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Twenty years ago I did my first Seattle to Portland (STP) bike ride in one day. The event typically attracts 10,000 participants and covers a distance of 206 miles. Four of us finished in approximately 11 and a half hours. I felt a lot of pride by putting in my share of the workload. I didn’t just sit and draft behind the others.

After completing that ride, I took a long break from cycling to begin raising a family and start my own training facility in the Portland, Oregon area, Performance Training Center. About eight years ago I resumed endurance training: cross country skiing, running, hiking, and cycling. A big reason for getting back was my desire to train this type of athlete. What better way to learn than by using myself as a test subject? This led me to research how the top athletes in those disciplines trained and learn about the science driving how coaches planned long-term and short-term goals.

I discovered the first major point on training volume and intensity by studying the world’s best XC skiers. About 80% of their annual training volume (800+ hours) is at an intensity between 120-140 bpm, with higher intensity training making up the other 20%. This made perfect sense to me, as accumulating both high volume and higher intensity would have a negative impact on performance. With this new strategy in place, I set a personal long-term goal for the next four years: year 1 – 500 hours, year 2 – 550 hours, year 3 – 600 hours, and year 4 – 650 hours.

Initially, I used three different assessments to determine my progress. The first was daily measurement using the Omegawave system. Second was the Polar RSX-800 heart rate monitor with GPS, which enabled me to track speed, distance covered, average HR, and maximum HR over a variety of routes. The third measurement, which was subjective, was the rate of perceived exertion (RPE) during training, on a scale of 1-7 (1 being the easiest). During this period I had considerable success with a few key biomarkers: my resting heart rate dropped from 65 bpm to 45-50, my HRV scores improved, and so did my speed at anaerobic threshold in cycling, running, and XC skiing. I did all my training alone, with improving my biomarkers as my internal motivation. I did not compete in any races.

 

After the first four years, I repeated the same yearly volume as part of my education. At the beginning of this year, I got the itch to compete again to gauge my progress. I called one of the friends with whom I had ridden my first STP to ask if I could join his group. When he said “sure,” I knew I needed to have my training dialed in. I dropped running and XC skiing and focused just on cycling. In early March, I was introduced to a new (to me) product that changed the way I looked at assessing my training and caused me to move forward in an entirely new dimension.

Moxy Monitor

This product—which became my fourth method of assessment—is the Moxy Monitor. As the company’s website says, “Moxy provides real-time physiologic feedback. . . . It uses light from the near-infrared wavelength spectrum (light from about 670 to 810 nm) to measure oxygenation levels in muscle tissue. Human tissue has a low optical absorbance of near-infrared light, so the light can travel to reasonable depths in the muscle. The near-infrared wavelength range is particularly useful because hemoglobin and myoglobin change color in that range depending on whether or not they are carrying oxygen.”

When a colleague introduced me to Moxy, I wanted to learn more about how it could assist my training. Fortunately, the staff at Herriott Sports Performance, a bike shop in Seattle, had been using this technology for the past four years. I called co-owner David Richter to set up my first Moxy test, which consisted of riding my bike on a trainer. I had a Moxy unit attached to each quad. They relayed signals to a TV screen showing my live muscle oxygen saturation (Sm02) and hemoglobin levels. David also monitored my power output and heart rate. This assessment involved a series of steps that followed a pattern of four minutes of riding, followed by a one-minute break. After four or five steps, David identified the heart rate training and wattage zones on which my training protocols would be based. Here is the report he gave me:

You were limited by recruitment. If a muscle can’t utilize O2 any longer, the brain shuts down recruitment. You had available O2, but couldn’t use it. How do you use it? There’s a thing called the Dissociation Curve. It controls your bioavailability of O2. A rightward shift causes a decreased affinity for O2. This makes it difficult for hemoglobin to bind to O2. But it makes it easier for hemoglobin to release O2 bound to it. A leftward shift in the curve causes an increased affinity for O2. . . hemoglobin binds with O2 more easily. But it unloads more reluctantly. You need to move the curve to the right (to release O2). . . only when you’re near maximum effort. Then back to the left (to pick up O2).

Can you see the catch-22? It’s a shell game. It’s a game that is tough to control. It’s a game that is played by your brain, whether you like it, or not. But there are some things that you can do to take control of that curve temporarily. Breathing coordination is how you accomplish that. . . you can temporarily take charge of that curve by regulating CO2. An increase in CO2 results in a decrease in blood pH. But that’s where you play with fire. If you can’t get rid of that CO2, then you have a different problem.

Better breathing coordination will make you better. . . and help with recruitment.

Something else to be aware of, concerning breathing improvement, is that cyclists expend a lot of energy stabilizing their trunk to optimize power production. Breathing and core stabilization are in competition. Breathing costs. . . so, demand for breathing by increasing breath volume is more efficient than increasing the frequency. Breath training will be very useful for you. A great place to start is a POWERbreathe. I started with that in 1996 and have been using it since. Great tool. We should have them back in the Pro Shop this week.

Here are your zones:

• Active Recovery (AR) 0-119bpm/0-189watts
• Structural Endurance Intensity (STEI) 120-149bpm/190-259wattsFunctional Endurance Intensity (FEI) 150-175bpm/260-330watts
• High Intensity (HI) 176+bpm/340+watts

This assessment made me think about assessments, training, and the many other factors involved in planning training, intensity, volume, and recovery. I was very excited to get to work using my new training zones. I also scheduled another Moxy assessment for five weeks out to see how I was improving.

Bike Fit

During this first test David noticed that my bike position did not look right, so we scheduled a bike fit prior to my next appointment. David has been doing bike fitting for eight years and has worked with some of the world’s top professionals. The objective is putting you in the best possible position to work efficiently through a series of measurements, including saddle height, cleat position on the pedal, seat fore/aft position, reach to handlebars, width of handlebars, and stem height. David used lasers after each tweak was completed to make sure I was tracking in the proper line. Three things jumped out as areas with the biggest potential for performance improvement: saddle height (we raised it 1.5”), cleat position, and handlebar width and stem length.

