One of the best aspects of this conference was how small groups of coaches and athletes would form to discuss some part of what we just saw, with lots of arms making throwing motions and sideways twisting to be seen everywhere. Javelin people doing their thing. I enjoyed wandering around trying to eavesdrop on what was being said. But many of the groups were conducting their discussions in their native languages, probably trying to sort out what they’d just heard.

That was it for the first day. An hour later at dinner, groups of coaches would hang together, and a few were alone. By the second evening, there was more mixing and it seemed that the camaraderie
was first class.

The next day, superstar Dr. Lehmann went over how all this measuring they do actually gets worked into the system of coaching they have in Germany. I was surprised to learn that, just like in the US, there are coaches who don’t like being told what to do by the biomechanists! But mostly, their system involves the athletes and scientists getting together to see how the progress (if any) is going. Dr. Lehmann said there is a big problem in Germany with injuries among top javelin throwers – something like 6 of the top 10 have significant problems. His conclusions included the need to keep injury avoidance as a top priority.

A few of the coaches there remarked that this information was interesting but it couldn’t help them much because they had no sport institutes with dedicated throwing biomechanists measuring trends in the training of their throwers. For example, in France, they have a sport institute with biomechanists, but all the work is dedicated to the pole vaulters because the French lead the world in that event. In the US, lots of work is done with the sprinters. In the end, it seems to be a question of resources.

The next presentation was on…hammer throwing! Interesting, well presented, and possibly useful to some of the coaches there, but I thought it was an odd inclusion to the program. We watched some good demonstrations and heard a fine commentary and perspective by Olli-Pekka Karjalainen, Finland’s top hammer thrower for many years.

We then walked to the Gymnastics hall for a fantastic demonstration of gymnastics for javelin. The demonstrators included 87m thrower Teemu Wirkkila. He and an 84m+ guy, guided by a former top Finnish female gymnast, put on quite a show of floor exercises and apparatus moves that showed top-level skills and strengths. Everyone thought this was a highlight of the conference – useful, well-thought-out exercises that could be adapted to athletes of many levels. The only hitch was that not many fully-equipped gyms are available, which is why the excellent floor routine was so useful – it can be done on any reasonably soft surface.

Back to the lecture hall for a statistical analysis of the history of javelin results from major competitions around the world. Interesting patterns were revealed, such as nearly all the medallists in the Olympic Games were in the top 10 in the world the year before, and of course, it was
pointed out how the Finns have done very well internationally.

Our last presentation told the story of Julius Yego, the amazing Kenyan who taught himself to throw using YouTube in Kenya, where javelin throwing is very poorly supported by their national federation. Julius achieved an incredible 4th place finish at the 2013 World Championships in Moscow. I saw pictures of Julius in the year before finally meeting him, and thought he was a much bigger guy than he really is. This makes his achievements even more impressive. He’s also a very kind and thoughtful person – a pleasure to be around. He stood to have his picture taken with different coaches many, many times.

The conference wrapped up with the 1988 Olympic Gold Medallist Tapio Korjus leading a discussion about improving the globalization of javelin throwing. This meant sharing information, organizing training opportunities, and trying to find ways to get young athletes interested in the event. Like some of the other discussions, the big stumbling block was resources, but it got everyone thinking about ways to improve the javelin around the world.

If you love javelin, and want to be surrounded by other who feel the same way, this is a unique chance to immerse yourself in a very cool section of the global javelin family. Even the topmost performers and coaches are very approachable and willing to discuss everything javelin. And there was great wisdom to be gotten by simply listening to discussions of the average attendees going over the information of the day. The organizers did a first-class job, the facilities were as good as they can get, and I came away from Kourtane recharged about javelin in a way I wasn’t expecting. Highly recommended.