Alain Blondel was the personal coach of Heike Drechsler, the third farthest female long jumper of all time, from 1997 through her Olympic title in 2000. This Olympic gold made Heike the first and only woman to have two Olympic long jump victories to her name in addition to her two World Championship titles in the same event. Alain also enjoyed a solid athletic career which culminated in his victory at the 1994 European Championships in the decathlon, a competition at which he set his personal best of 8453 points. Alain’s ties to the sport run even deeper as he is currently the meet director of an IAAF permit indoor competition, the BW-Bank Meeting in Karlsruhe, Germany.

This interview has two themes, with the first focusing on Alain’s training as a decathlete and the second discussing Heike’s training. Trained by his father, Alain gives examples of the various types of technical and speed workouts that worked for him, and talks about how important the recovery to training ratio is for combined events athletes. He talks about the realization of quality versus quantity in training and how this led to better results later in his career. Alain then breaks down the training that led Heike to an Olympic gold in 2000. Stemming from his experiences as an athlete, he stresses the how significant high quality training versus the attainment of specified volumes was to Heike’s success. He also discusses the changes that they made in Heike’s mental approach to training and competitions, and how progress in this area led to better consistency.

This interview can be accessed via our Media On Demand feature.