Making Progress

During the next five weeks, I trained on average 14 hours per week, with 80% of the volume in the STEI zone (structural endurance intensity), 10% in the FEI zone (functional endurance intensity), and the balance in AR (active recovery). Here are the results David sent me of my second Moxy assessment after five weeks of training and my new bike setup:

• AR – 0-120bpm/0-220watts
• STEI – 121-140bpm/221-275watts
• FEI – 141-168bpm/280-350watts
• HI – 169+bpm/360+watts

The POWERbreathe training will change your game. . . but not as much as your new position did! I look forward to seeing you in a few more weeks, to see more progress.

Armed with my new zones and bike position, it was time to get back to work. I had another assessment scheduled for five weeks out. I kept the same percentages of work I had used in the previous training block in each training zone. I also kept volume per week at the same level. At this time, I was only using heart rate to keep me in my training zones as I did not have a power meter. I planned to purchase one on my next visit.

I returned to Seattle on May 8 for my final test before STP. I was feeling good about the training I had done over the past five weeks and felt like the improvements on this test would be very good. Here are the results Dave sent me from test #3:

• AR – 0-124bpm/0-225watts
• STEI – 125-152bpm/226-280watts
• FEI – 153-170bpm/280-350watts
• HI – 171+bpm/365+watts

A trend that I have identified is something we slightly touched on, a L/R difference. Your right leg is working harder (especially at lower workloads). My guess is that it’s more than a strength issue, a coordination issue, as well. So, I’d recommend some isolated leg strength training off the bike. . . or PowerCranks. Simple functional movements are all you need. . . single-legged exercises to help with the coordination. Pedaling millions of times helps, too!

Good job with the breathing, biggest improvements there. . . your smO2 dropped the lowest to date and tHb higher throughout this evaluation. . . built capillaries. . . a better delivery system. Keep cranking and talk with you soon.

These would be my training zones leading up to STP on July 11. For the next three weeks, I would work in the same % for the zones: 80% in the STEI, 10% in FEI, and 10% in AR.

#BloodDontLie

I have had blood work before, but it was always to test basic cholesterol, blood glucose, white blood cell, and so forthbasic health markers vs. anything performance-oriented. I spoke with Carl Valle, the head of innovation at InsideTracker, about getting myself tested and begin a N=1 experiment on my-self. Here is what InsideTracker is looking at, according to their website:

InsideTracker is a personalized health analytics company founded by leading scientists, physicians, nutritionists and exercise physiologists from MIT, Harvard and Tufts University. The InsideTracker platform tracks and analyzes key biochemical and physiological markers and applies sophisticated algorithms and large scientific databases to determine personalized optimal zones for each marker. InsideTracker’s expert system offers science-driven nutrition and lifestyle interventions that empower people to optimize their markers. When optimized, these marker levels have been scientifically proven to increase vitality, improve performance and extend life.

Our goal is to empower individuals with the essential information they need to manage and optimize their health. We believe that by providing a dynamic, personalized analytic platform at the intersection of biology, science and technology, then distilling the results into simple, natural, and sustainable nutrition and lifestyle recommendations to follow, we can help people live longer, healthier lives.

 

The beauty of the InsideTracker assessment is that it provides food, lifestyle, and training suggestions to assist you in bringing these elements into an optimal zone for you. The personalization is world-class. I signed up for the Ultimate panel, which looks at 30 biomarkers in addition to providing a bonus “inner age” score. I had the results quickly. The two markers needing immediate work were blood glucose and testosterone/free testosterone and their relationship with cortisol. Since this was a base-line test, I would continue to train as I had been.

Following the blood test, I began a concentrated loading phase in which I would perform seven training sessions in a four-week period in the FEI level at an HR of 152-171 bpm. I would perform an FEI session on Monday based on my readiness level according to my daily Omegawave assessment. These sessions consisted of 20-60 minutes of intervals (10-20 minutes of work followed by 5-10 minutes of easy riding). Then for the next 1-3 days I would do training sessions in the AR. When my Omegawave readiness was back to my baseline level, I would go out for another hard interval session. On some days, my muscles would be sore when I would go hard during the intervals, even though my readiness scores for my cardiac and central nervous systems were optimal . When this occurred, I would go home and not try to push it.

During this block, I used two performance markers to gauge my progress. The first was a 20-minute interval, in which I tracked distance, speed, and power output. The other was a hill climb. My 20-minute interval improved from 6.6 miles, 18.7 mph, and 287 watts to 7.7 miles, 21.7 mph, and 326 watts. My hill climb dropped from 10:06 to 8:59.

Sleep Monitoring

After my initial blood test through InsideTracker, Carl and I discussed sleep quality and monitoring because poor sleep can lead to lower testosterone levels. Following up on Carl’s suggestion, I purchased the Misfit Flash, a movement and sleep tracker. The first 30-45 days were strictly to begin collecting data and implement a few simple ideas to promote better sleep quality.

First, I turned off my phone, laptop, and iPad two hours prior to going to bed. Then I began sleeping with a blackout mask to keep out as much light as possible. It is very interesting to see how you truly sleep, if you are getting a good 7-9 hours, and how much restful sleep you get vs. being restless and waking a lot during the night.

 

Race Day Arrives

For several weeks before the race, average temperatures ranged between 85-95 degrees F, which in Oregon and Washington state is out of the ordinary. So wouldn’t you know it—on race day it decides to be overcast with a strong chance of rain! I rolled out as part of a group of eight riders at 4:45 AM. During the first part of the ride, everyone wants to go super-fast. As a veteran, I needed to remind the newbies that we had a long day ahead of us and that they should keep calm and not burn too much energy too soon. Twelve hours and change later I finished. Average moving speed was 18.9 mph. My energy throughout the ride was very good, and I handled the changes in tempo fairly well even though I had not ridden at those speeds for any distance over 100 miles in a long time.

