Introduce Plyometrics Slowly

Plyometrics are used regularly but are often misused. Coaches tend to implement them too early on in a training plan and at too large a volume.

Jumps and throws are good to do but you should monitor your volume closely to avoid injury and overtraining. I feel this applies more to jumps as many athletes are already running, cutting, and jumping, when training for their sport. Doing too many ground contacts in the gym on top of all this work can lead to problems such as shin splints. You will typically see this throughout the offseason/pre-season in rugby league.

You should also slowly increase the volume of plyometric work anytime you have had a break from them, even if you have still been training. I hadn’t programmed any jumps for myself for a length of time and in my previous program decided to re-introduce some jumps. My tibialis anterior were sore after the second session and the volume was low. I only did 4x8 of tuck jumps on day 1, and 4x8 broad jumps on day 2. So, my weekly volume was only 64 ground contacts. By week 2 and 3 of my plan, I was fine. The point of this, is that it doesn’t take a lot of work to cause muscle soreness initially, so you have to monitor the volume and increase it gradually. The following chart is a good starting point when considering how much volume to do:

(I can’t remember the source as I have had this a long time so I apologise for not giving credit or having the reference)

Some things to remember when trying to develop power:

• Quality is more important than quantity.

• Intent is key.

• In most cases, you should be fully (or near) recovered between sets.

3 Overlooked Factors in Power Development for Athletes

February 16, 2015

1 – The brains intent

Most people believe that the only way to increase power is to use light loads and high speed. This is not the case. It has been shown that it is actually the brain’s intent that determines the adaptation to high-speed lifting. So as long as you concentrate on accelerating the bar, no matter how fast the bar actually travels, you will get the same results as high speed lifting at a lighter load.

This is not to say that plyometric exercises such as depth jumps, box jumps, throws etc. don’t have a place in the development of power, they do, I just feel that most people over use these methods without having a solid base of maximal strength, or they tend to neglect the heavier work which in the long run holds back their development in speed.

When training athletes for power I like to keep the reps low (1-5) so that the high threshold motor units are recruited. If you use higher reps than this more slow twitch fibers are recruited even if you concentrate on accelerating the bar.

Purposely training at slow speeds can increase maximal strength levels but leads to less power output. I tend to use slow speed lifts in the early or general preparation phases of an athlete’s program and progress them to higher speed movements as competition becomes closer.

2 – Neglecting maximal strength work

It is important to remember that threshold levels of maximal strength are needed before a fast lift can be improved. I learnt this from Charles Poliquin. An example he uses is that if you want to power snatch 100kg, you won’t be able to do so until you can full squat between 184kg and 194kg. No amount of power snatches will get you to lift 100kg until you have reached the numbers on your full back squat.

This is why we test our athletes in the power snatch, power clean, front squat, and back squat, we use the data gained to determine the amount of time we devote to power or maximal strength development.

3 – Not resting long enough between sets

Rest periods are also an important factor when training for the development of power. When I watch athletes train for power their rest interval is generally far too short to recover between sets to be able to exert maximal force. The nervous system takes five to six times longer to recover than the muscular system. So although your muscles may not feel tired,you still need to take into account the recovery of your nervous system. This could be anywhere between 3-4 minutes, up to 5 minutes, to be able to repeat efforts at these high intensities.

So to develop power in athletes you can still use heavy loads that may travel at what seems to be a slow speed, as long as the athlete focuses on trying to accelerate the bar as fast as possible. Maximal strength levels play a very important role in how effective your power development can be. You need to be able to determine what your limiting factors are and where to orientate your training for 

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Need For Speed

Originally posted on Totalhealthperformance.com.au 

To increase speed you’ll see trainers have their athletes do ladder drills and run over hurdles. I believe this is a total waste of time. You would be much better off working with a strength coach who knows how to get athletes fast.

My athletes are always amazed at how much their speed improves when we don’t perform a single “speed” session on the field. We don’t have a sprint training program. All the work I do with them is in the gym.

Below are some of the things I work on with my athletes to increase speed.

FMS & Structural Balance

The way we go about increasing speed in our athletes is to first of all work on any structural imbalances. To do this we run the FMS and structural balance assessment which allows us to see where the athlete is weak, tight, what their strength deficit is, and much more, plus it allows us to orientate the training program to ensure optimal performance. Year round specialization tends to lead to muscle imbalances and in the general preparation period we work to correct these issues to decrease the risk of injury. If we find a weak VMO for example, we know that this can affect running mechanics, and can also lead to loss of force being applied into the ground, so by strengthening the VMO we can in turn increase running speed. For more information you can read the FMS and structural balance testing articles.

Relative Strength

You need to be strong to have a fast start. Being strong will help you overcome inertia.

One reason for the increase in running speed by getting stronger is that you will be able to apply more force into the ground; most people believe that you need to be able to swing the arms and legs faster. The fact is that while you sprint your muscles need to be able to support more than five times your body weight.

Another thing to consider is muscle mass. Generally, any increase in muscle mass will make an athlete faster. While many of my athletes want to put on muscle mass it is important that this added size is functional. By that I mean if they gain 5 kg on a hypertrophy style program but don’t gain any strength then the extra weight gained is pointless as it will not correlate with increased sports performance. On the other hand if you use the correct training methods that recruit the high-threshold fibers the gains in muscle mass will make an athlete faster because these fibers contribute to speed.

Another important point on muscle mass gains is that if you gain muscle mass too quickly, even if it’s with the right type of training, you could decrease performance at first. Due to the heavier bodyweight and change in mechanics your timing may be off and it can take some time to get used to this new found muscle. The way to go about increasing size optimally is to focus on hypertrophy methods early in the off season to have time to adapt to the changes in body structure or even better it is best to work on the increase in size earlier in the athlete’s career, focusing more on relative strength later on.  

Exercise Selection

With all my athletes I use full range of motion free weight exercises. Too often I see athletes focus on exercises such as the leg press and leg extension. These exercises do not carry over to the playing field as well as snatch grip deadlifts on a podium or full squats for example. Machine based work should only be used around 20 percent of the time.

I also like to use complex training, combining traditional exercises with plyometric exercises, rather than doing plyometrics as a stand-alone method. It has been shown that complex training is a great method to increase neuromuscular efficiency through a training effect called post-activation potentiation.

I do zero so called “functional training”. Balancing on a bosu ball and doing squats doesn’t recruit any more muscles than doing regular squats. The reason why stability exercises are a poorer choice is because you have to use less weight.

Decreasing Body Fat

With all of my clients I start by doing their BioPrint. This gives me an insight into their hormonal profile and allows me to design a tailored nutrition, lifestyle, and supplementation plan. For more information you can read this article on BioPrint.

When an athlete gets leaner they increase speed because they aren’t wasting energy carry around an extra 5kg of fat. Fat doesn’t contract and it doesn’t help you run fast. If you want to test this out try carrying 5kg and running a 40m sprint. Compare that to your normal sprint time and you’ll see a pretty big change in time.

This drop in weight isn’t a loss of muscle mass. In fact my athletes drop body fat while increasing their lean body mass. This is important because as we spoke about above, an increase in muscle mass is generally related to an increase in speed.

The advice given by most trainers and dietitians won’t cut it. Calorie restriction will lead to a loss of muscle mass and aerobic exercise which most trainers recommend to lose fat will train the slow twitch fibers and make the fast twitch fibers behave like slow twitch fibers, in turn decreasing speed.

There are many other ways to increase speed. These are just some of the things I do to help my athletes increase their speed and performance on the field. If you want to increase your speed, please feel free to come and train with me or get your program designed and put these methods to the test.