Pay Attention to Your Rest Periods

Rest periods between sets would be one of the most neglected aspects of training and program design. The whole training affect can be changed depending on how long you rest, so I think it is an important part of training that you should pay more attention to. The length of the rest period affects the recovery between sets and the hormonal responses to a training session.

The basic principle is, lower the reps and the higher the load, the longer the rest. Higher reps and lighter load, you need less rest.

In general, when training for maximal strength (1-5 reps at 85% or more) longer rest periods are warranted to allow time for the central nervous system to recover. Typically, larger muscle mass is being used in strength phases and the exercises tend to require more coordination such as when performing cleans or snatches. Two to four minutes is the general recommendation but there are many factors that can influence this as well. The strength of the athlete being one. For example, I have heard of world class powerlifters and strongman competitors resting a minimum of 8 minutes between sets, and some recommend even more. For most of us 2-4 minutes will be fine. This should allow enough time to prevent fatigue and allow you to perform repeated efforts at a high intensity. You should get stronger each set (up to a point) when training for maximal strength. If you aren’t experiencing this in your sessions, maybe your rest period is too short. On the other hand, if you are waiting too long, you may not see the benefits either as the post-tetanic facilitation effect might be lost, basically your nervous system may calm down too much before performing the next set.

For hypertrophy and body composition, the rest periods are shorter. You are looking to create more metabolic demands with this type of training, compared to strength training where a large emphasis is on the nervous system. Shorter rest periods, when using multi-joint movements, will also create more lactic acid, which has been said to increase growth hormone. This will lead to more fat loss over time. Kraemer and his colleagues determined that the highest growth hormone, beta-endorphin, and cortisol concentrations were observed when 10RM multiple sets (3 sets) of exercises were performed separated by a short (1-minute) rest. Testosterone was responsive to both higher intensities (5RM with 3 min rest) and also lower intensities with a shorter rest (10RM with 1 min rest).

There are many factors at play but the takeaway is to pay attention to your rest periods and match them to your goal.

When training for pure speed or power, then full recovery should be allowed between sets. This type of training is about quality, not quantity. Often, these sessions turn into speed endurance type workouts simply because there isn't enough rest given between sets.

Another problem area I see is with hypertrophy and body comp training. If you rest too long, results will be minimized. As the workout starts to get hard, people want to extend their rest periods more and more. It is important to stick to them to get the training response you are after. Resting too long in this case will change the adaptations that will take place.

Strength training isn’t impacted as much because you have more leeway and most people rest too long as it is.

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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Sprint Training Tips

Originally posted on www.totalhealthperformance.com.au 

Sprint training isn’t something I spend a lot of time on with my athletes. I spend more time in the gym correcting imbalances and getting the athletes strong. I feel this is the biggest bang for your buck when time is restricted as they get a lot of speed and agility work from the demands of their sport anyway. Their biggest limiting factor tends to be imbalances and lack of strength. If I were to perform more sprint sessions with my athletes then these are some general guidelines I follow.

When training for pure speed, it is important to focus on the quality of movements performed during the session and not just the quantity. You will see sessions performed where guys are just going through the motions with no attention to the details of each drill. This is pointless and you are just accumulating fatigue. You want to make sure each rep of each set is perfect. Training is about trying to ingrain the correct movement pattern into the brain so that when it comes time to compete and when you are under fatigue those are the movements you naturally resort to. If you perform them sloppy at each session then when you are under fatigue, how do you expect to maintain technique and speed?

Another thing to consider is how often you perform full speed or near full speed sprints and the distances you should cover. Personally for most field athletes I would keep the distances relatively short, working mostly on starts and maintaining speed over 30 to 60m max. If they are fast in the first few steps then they can beat defenders and accelerate away from them and if they can maintain that speed for 30 to 60m then generally they finish off and score points.

After each sprint session you must focus on complete recovery. The central nervous system (CNS) is heavily taxed when performing all out efforts so to keep the quality you must recover not only between drills and sprints but also between sessions. You will learn much better when you are fresh and you will also feel it in your performance feeling a much better flow in your technique then if you done it fatigued. Speed work should only be done twice a week in my opinion with about 72 hours rest between sessions.

During a sprint workout you have to know when to call it a day. It is the same as in the gym. We call this the critical drop off point. When the quality begins to deteriorate it is time to stop the speed work and move on to something else or go home. As they say garbage work equals garbage results. More is not always better.

When sprinting, it is also important to try and stay relaxed. Personally I find this very difficult but you should try to keep the face and shoulders relaxed and maintain correct arm action. They are the biggest tips I think most people, especially athletes get wrong. Leg turnover is generally quite good but the arm action is tough to master and needs to be focused on a lot during your drills and tempo runs.

This is far from an exhaustive list of tips but hopefully it sparks some ideas on how you can best implement sprint sessions into your program if you desire to.