 

As you can see, this was a very long-term progression that ended successfully with a respectable time. In terms of assessment and monitoring these days, the options seem to be endless. The key is being able to understand what you are tracking, getting a clear picture of what the data means, and recognizing how it equates to improved performance. This process takes time and having patience becomes a key component of long-term success.

I would like to thank a few people. First and foremost is my wife, Deb McLaughlin. Without her full support, love, encouragement, and putting up with my endless research, none of this would have been possible. To Carl Valle, for showing me another way to think about monitoring and how to take it a step further in how we relate it to improved performance. To Coach “Rio,” for introducing me to the Moxy Monitor, his keen insight regarding performance enhancement as it deals with endurance sports, and his expertise in assisting in my training. Finally to my editor Peter Ingleton, who made me an offer a few years back to assist me in my writing endeavors. I am extremely happy I took him up on that offer. He makes me sound like I know what I am writing about.

Since you’re here…
…we have a small favor to ask. More people are reading SimpliFaster than ever, and each week we bring you compelling content from coaches, sport scientists, and physiotherapists who are devoted to building better athletes. Please take a moment to share the articles on social media, engage the authors with questions and comments below, and link to articles when appropriate if you have a blog or participate on forums of related topics. — SF

 

I am one of the (increasing) many who say that “The Basics” must be in place first in order to optimize any training program. They work, they’ve always worked, and they will continue to work forever! I also know what I think are the basics—the fundamentals, the groundwork for future work, the basis from which all else grows.

However, even though I have lightly defined the term, someone could still say that I haven’t told you what exactly “the basics” means, and they would be 100% correct. While lots of folks mention that we should get back to the basics, it begs another question: If everyone says it’s time to get back to the basics—implying that many coaches are not using the basics—then why are we not getting back to the basics?

Perhaps because there is no general, agreed-on consensus as to what the basics are. It could very well mean that the basics have several definitions and that all those definitions are correct. Maybe. So why not use Merriam-Webster to get the true definition of “the basics”?

Definition of basic:

1. a: of, relating to, or forming the base or essence: fundamental. basic truths
   b: concerned with fundamental scientific principles: not applied. basic research
2. a: constituting or serving as the basis or starting point. a basic set of tools

There is no question that we all understand the meaning of “basic.” The question is whether we understand the meaning as it relates to training and building performance models based on a yearly plan of periodization. Here’s my perspective of what this means in my philosophy; perhaps it will ring true to some of you reading this.

The Reason I Say, ‘Get Back to the Basics’

Generally, I say this because I watch coaches hasten the training process—too much, too soon; too complex, too soon; skipping steps towards the best performances. A few examples are younger, less-experienced athletes performing complex lifts, lift variations, or multi-response single leg plyometrics and skilled athletes of any age performing advanced training based on their sport skill level.

It’s not exclusive to training, either. The use of athlete tracking systems when other aspects of the program are weak or absent (sports nutrition, training compliance, sport coach strength and conditioning buy-in) ignores the fundamentals of development. I know of one organization willing to fund an annual six-figure commitment to the purchase of tracking equipment before committing to a full-time sport nutritionist. To me, that’s skipping necessary steps and improperly forming the basis for the best possible future results.

I think this quote I picked up years ago sums it up nicely:

“We need to realize that building a system to reduce risk needs to start with the basics and build vertically step by step, instead of taking the express elevator to the top and finding the foundation crumbling beneath us!”–Carl Valle, Boston Sports Medicine and Performance Group, LLC Blog, 1/8/14

The gist of this is easy to understand. Sure, beginning with the basics ensures risk reduction when it comes to injury, but it also ensures physical performance improvement. The crumbling foundation could mean injury but also less-than-best performances camouflaged as “good” performances.

Starting with the basics ensures injury risk reduction as well as physical performance improvement, says @Coach_Alejo. Share on X

From my vantage point, identifying a lack of the basics is mainly part physiology and part common sense. When Kyle Kennedy of Razor’s Edge Performance in Canada tweeted, “I’m not against “mastering the basics”, but there’s no consensus on what that means,” my first reaction was that of course everyone knows what the basics are. Only when I started writing about it did I see he was right. I couldn’t put the damn thing in a finite box; ergo, no consensus. Although science, and what it looks and smells like, helps identify the basics, there are a bunch of layers to this. My only weapon against this is to start the dialogue with my examples and the rest is up to, as they say in the South, y’all!

Real-World Examples: Skipping the Basics

The following are three real examples that I see where coaches skip the basics and ignore science. I point out what they’re doing wrong, and why.

Get back to the basics! – Young or physically underdeveloped baseball athletes swinging a bat connected to resistance cables, with full or partial swings.

Here’s why – First of all, this type of “sports-specific” training has never proved helpful. If I’m wrong, please contact me and persuade me with the volumes of anecdotal or scientific information; a topic for another day. I’d say the more important questions is: Does the player have a good swing to begin with? My initial thought isn’t a strength and conditioning question or even science-related. So, even if this drill strengthens the movement—and it doesn’t—it won’t matter anyway if the player doesn’t have good swing mechanics.

The basics of strengthening a good swing would be to have a good swing! Second, the operative words are that the athlete is “young or physically underdeveloped.” There has been some research by David Szymanski suggesting that total body strengthening is just as good as “baseball-specific” training (additional forearm exercises) for high school baseball players for creating bat head velocity.^1,2,3

Three 12-week studies from three different states and three different years indicated that full body exercises were just as good as total body exercises with supplemental forearm training. And, by the way, the groups that did no forearm training still increased grip strength, showing that gripping barbells and dumbbells while training is beneficial in young athletes. There’s nothing shocking here, as any sport biomechanist would tell you that the entire body swings the bat and throws the ball—it is a chain of events.

All this means that the basics for strengthening a swing are to perform a total body strengthening program, and improve and acquire a good swing through batting practice while the weight training program contributes strength to the swing over time. After acquiring a standardized level of strength AND swing mechanics in the trained population, the athlete might begin to use heavier or lighter bats that are weighted enough that the swing is not altered. Research has suggested a weight only a few ounces more or less than the game bat. Additionally, total body power exercises can begin at this time: squat jumps, high pulls, and single response-body weight plyometrics.

