Breaux Greer Javelin Photo Sequence Analysis

This article was featured on the original ThrowFarther.com website and was contributed by Jeff Gorski.  It was originally published in 2000.    

Breaux Greer - Javelin Photo Sequence Analysis by Jeff Gorski 

This photo sequence is taken from a throw in excess of 79m by Breaux Greer at the 2000 Florida Relays on March 25th. On that day, Breaux walked 4 strides into a 5 step throwingpattern and had 2 throws over 79m that day. This throw represents a great improvement intechnical movements for Breaux, who set his career best of 79.98m at the 1996 OlympicTrials. He has always had an incredible throwing action from his chest/shoulder/arm and hedemonstrates it on this effort. Moving to Athens, Ga to train with Don Babbitt, the change inroutine has worked well for him. Don has developed some very solid improvements in Breaux'stechnique, the most obvious being how well he now holds his left shoulder during delivery. Healso uses his left leg to stabilize his hips and create a great elastic reflex in his chest and shoulder.

Fig 1 - 3 show him on his final right/left takeoff prior to his crossover and plant. Even off just 4strides he shows a very explosive final left ( Fig 4) along with an aggressive right leg, andshows good "waiting" for the right to land ( Fig 4-6 ); he doesn't place the foot down hard. Hisactive left takeoff has recovered his plant very quickly (Fig 6-8), and he maintains an excellentline with his shoulders and javelin as he plants the left leg from low and behind (Fig 9 - 12) asa result of a quick drop and roll of the right knee and foot. He passes over his right quickly andhis body weight is completely on his left as he begins the upper body strike on the javelin. Fig.8 - 13 show good use of the left shoulder anchor; his right side covers a great range as itdelivers the javelin while the left shoulder stays fixed over the left hip. More speed from alonger run up would make the hips shift from right leg to left as they rotate ahead of theshoulders ( Fig 10 - 12 ), the hips are very well anchored behind the left to provide a stablebase for the upper body to strike from (Fig 11 - 16 ), however, his throwing stride is a bit toolong. As a result his waist breaks a bit early (Fig 10) and it cost him a bit of abdominal stretchthat would have given ore power to the chest. During this delivery Breaux shows his incrediblethrowing shoulder- not many throwers on this planet can do what he shows here ! There is avery powerful follow thru after the delivery( Fig 15 - 18 ), an indication of an effort withouttension or fear and his ability to control himself in one stride after release ( Fig 18 - 22) show that most of the energy he generated went into the javelin.

Breaux has made some real strides in his throwing technique, and if he continues to improveas he has the last 3 months he will become a force to consider on the world scene sooner than we thought....way to go, Don and Breaux !! 

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Breaux Greer Javelin Photo Sequence Analysis - Continued

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