The Most Effective Drill You've Used to Build Drive Off the Rubber

[Traps71]

Setting general strength training, sprinting, and plyometrics to one side, what is the best pitching specific drill you have found to increase drive/explosiveness off the rubber? This is an area of focus for my DD in this offseason.

 

[Rick M]

Not exactly a drill, but DD made huge progress with a Queen of the Hill drive trainer. The physical feedback is great. She’s barely 5’3”, and her stride length is nearly 7 feet.


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[Jay Bolden]

Top 3 -
1. Split N Git
2. Skip In by @Doug Romrell
3. Jump Back, Split and Drive.
I've gotten more into Springy type drills to help most drive mechanics

 

[Mike-Coach Q]

Top 3 -
1. Split N Git
2. Skip In by @Doug Romrell
3. Jump Back, Split and Drive.
I've gotten more into Springy type drills to help most drive mechanics

I’m interested in learning these you posted, if video is available ?
We we’re working on driving with the right leg yesterday. Here is a clip. I have a longer version on my you tube . If she shifts her knees forward, she drives better with the right leg. Most of the kids I see , use the stride leg to pull around the drive leg.
This is a subject I’ve been working on for a while. I’m interested to see if it actually helps gain speed.

 

[ArmWhip]

Working on increasing drive is one of the last things I address because I find that doing it too early creates flaws. I have seen kids who have been taught sprinter's stance bend over too far and never get back to being stacked. I have also seen girls who leap up rather than out. Then there are those who push off aggressively but land poorly. I focus on good overall form first, then build on that.

 

[Mike-Coach Q]

Working on increasing drive is one of the last things I address because I find that doing it too early creates flaws. I have seen kids who have been taught sprinter's stance bend over too far and never get back to being stacked. I have also seen girls who leap up rather than out. Then there are those who push off aggressively but land poorly. I focus on good overall form first, then build on that.

Absolutely valid points and I’ve gone through some of those with Kayden and others I’ve taught along the way. Kayden definitely needs to improve her landing FSR and foot angle.

 

[Northball]

Walk-throughs with incrementally increasing distances. Their bodies can somewhat figure out on their own what to intensify to get the ball to go farther. Part of that is increasing the energy they put into the drive.

 

[Jay Bolden]

Working on increasing drive is one of the last things I address because I find that doing it too early creates flaws. I have seen kids who have been taught sprinter's stance bend over too far and never get back to being stacked. I have also seen girls who leap up rather than out. Then there are those who push off aggressively but land poorly. I focus on good overall form first, then build on that.

All valid! Teaching shin and spine angle will help them not get to bent over. It's a sprinters lean, not bend. Several visuals and drills can help that. One thing I like to do with them is a trust fall forward where they keep the body straight and let it fall until the stride leg comes out to save them. Then we add a little thrust. I video tape them, so they can see they are leaning and where the nose gets before the stride leg come out, and not bending over. Bending causes most of them to get stuck in their hips, and they won't fire. My cues, Nose over knee, Knee over toes. That should give you both a great shin angle and spin angle and this angles should be close to the same.

I’m interested in learning these you posted, if video is available ?
We we’re working on driving with the right leg yesterday. Here is a clip. I have a longer version on my you tube . If she shifts her knees forward, she drives better with the right leg. Most of the kids I see , use the stride leg to pull around the drive leg.
This is a subject I’ve been working on for a while. I’m interested to see if it actually helps gain speed.

If you look for @Doug Romrell on Facebook, he posts a ton of great information about drive mechanics! Doug is absolutely in tune with really efficient drive mechanics. He has posted his Skip In on there recently. The other two, let me see if I have any video of them. I make my kids, does those 3 for every warm up.

 

[Mike-Coach Q]

Walk-throughs with incrementally increasing distances. Their bodies can somewhat figure out on their own what to intensify to get the ball to go farther. Part of that is increasing the energy they put into the drive.

Along the line of walk- throughs

The first couple pitches are assessment pitches from our 1st lesson. Her speed seemed to have peaked and she asked if I could help with a more traditional stride and drive In hopes of gaining speed.