Abstract

Former women's 400m hurdles record holder, Marina Stepanova, is the first athlete to break the 53-second barrier for the event. Stepanova is also regarded as the world's oldest female record holder, her record breaking performance coming at the age of 36 years and 139 days. In this text she sums up her training and racing experiences in what she considers to be a rather complicated but challenging event. The article shows that the road to reach elite performances and records in the female 400m hurdles required in her case 15 years. Half of this was made up from general track and field training in many combinations, allround development of strength, speed and endurance, and establishment of basic hurdling technique. The remaining 7 to 8 years were required for specific work, indicating that best performances are achieved on an average at 27 to 29 years of age and occasionally even later. Early specialisation, where the development of running technique and forced anaerobic processes conflict with the basic improvement of speed, strength, general endurance, mobility and rhythm, have so far failed to produce success in the ranks of senior competitions. Verf.-Referat