Get back to the basics! – Sloppily pulled or pushed weighted sleds.

Here’s why – No coach wants to practice poor technique, so why have sloppy anything? That’s basics, isn’t it? Poor technique leads only to one question: Are you coaching what you are seeing?

If the technique you are looking at is not what you want, a) Don’t post it as a video, and b) Make sure the athlete can perform the exercise correctly. In this case, can the athlete push/pull an unweighted sled? I know it sounds silly, but it’s common sense. If the athlete can perform a push/pull without weight then weight is the problem.

I do the same with weighted lifting exercises. Sometimes the weight (light or heavy) dictates the technique even during technical acquisition. Pulls from the ground are the perfect example. Occasionally, during the beginning stages, coaches might add a little more weight than the athlete can handle; their legs straighten at the moment of separation, they don’t pull the bar high enough during the second pull. That’s the time when you go back to the bar and check whether they can perform the movement unloaded. If they can, the weight is the problem and the correct loads are somewhere between the bar and the bad-technique weight. If they can’t, start at the beginning.

If the athlete is not that much better at sled-only load, then there are plenty of places to look: lower body strength; core strength; functional movement screen assessments; overall running technique (in particular, starting technique); and 10m runs. Sled push/pulls have been shown to improve starting and running speed. However, performing them incorrectly allows for little or no benefit and it could result in an acute or chronic injury. Master the basics before getting to the sled—get strong and acquire good running technique. After that, begin with a sled load that allows for the strength to come through in the form of good “drive angles,” and a solid torso to deliver force from the legs to the ground to the sled for locomotion.

Get back to the basics! – Young or physically underdeveloped athletes bench pressing or squatting with bands or chains.

Here’s why – Basic exercise science! I’m sure we can all agree that young and underdeveloped athletes make the fastest gains in the shortest amount of time. In fact, they probably make the most gains percentage-wise than in their entire life. We also know that overload and progression is a critical part of strength-gain, given the right pace and timing. If the speed of overload and progression is too quick for athletes who are not strong, the result is injury or, at the very least, a more rapid decline than normal in strength gains over time—neuromuscular overload is my theory.

Basic science tells you that with this type of athlete, the nervous system is the first adaptive mechanism, not muscle. Just learning the lift will increase strength, so it’s a cheap and easy way to gain strength. As the literature confirms, early strength gains with novice lifters are neural in nature, as demonstrated by little, if any, hypertrophy accompanying the increases in strength. Therefore, take your time.

I consider bands and chains as advanced techniques. If we are writing programs based on physical status and needs, advanced technique for beginners is an oxymoronical philosophy: It makes no sense. I’m not saying that inexperienced athletes won’t gain strength with bands and chains—they work and there’s research to back that up. What I’m saying (and so does the science) is that when you start too early with the complex stuff, the benefit is not as great. We want the most gains, right? Using the basics in this case means teaching the lift to proficiency, training for a length of time to gain a standardized strength level, and then assessing if a more complex level of training is needed to maintain the normal progress of strength gains in the program.

Common ‘Basics’ Tenets

Without beating around the bush, the following is a list of what we know to be true:

• Strength is the building block for power.
• Strength is the building block for speed.
• Strength is the building block for speed endurance.
• Strength is the building block for reducing the risk, severity, and incidence of injury.
  (See a theme here?)
• Two- or one-legged squat technique and strength are the basis for optimizing squat jumps, multi-response plyometrics, banded or chain squatting, and heavy partial movements.
• Bench press, squat, and deadlifting (powerlifting or Olympic) technique and strength are the basis for optimizing banded or chain squatting, and heavy partial movements.
• Coordination is the basis for agility.

I’m sure this list is not comprehensive, as I was not intent on making this article the definitive masterpiece but rather a start for thoughts going forward. Additionally, when we talk about strength over a spectrum of qualities of varying energy sources, the absolute measures are very different. No one would argue that the strength necessary for sprinting 100 meters is the same as for running a 10K.

However, there is a relative strength—individual as it may be—optimizing performance in a 10K. Even now we see that vertical jump height, usually used as a marker or assessment for power, is associated with faster times in distance events. This leads to a theory that if strength is part of the power equation, then it has value when looking at jumping performance.

The Basics Are the Basis

Definitively, “The Basics” serve as a starting point, forming the basis of training regardless of the athlete’s chronological or training age. I agree with what I hear and read from some of my colleagues: Not following the basics means skipping steps in what is a multi-level training, teaching, or philosophical method intended to achieve the best results, often involving younger or physically underdeveloped athletes.

A too-much, too-soon approach with results that might appear favorable is misleading in terms of what could have been possible. Essentially, “taking the express elevator to the top” goes against science and, in some instances, best practice. Understanding basic scientific principles (neural adaptation, physiology, kinesiology) and following common sense helps to recognize and order the steps necessary to create the best path to the best outcome.

I have been there and I understand having to do the elementary stuff while yearning for the glitz and energy of the more fun and complex exercises. In the end, what keeps me on the steady course are the huge physical dividends that the athlete is going to experience down the road because I chose to teach their body the proper progression to its highest level.

Since you’re here…
…we have a small favor to ask. More people are reading SimpliFaster than ever, and each week we bring you compelling content from coaches, sport scientists, and physiotherapists who are devoted to building better athletes. Please take a moment to share the articles on social media, engage the authors with questions and comments below, and link to articles when appropriate if you have a blog or participate on forums of related topics. — SF

References

1. Szymanski, DJ, Albert, JM, Reed, JG, Hemperley, DL, Moore, RM, and Walker, JP. Effect of overweighted forearm training on bat swing and batted-ball velocities of high school baseball players. The Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research. 22(6): 109-110. 2008.
2. Szymanski, DJ, McIntyre, JS, Szymanski, JM, Molloy, JM, Madsen, NH, and Pascoe, DD. Effect of wrist and forearm training on linear bat-end, center of percussion, and hand velocities, and on time to ball contact of high school baseball players. Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research. 20(1): 231-240. 2006.
3. Szymanski, DJ, McIntyre, JS, Szymanski, JM, Bradford, TJ, Schade, RL, Madsen, NH, and Pascoe, DD. Effect of torso rotational strength on angular hip, angular shoulder, and linear bat velocities of high school baseball players. Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research. 21(4): 1117-1125. 2007.

