Doing Correct Hand Offs in the 4 x 400m Relay

"LOUIS YOUNG: Hi. This is Louis Young on behalf of Expert Village, and I'm going to briefly describe some of the relay hand-offs and some of the differences. This one is the half-blind hand-off, where you're still be coming in. This is better for a faster finisher in the mile relay, where you come in. He takes three steps without looking then reaches back. The reason he's not looking is he can efficiently accelerate to a faster speed and then receive the baton. And this final hand-off is the completely blind hand-off which you're going to see predominantly in a 4 x 100. He's going to go without looking for it and then reaches back when I say "stick" and gets the baton. And then we're going to keep the baton moving at full speed because the actual time is not the time of the runner but the time that the baton crosses. So you want to keep it coming at full speed all the way around the track."