From the Forum - Tue Dec 12 19:54:50
2000<br><br>Upon landing of the plant leg, all athletes tend to be
facing the same way, whether they are considered
"wrappers" or not. Some are a little more closed off than
others, but there is not as drastic of a difference to
each thrower as there is as they come into their last
step or penultimate. I view the "wrap" Zelezny does as
more of the way he prepares as he goes into his throw.
He described it to me as a matter of rythem a few
years back. SK feels Zelezny gets the most rotation out
of his body in a throw,this is foe sure, but Jan is
also shown on three-dimensional analysis to be the
only thrower to have his center of gravity go in the
same direction as the throw. In the case of this
analysis, his throw went to the right side of the sector
and so did his momentum and center of mass. Seppo
Raty for instance, had a deviation in his mass
movement, and throw direction. What this shows is a sample
of the talent Jan has to be able to rotate a bit,
and get a lot of torque, but not breakdown his left,
and and split his momentum, and throw
direction.<br><br>Zelezny has one gift far superior than anyone else. He
holds his left leg hard, staright, stiff or whatever
you want to call it, better than anyone. His goal
then, should be only to create speed, and some length
of pull, so he gets alot of momentum. <br><br>With
the speed he carries, if he were to land "wrapped" as
described by everyone, he would torque against the grip of
his spikes and damage his body. He does come in to
the plant more "wrapped" or I would escribe it as
leading with the left, to keep his arm as far back as
possible which makes him "wrap" his javelin but he
maintains great linear drive throught the javelin itself.
His slight weight and body give him the ability to be
a little more "torqued" than the rest of the bunch.
This is whay he is the best. He does a lot of great
things. It just comes to him, and he enhances with great
hard work.<br><br>I worry about describing "wrapping"
because it is simply not defined properly by many coaches
in the United States. They don't consider the term
in Europe. The idea of our "wrap" to them revolves
around set-up, and position at landing. The variables
that dictate this is the ability to hold the plant,
the felxibility of the athlete, the talent in the
athlete which allows then to pull and strike the spear a
certain way, and back and waist health.<br><br>I have
tried all methods of delivery, and even made the
mistake of following Backley as a model too closely. I
found my natural strike in 1993, when I just went back
to throwing hard, and leading with my left hip
during the penultimate. The result of this was from a my
javelin tip pointed to the right sector line, but upon
landing I straighten out to my comfort level. My goal was
to lead and drive off of my penultimate, and I ended
up with a "wrap" according to most descriptions. I
don't prefer to label it that way. So it is not
something I would teach in those terms. I wouldn't say to
an athlete you should wrap because I don't believe
it describes fully the idea behind it.The idea is to
find your arm groove strength and follow other
variables and you may be one to become labled a "wrapper",
but the fact is you should be driving all momentum in
a linear fashion.