After a tremendous experience teaming up with Erik Jernstrom and Ryan Baugus in the EForce Sport off-season to work with a group of NFL hopefuls and veterans, I started a second off-season project with an area college basketball athlete. Mark McLaughlin, Director of Coaching Education for Omegawave North America, has trained this athlete for years and he invited me to help better assess his training process.

Let’s be clear: We already have a solid understanding of the athlete’s strength and conditioning program. Mark has done tremendous work over the years to help develop this young man, and his athlete-centered philosophy is to thank for the numerous, repeated successes his athletes have achieved. Bringing me onto this project had a bigger element in mind: skill development.

As I shared in previous SimpliFaster articles, there is a real need in sport science to continue to connect the dots between performance, monitoring and assessment, interventions, and performance outcomes. This current project helps us form the foundation for assessing the athlete performance process and connecting to its most meaningful outcome: game performance.

There are some people in strength and conditioning and sport science who maintain that what happens in competition is out of their hands; they improve the athlete, and it is up to the athlete to display their skill in competition. Others claim their programs are instrumental in helping their teams stay healthy and perform better. I believe in a slightly different approach that considers strength and conditioning, rehabilitation, practice, recovery, and games as all part of a single performance process.

Tactics aside, the way we train athletes in the off-season absolutely influences how they can optimally, sustainably, and consistently display their skill in practice and competition. Here is an explicit example: If you train your offensive linemen using only long, slow endurance runs, are they going to be the most powerful blockers at the line of scrimmage? Clearly, they will lack certain physical tools to optimally and sustainably maintain a maximal effort block for several seconds in a highly reactive environment, every 15 to 30 seconds, for 5 to 9 minutes, 8 to 12 times a game. So, while strength and conditioning isn’t teaching athletes how to perform a sport-specific skill, it is absolutely giving them physiological and mechanical skills to execute the tactic.

This example brings us back to the original reasons of this project, determining:

• How are we asking questions about the ways training and recovery may, or may not, have an influence on the actual performance of the sport in competition?
• How could we possibly nail down the right variables to monitor and assess?
• Just what is the exact question we are trying to ask about the effects of training and recovery on skill performance in competition?

Initially, Mark wanted to ask a much bigger question about skill-building sessions and practice. After assessing all the factors related to the variables and KPIs we monitor, I determined we needed to simplify our approach to the order of our investigation. Do readiness and recovery have an effect on skill performance outcomes?

Part of the theoretical construct I base this line of questioning on comes from research performed on collegiate athletes at Stanford University. While pure physical traits such as speed and skills such as domain-specific reaction time will, in theory, help boost performance, these studies outline sport-specific skills that get better following the improvement of specific recovery strategies such as sleep duration.

With these concepts in mind, in the last five years I have focused on the discovery, interpretation, and communication of meaningful information in sport that staff can directly apply to improving their team’s performance. Like many others, I fell in love with the idea that technology could help us measure every aspect of performance, recovery, health, and wellness. I was certain that GPS would help us unlock the truths about crazy practice loads and the reasons that teams fail in games. Perhaps we all were a bit too zealous in thinking that technology was going to solve every problem, but it helped us to start asking different questions of ourselves.

The idea for my Pyramid of Performance Analysis began back in August 2012, as I was going through the local newspaper and reading about an abundance of injuries in NCAA football teams during fall camp. Recalling my own time trying to survive camp as a college football player, I strongly felt back then that there were better ways to prepare a team to perform. There was an explicit feeling I had on the field, which my teammates shared, when we were strong, fast, fresh, and ready to play. Perhaps “flow-state” is too cliché to describe this feeling, but our team performance spoke for itself.

Likewise, when the three-plus hour-long full-contact practices started adding up, our game performance began suffering. The feelings we had about our own well-being, recovery, etc., were not the same as in the weeks and months before. Our body language, our physical performance, and our game performance suffered. This had nothing to do with the fabled “mental toughness” trait peddled by coaches for decades, and everything to do with how fatigue impacted our play.

Central, peripheral, neural, tissue—whichever label or paradigm you subscribe to, the fatigue was present. I sensed it, my teammates sensed it, and the scoreboard showed it. The acceleration out of a break in a route? Gone. The extra push off the line of scrimmage in man-blocking? Gone as well. Our ability to execute our tactics in a highly complex and reactive environment? Impaired. It didn’t matter if the right play was called, if we were aligned correctly, or even if we made the right read, we were a step slower and weaker when it came time to execute our tactics.

This experience was instrumental in influencing my approach to our investigation. Can we do a better job of identifying and presenting the factors that affect the sport-specific skill performance of an athlete? If we establish a firm foundation in our line of questioning, can we entertain a larger discussion about team performance in games? In the future, this will require us to see success first and then work backwards. Based on our team, our players, our systems, and our opponents, what does success look like for us?

Is scoring 70 points in a basketball game and winning by five points sufficient for our team? Is our defense giving up 80-plus points a game acceptable for our program? More specifically, are we sufficiently performing the traits, skills, techniques, and tactics we need to reach our goal of winning? And if we aren’t performing these traits to par, what are we doing to positively affect them? This last question is where all allied performance staff members should be contributing their skills to help maximize the specific physical and psychological traits the athletes need to execute the tactics and techniques.

