 Hey everybody what's up it's Eric Johnson from Airtate Throws Nation and today we are going to look at the number one women's discus throw in the world and what are three things that she does so well and makes her so dominant. So let's check it out. Okay guys so in today's video we are going to go through, we're going to kind of switch the pendulum a little bit and we're going to break down a more advanced technical throw and we're going to look at Valerie Ellman. Valerie Ellman is on fire, she's the Olympic gold medalist, she broke the American record the second of the year, what was that, 234, 571, 46, huge throw. She just did her first meet overseas and she just crushed it, claimed another W, a good performance and again we want to look at what are three things that I think she does super well. Now before we get into the video I do always try to make this disclaimer, one this is just my view and opinion, these are the things I look at. When I look at somebody who throws 234 feet I typically do not tend to see all the things that I think that they could do better, I tend to look at say what makes this so good and why is it 234 feet. Now this particular video is just a mirrored 220 something feet, so still a very, very good performance. So what makes her so dominant, what's making Val be in that position where she's just constantly crushing good throws. Now number one before we again totally dive in and again I will say that I'm always not trying to critique but bring more awareness to the sport in general and to these fantastic athletes and her coach Zebsian who's obviously done an amazing job, these two are like the dynamic duo and of course they have no affiliation with us, periodically people will ask or they use you know some you know people say that stuff. We do these opinion pieces and videos on all the throwers around the world and so clearly we aren't involved with all this because if you were you would hear about it all the time. So at any rate congrats to Val and her coach Zebs, their system is pretty awesome so from an outsider's perspective here's some of the things that I think are really awesome and one you know when we talk about our program and we just can't help but talking about throwing in terms of our six pillars right, again the six pillars are real simple we are looking at how do we break down the throw and teach the throw and then identify what every athlete needs so we just naturally look at the throw in this rate. Her setup is key and it's very consistent that's one of the huge things for any thrower and you look at elite level so she's in that status right she's in this just weekend week out year in year out she's just smashing huge throws and one of the things is she has a very nice consistent setup so when we see her set up here look at how long she creates this great stretch and you kind of see how everything is real centered this is something that we've talked about in our system for a long time and it's something that we teach beginning throwers and again as you get more advanced you know a thrower is going to be able to have and kind of add their own style and bigger range of motion but because they understand the mechanical positions so the first thing that I would say that she does so well is this setup if you look at the start again her pillar one she's going to be super consistent you're going to see that this throw and the throw before and the throw you know all of her meets this year the meets at the Olympics everything's consistent in that super critical so that you can get that super awesome rhythm now number two is we talk about here the position getting left is kind of the universal thing and throwing and that's our pillar to setting up maximum power how do we move around that axis and the thing that what you see with Val again is she really opens and here's the key she's using that left arm but you notice the chest doesn't open she's got the classic drag you know she's gonna get that sweep leg up and down wide and around really fast right and so you see how that left arm comes to a stop I think when we did the breakdown when she first went over 70 meters a couple years ago we talked about that and you can really see that she does this amazing job of decelerating the upper body and allowing the lower body to move the upper body this is something we teach at our camps this is something we teach inside of our system and it's a really tricky thing to feel how you kind of delay the upper body clearly they do this what it appears from my perspective right looking at it they go really big she's gonna go this real nice long she winds long she creates this little thing and now she can create this kind of like you know again inside our system we call it a cast we're gonna get that arm kind of cast it out long and then you see it stop and you see how that upper body so from her right shoulder to the elbow just kind of stays all together you see that disk is continuing to rise up to the high point and she just gets such a phenomenal high point so this would be the number two thing now there's so many good things and again we look at the throw it happens super fast right it vows level she's from the time that discuses back you know to the time she releases about 1.3 seconds so the whole thing's happening less than two seconds so the six pillars are helping you identify how to create positions so what are the three things that we like I said think she does so incredibly well the high point her high point and this extension and the vertical axis that she creates in the middle is just ridiculous like this this right here right is what throwers are trying to achieve you're trying to move across the ring and you have to move around that axis and look at how efficient it is look at her just move from start to finish so what she does is she gets that discus to the high point nice amazing counterbalance she's slowed down the upper body here and now you can see that she comes back out she gets that nice length from the balance arm to the