Marco Airale is an Italian sprint coach who runs Team Air, works for Nike Track, has coached sub-10 men and sub-11 women across Europe, the US, and China.
In this presentation, he walked through how he uses 1080 across the main pieces of his programming: assisted vs overspeed work, resisted drills for return to sprint, and resisted sprinting for max acceleration.
👉 Watch the full webinar here 👈
Assisted vs Overspeed: The 103% Line
Marco draws a clear line between assisted and overspeed at 103% of an athlete's max velocity.
-Up to 103%, that's what he considers assisted work. Stride frequency goes up, rhythm improves, and the athlete gets exposed to high speed without breaking mechanics.
-Past 103%, it becomes overspeed. It's a more powerful CNS tool, but one that requires more of the athlete's mechanics.
"More speed isn't always better speed."
Both have a place, but they have different value in training. Assisted is about exposing the athlete to high speed inside good mechanics. Overspeed is about forcing a CNS adaptation when an athlete is stuck at a velocity ceiling, like a sprinter plateaued at an 0.88 split who needs 0.83 to run sub-10. But both require good mechanics and being part of a complete training plan.
103% is where Marco sets his threshold. That's a great place to start as you develop your own philosophy for overspeed work.
Programming Assisted Sprinting
Marco's setup with elite sprinters is very intentional:
-Max 4 assisted sessions per season, roughly one every 10 days
-Stops 4 weeks before the main event
-Velocity increase: 1-3% above max velocity
-Distances per rep: 20-60m, sometimes up to 80m
-Total volume: low, he gave an example of a full session that totaled 180m of assisted sprinting
-Full recovery between reps, quality over quantity
However, it's worth naming the context here: Marco is programming for elite world- and Olympic-level sprinters in peak prep. That's why the volume is low, the frequency is spaced out, and the timing so precise. For younger athletes, those in team sport, or non-peak training blocks, those variables could look very different. Although the principles are the same, the specifics reflect the context.
Here's our assisted sprinting how-to and best practices guide 👉 here.
Braking Forces: The Assisted Sweet Spot
One of the metrics the 1080 measures is force, and during assisted sprinting this means how hard the machine is working to pull the athlete. We can use this as a pseudo-metric for how much braking force the athlete is creating.
-Lower number means the athlete is running the speed mostly by themselves
-Higher number means the athlete is being dragged instead of running
That's the sweet spot for assisted work: pulling enough to challenge the athlete into higher speeds, not so much that it stops being running.
Marco's rule of thumb: keep average forces under 40-45 Newtons
-However, it's worth noting that the Newtons are also relative to how much load you're using, more assistance means more pulling force. So the threshold is relative to the setup, not an absolute number. It's a useful reference point, but not a single number to chase.
Braking force is one piece of the puzzle alongside video analysis, athlete feedback, split times, and your coaching eye. All those things combine to help guide your coaching decisions.
Return to Sprint: Why Load Matters
This is where the case for resisted work shifts from "develop force" to "control velocity so you can introduce sprint-specific shapes safely."
"The 1080 can help us slow down a lot of action. We can get the athlete very soon into doing an activity that's way more similar to the one we need at high-level sprinting."
His core drill progression: A-walk, back walk, lateral walk, dribbling/ankling, and straight-leg run. Loads start higher (which makes the athlete slower) around 15kg and progress down over time with distances in the 10-30m range.
And one thing worth noting: these drills aren't only for rehab. They have a place in preseason, recovery sessions, and technical work.
Max Acceleration: Velocity Decrement Over Percent Bodyweight
Marco organizes resisted sprint loading by velocity decrement rather than by percentage of bodyweight:
-10–20% velocity decrement: technical, velocity-oriented. Much lighter loads needed than you might think to achieve this
-20–40% velocity decrement: balanced force-velocity. This is the most common range
-40–60% velocity decrement: force-dominant. Marco doesn't use this with elite sprinters
Although Marco starts his program by percent bodyweight, he both makes adjustments live as he's watching his athletes and analyzes post-session what velocity decrements were actually achieved.
"Even when we use roughly 10–12% body weight in a resisted sprint, the decrease in velocity is actually way higher than what we think." Which is why it's important to always double-check.
Coaches can also build this into prescription through load-velocity profiling (learn more) for more precise velocity decrements (learn more).
Conclusion
The common theme throughout Marco's presentation, whether it was assisted or resisted, is intentionally using load to create the challenge and mechanics we want. And although load is what is programmed on the 1080 Sprint 2, it's the velocity add (ex. 103%) or velocity decrement (ex. 40%) that ultimately matters.
Assistance exposes athletes to higher speeds and challenges mechanics. Resistance creates both forces and shapes specific to that part of the acceleration (heavier for earlier, lighter for later).
The point is to apply the right stimulus, to create the right velocity, at the right time. Not by assuming it's happening, but by confirming it.
👉 Watch the full webinar here 👈
Published: June 4, 2026