Our current project starts with a basic question around readiness and recovery, and their relationship to basic, objective, sport-specific skill performance. In our case, we assess free-throw and three-point percentages in standardized shooting drills during “skill sessions” with private basketball trainers. Mark and I are not in charge of the skill sessions, but we receive daily feedback from the athlete via surveys in our athlete management system, Voyager. Based on our theoretical construct that readiness and recovery factors have an impact on sport-specific skill performance, we outline the data as follows:

In our system, we believe that these are the appropriate KPIs to use as independent variables that influence the dependent KPIs given our baseline investigation. It was crucial to include both subjective (recovery survey) and objective (Omegawave reading) information regarding readiness and recovery. Additionally, we included information from the athlete on the session RPE of the skill sessions.

In the coming weeks, we will expand the information to include the skill-session coach’s perception on session difficulty and player performance. From a data-collection standpoint, this may not be the most specific, sensitive, or reliable data source; however, including the coach’s feedback in our process serves a much bigger goal of relationship-building, education, and sport-specific input. From a sport science standpoint, one should pursue anything that can be done to build a bridge with the sport coaching staff. Sport science does not own all of the solutions to team performance by itself; it only exists to help find them.

Daily Procedures

Each morning, the athlete wakes up and uses their phone to complete the recovery survey inside their Voyager account. The survey has similar concepts to a popular recovery survey produced by John Abreu and Derek M. Hansen in 2014. The core concepts of our survey are based on McLean et al (2010) and Hooper & Mackinnon (1995)1,2.

A few minutes later, the athlete performs the Omegawave reading procedure from home as well. Mark took great steps to educate the athlete on a standardized scanning procedure for the Omegawave to help reduce errors in measurement. The subjective input from the athlete is received first, and the objective data collection via Omegawave is performed second. Some athletes can see the results of their scan and plan accordingly, but we have elected to limit the visibility of the results of our athlete’s scans during this specific period of his summer program.

The athlete performs two to three skill sessions each week, and has two to four training sessions as well. Mark programs and manages the timing and frequency of the training sessions depending on the athlete’s readiness. As stated before, we do not have influence on the timing, frequency, or intensity of the “skill sessions.” Mark elected to limit aerobic development and maintenance work in training, since we believe the skill sessions provide the stimulus to aid in accomplishing this task.

In the 15 to 30 minutes following each skill session, the athlete again uses his Voyager account to fill out a post-skill session survey. He inputs total free throws and three-pointers attempted and made, as well as a session RPE and total session time (in minutes). I establish a daily shooting percentage for each metric, as well as a rolling average for the summer skill sessions.

Initial Data Summary

As we continue to build the database on our athlete, we have formed basic descriptive statistics about the athlete’s recovery behaviors and Omegawave data, as well as his objective shooting performance. In the first month of our investigation, I chose to first focus on identifying the trends and relationships among the recovery and wellness factors. We are still building a more robust data set for our skills sessions, so making any type of inference based on a data set of N=10 would be premature. As the skill-based data builds, focusing on the recovery and readiness data allows us to start asking more specific questions. I intend to either trim down the data we collect in the future, or assess ways of fortifying the sensitivity of the KPIs we deem most important from this project.

The recovery survey is a five-point, five-question survey and includes a space for quantifying sleep time. Additionally, there is a space for the athlete to input any notes for me or Mark. Our athlete has averaged a total wellness score of 20.1 (out of 25) over the first month of our investigation. The standard deviation of each wellness indicator is below 1, which in this case means the athlete scores consistently from day to day in his wellness and recovery indicators.

Since we are partially basing our theoretical construct on sleep quality and time, it is worth noting that our athlete averages 8.23 hours of sleep per night, with a standard deviation of 1.34. His sleep data totals reflects this, as he only reported sleeping less than seven hours on one occasion (6.5 hours to be exact), and his other scores from that day hovered at or below their averages.

While basic descriptive statistics are a start, I wanted to know if there were actual relationships between our KPIs. I will emphasize “if” as being a big IF. From a statistical point of view, a correlation between two variables must pass a certain numeric threshold to be deemed significant. Unfortunately, people often throw around the term “significant” in both research and daily life. Additionally, it should be no surprise that something statistically significant may not be practically significant whatsoever. For statistical purposes, the following rules apply:

Based on these statistical rules of correlation coefficients, there were nine variables that showed large, positive strength of associations. The strongest relationship we found after the first month was between the subjective metric of “Energy” and the objective measure of “Fatigue” from the Omegawave (r=0.73). In theory, this makes sense as fatigue measured by the Omegawave is described as “the state of excessive or prolonged stress in response to physical and mental loads. How tired are the regulatory systems?”

If a strong statistical relationship exists between these two factors, how do each of them compare to the sleep metrics aligning with our theoretical construct? So far, Energy has a small, positive association with Sleep Quality (r=0.25) and a small, negative association with Sleep Quantity (r=-0.09). Fatigue has a small, positive association with Sleep Quality (r=0.17) and a small, negative association with Sleep Quantity (r=-0.02).

Does this mean sleep is not important, or that the strongest statistically associated variables have debunked the theoretical construct? Absolutely not! First, we are still in the primary stages of forming our database. Second, the factors with the strongest statistical association may have little to no impact on, or association with, the domain-specific skill of shooting a basketball.

As I dove deeper into the investigation, I wanted to better understand relationships between our KPIs. I elected to use a statistical procedure to compare the variability of the metrics. This asks a basic question: Do any two of our KPIs bounce around in similar ways? If the statistical procedure says they do, what are the underlying variables, and how will they inform our decision-making in the future? Remember, using something like an F-test is not a be-all and end-all statistical procedure, as has been well-documented in the athletic performance and sport medicine circles in recent years. We are simply using it as a primary step to reinforce our notions about how our KPIs might be related.

What is an F-test? It is essentially a ratio of the variances of a sample two metrics. Remember ratios as they are written in fraction form, a over b? Dividing the numerator by the denominator gives us the ratio we are looking for, and for our purposes, seeing a ratio close to 1 is an interesting starting point as we continue to ask questions. Going further into the F-test procedure from a statistical standpoint requires us to ask questions about our assumptions of the two variables. One assumption we test is that the variances are equal—termed the “null hypothesis.” The second is that there is a difference in the two variances—termed the “alternative hypothesis.”