discus and the discus is an incredibly high point she gets the foot down and she's just pulling it for days so that high point is so critical it's what helps keep the athlete on top and over the right leg and being able to turn around on it and that high point is like second and none I think her and Perkovich I think there's actually a ton of similarities between these two this is like clash of the Titans and I think that's inspiring me to come out with a almond Perkovich you know side by side to kind of look and I think that they actually have a lot of things in common and I would go so far as to say who wouldn't be influenced by Sandra Perkovich I would have to think any coach any coach who's coaching a female discus doors got a look at Perkovich and when you see this this is one thing that they do and I think vows discus is even slightly higher than Perkovich is which is pretty incredible okay so when you get here the thing that she does right she just pulls around now to me again it looks like she works on a focal point I think that's really tricky I talked about that in previous videos that can clearly work and it clearly works incredibly well for her but it's something that I think is a more advanced thing I don't I've seen too many athletes do focal points and developing athletes hold the focal points too long and they start to inhibit motion but so what what's the big thing you know she comes here she gets to that high point and this sets up the finish and she is just smashed so what's the third thing that I think she does super well she is down on the ground her finish is she comes off the right but she's moving in and this is a perfect example when people argue about should you be elevating at the finish or should you be you know going around this discus should be around the right hip is going to create the elevation and see she loses the ground but what she doesn't do is she doesn't lose the left foot right the left foot is smashed onto the ground this is what you'll see with all the best throwers in the world and you see that with with like stall daikers if you look at Goozdias right now Miklos Alekna is like blowing things up in the NCAA his foot's on the ground you're seeing that the information is out there this is critical you stay on the ground I see people trying to jump it doesn't work that way yeah so there are people who have been successful doing that here's a perfect example she's on the ground through the release and that is what just allows her to just smash the crap out of it and remember the discus the hip years ago I was fortunate enough to hang out evening with like Daniel Jizinski and Robert Harding and those in Robert talked about the acceleration factor of the hip all the way through the finish and that rotation elevation through and Val does that amazingly well and the fact that her block is on the ground that's the third thing clearly at this point that she does so frickin well and it's really awesome to see so like I said earlier big shout out to coach Sion and Valerie they are they've done an amazing job that chemistry of coach athlete gearing up doing everything at the right time and the consistency is just so fun to watch so when you look you of course want to pay attention to what are these little things that these guys do so well and that is like second to none I love her start it's super consistent she comes big great load and sprint delays that upper body amazing high point gets the foot down on the ground and it just stays down all the way through release and she just crushes it and she's so consistent you're seeing that and not to mention she's like a poster child for athletic physique and what throwers should look like lean strong fast powerful you know dynamic everything you would want to see an athlete and this is of course why she's the greatest American thrower ever she's an Olympic gold medalist and she's absolutely dominating and her first head-to-head this season with Perkovich she came out on top really good it's nice to see Perkovich throwing really well and that's going to be really exciting to see these guys in Eugene at the world championships so at any rate hopefully that kind of just this is just kind of some fun to look at all the things that she does super well there's so many things I think you could you know talk about and again I'm sure they're looking at this her and her coach right and they're saying well we can adjust this and we can just that because that's the nature of the sport but there's a lot of really good things and it would be I would love to hear from them at some point how they approach things and what they're doing and I know they did a conference over in Europe in the fall and that would have been really cool to see so any rate congrats them on a amazing start to 2022 congrats on the American record and for you guys watching hopefully these are just some things look at how consistent that start is that high point we talk about the orbit if you watch any of our stuff we talk about the orbit path and all that kind of stuff constantly her high point and orbit are amazing the radius is freaking off the charts and she's just nailing that finish right that block like stays on the ground and she just can crush it and you can see the discus is gone and the foot still on the ground it's it's really awesome to see the finish she just so that combo of a great setup super great balance and a monster finish those are the three things that I think make her absolutely incredible and clearly the performances are off the charts so congrats take care hopefully you guys like that now remember if you guys like information on how to learn the throw find out what you need in your throw check out our throwing chain reaction system links in the description and you guys do us a favor support the channel we really appreciate you watching give us a thumbs up hit that like subscribe all that good junk because that's how we are able to keep putting out content and we will see you guys on the next video take care