Remember, it must be stated that a relationship, from a statistical standpoint, does not infer causality, and that any relationship, from a numeric standpoint, means very little without content knowledge and a theoretical construct to connect two variables. Think of it this way: I can prove to you that there is a perfect one-to-one correlation between athletes who score game-winning shots at University of XYZ, and athletes who wear Nike shoes at University of XYZ, given that University of XYZ is a Nike-sponsored school. See the point I make? Numbers can be deceiving unless you have a handle on both the variables you are dealing with and the statistical procedures you are using. No surprises there!

The results of our F-test procedures were not earth-shattering, aside from a very interesting (yet perhaps totally coincidental) relationship between two metrics. There was a perfect one-to-one relationship in the variances of Focus from our recovery survey and Fatigue from our Omegawave data. Remember, the Omegawave Fatigue score was also part of the strongest association in our correlation analysis, as it connected with Energy from our recovery survey (r=0.73).

Focus also shared a ratio close to 1 with Sleep Quantity (1.25). Of the 75 variance ratios we tested, we failed to reject the notion (or null hypothesis) that the variances were equal in 50 of the 75 cases. So, what on Earth does that mean from a practical standpoint? We could not, from a statistical standpoint, prove that there was a “significant difference” between the variances of the two variables in 50 of the 75 cases. The door is open for us to see relationships between the values of our KPIs in a correlation, as well as in the relationships of the variances among our KPIs.

This also means we have two options in our future analysis of recovery and readiness variables for basketball skill performance. Should we narrow down the variables we compare, or should we keep casting a wide net? The latter is essentially the idea of throwing a bunch of numbers at the wall and seeing what sticks. Since this is exploratory research for a case study, we need to cast a wide net. As we build to the future, the aim should be to simplify and assess as we, as a staff, continue to learn more.

The next step in this procedure is to incorporate our basketball-specific skill performance data into this analysis. From a practical standpoint, I am interested in seeing what the athlete’s variability of shooting performance is all by itself. We need to remember that, although we aimed to have a standardized procedure for assessing free-throw and three-point percentages, the procedure was most likely not perfect in each session. Does this mean our analysis is a total waste? No. However, we are charting new waters in this attempt and the information we gather will be a valuable lens to look through as we approach the competitive season.

Conducting this case study is allowing us to form a model of the way to assess an individual athlete’s recovery and readiness, and their possible relationship to sport performance. As we form a profile for one athlete, we will take the same model and apply it to a second. I have already established a second high-level basketball player here locally, training with Erik Jernstrom at EForce. We started to implement the same procedures and will undoubtedly learn a few of the same things, but we also hope to learn a few entirely different concepts. As we strengthen the model of assessing an individual basketball player, we will expand our player profiling to include the readiness and preparedness of physical traits critical to basketball performance. These will occur alongside psychological, technical, and tactic elements all playing a role in an athlete’s performance.

What we have already learned so far in our case study is that the KPIs we monitor in recovery and readiness reinforce Mark’s reasoning for using an athlete-centered model. Making inferences from this athlete’s results and applying them to other athletes would allow too much to slip through the cracks. Our athlete is tremendous at practicing basic recovery strategies around sleep and hydration, and shows interest in fortifying his nutrition plan and daily stress management. A second athlete might show signs of being a very poor sleeper and be inconsistent with hydration and nutrition. That second athlete will not need added recovery sessions or interventions until he or she can improve foundational recovery behaviors.

Concepts are broad and encompassing, but individuality is necessary to our approach. I look forward to sharing updated data analysis for readiness and recovery in the coming days and weeks, as well as their relationship with our athlete’s shooting percentage. We anticipate our skill session database to approach 20 sessions this week, which will allow us to compare information on the sessions from a more robust data set. Additionally, I look forward to shedding light on Erik and my experiences with our second case study involving a high-level basketball player.

Since you’re here…
…we have a small favor to ask. More people are reading SimpliFaster than ever, and each week we bring you compelling content from coaches, sport scientists, and physiotherapists who are devoted to building better athletes. Please take a moment to share the articles on social media, engage the authors with questions and comments below, and link to articles when appropriate if you have a blog or participate on forums of related topics. — SF

References

1. McLean BD, Coutts AJ, Kelly V, et al. Neuromuscular, endocrine, and perceptual fatigue responses during different length between-match microcycles in professional rugby league players. Int J Sports Physiol Perform 2010; 5 (3): 367-383.
2. Hooper SL, Mackinnon LT. Monitoring overtraining in athletes. Recommendations. Sports Med 1995; 20(5):321-327.

Electrical muscle stimulation (EMS) offers true benefits for sport performance professionals and those in the physical training and rehabilitation fields. If it were up to me, everyone would have their own EMS device to improve performance, manage fatigue and pain, enhance recovery, improve sleep, and elevate mood. This is not dissimilar to Bill Gates’ desire to have a “Computer on every desk, and in every home, running Microsoft software.” Although I’d like to think my motives are much more altruistic, I’ll leave that assessment to you after reading this article.

Research clearly shows that EMS can have positive effects on voluntary strength as well as abilities associated with improved muscle recruitment.¹ It’s also a highly effective means of educating people about the adaptability and plasticity of the nervous system. I’ve been using EMS with athletes for over twenty-two years, starting with a simple machine with relatively fixed parameters. Since then, I’ve worked with a wide variety of machines and technologies as well as thousands of athletes. And I reach the same conclusions over and over again:

• Electricity is a powerful tool to manage neurological processes and monitor the efficacy of these processes.
• The practitioner’s skill heavily outweighs the sophistication of the machine.
• Individual variability can be profound, so using a cookie cutter approach is both irresponsible and ineffective.
• Human adaptability is not only the question and answer but also the problem and solution.
• The brain governs all.

Having said this, I admit that the further you go down the EMS rabbit hole, the more you unearth questions rather than answers. Hence, my EMS experience has been an education discovering the nuances, raw patterns, and trends of nervous system responses rather than developing quick and easy solutions. Before you continue reading and trying to determine how EMS can solve all your problems and make life easier, be prepared to be thrown even more off balance. Up may appear down, left may look like right, and in may be out. This is how I like it. Certainty is not a place you want to exist, as it creates a situation where you’re unprepared for day-to-day life’s variability and unpredictability. Those who yearn for certainty are most definitely destined for disappointment.

During a walk in downtown Toronto with Charlie Francis, I asked him about the certainty of specific training approaches, and he replied:

“We can’t be absolutely certain of anything. There is no certainty that there will be a tomorrow. Science cannot prove that there will be a tomorrow. We believe there will be a tomorrow, because yesterday we were on this planet and today we are still on this planet. That is our only real proof. But, we could get run over by a bus at any moment during our walk today, and there might not be a tomorrow for us. Am I certain there will be a tomorrow? Absolutely not. I’m just expecting there will be a tomorrow, based on my prior experience.”

Needless to say, for the remainder of our walk I was hyper-aware of my surroundings and looking for large, speeding vehicles. Charlie’s way of looking at problems and his wariness of predictions has stuck with me in every aspect of my life, including the application of EMS.

In this article, I am not trying to sell anything or promote any particular approach to using EMS. I’m simply trying to communicate the reasons why I believe it’s a highly effective means of educating people about the adaptability and plasticity of the nervous system. When I introduce people to the concept of electrical stimulation, people immediately request “how to” solutions. “Where do I put the pads? How high do I turn up the intensity of the unit? How frequently should I use this program? How come it doesn’t come with a comprehensive instruction manual?” Aside from some very basic instructions on how to turn on the unit and some rough guidelines for pad placement, I tell them first and foremost to experiment with it.

The great thing about most EMS units is that you can’t damage yourself. Certainly you can cause pain and extreme discomfort, particularly if you get creative. While a barbell or kettlebell can do extreme amounts of damage to a person or facility if misused, EMS is one of the safer means of training, assuming you aren’t using it in the bathtub. As many of you have already found, trial and error is one of the most effective means of learning as long as you learn from your errors and make the necessary adjustments moving forward.

Referring back to my five conclusions regarding EMS technology, we can discuss the true benefits of electrical stimulation for the sport performance professional and others in the physical training and rehabilitation fields.

Electrical Stimulation for Monitoring and Managing Neurological Function

EMS’s biggest impact on my work has been in performance sport and return-to-competition scenarios where it provides information for assessing the status of an athlete’s peripheral and central nervous systems. Many studies have reported that electrical impedance is a byproduct of muscle damage and injury. The presence of edema reduces resistance to current flow, with healthy tissue offering more resistance. Recent studies also have determined that EMS can measure the severity of injury through localized bioimpedance measurement (L-BIA) and detection of physical gaps in muscle tissue, supporting the use of ultrasound and MRI.²

After reading the research, I initially thought that electrical stimulation detected structural disruptions in soft tissue. The more I worked with EMS in post-injury cases, however, the more I found that what I thought was impedance instead was a reflection of the nervous system’s tendency to inhibit function as a means of self-preservation. Pain alerts the brain that there’s potential for further damage to the body, and the brain shuts down specific motor units that could potentially lead to greater injury. The irony is that the brain’s natural tendency to inhibit function actually results in further impaired function and perhaps even a greater system failure concerning the body and brain. As we know, dysfunction and weakness in one area often lead to over-use issues and eventual failure in another area.

Case Study

EMS can confirm the nervous system’s inhibitory tendency during conditions of acute and chronic injury. I worked with an Olympic champion weightlifter who had acute and chronic knee pain that created an inhibitory response in her vastus medialis and other muscles in the quadriceps group. Greater inhibition of the nervous system created significant unbalanced stresses to the knee joint and significantly more pain. The chronic pain perpetuated the problem for one year before she consulted me–and we began using electrical stimulation.

The EMS device confirmed that significantly more current–three times that of the healthy VMO–was required to elicit a maximal contraction in the quadriceps. There was no scar tissue in the VMO, as the point of injury was the knee joint. Several MRI evaluations detected no muscular or connective tissue damage. However, the noxious stimulus created in the knee joint was essentially muting innervation to the quadriceps muscle group in a futile attempt to rectify the situation. In many ways, this response by the brain could be likened to an undesirable autoimmune response that wreaks havoc on the body where a genuine desire to help leads to unintended consequences.

EMS saved the day for this weightlifter by diagnosing the issue and ultimately recalibrating the brain to allow full recruitment in the quadriceps muscles over a period of four to six weeks. We integrated voluntary strength work with EMS to allow for a smooth transition to full function throughout the injured limb and the elimination of the pain pathway. While others were looking for obvious “hardware” problems, EMS helped to diagnose and remedy the “software” issues experienced by this athlete.

EMS of the vastus medialis can be a gateway into the status of the knee joint and hamstring. Share on X

I’m convinced that regular use of an EMS device can provide insight into the status of the athlete, particularly if we’re able to record the parameters of every session. In particular, diagnostic stimulation of the vastus medialis appears to be a gateway into the status of the knee joint and the hamstring, if not other aspects of the central and peripheral nervous systems. This observation is supported by the experiences of Italian researcher and performance coach, Giuseppe Gueli, who’s been using electrical stimulation technology with some of the top soccer and ice hockey players in the world for the last twenty years with data from thousands of high performing subjects.

The Practitioner’s Skill Outweighs the Machine’s Sophistication

This shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone who uses tools effectively. I remember attending a fabulous workshop in 1993 conducted by Ted Wong, one of Bruce Lee’s dedicated students. He was the only student of Bruce Lee’s who was taught Jeet Kun Do from scratch with no previous martial arts experience. At the time of the workshop, Ted Wong was in his late fifties, weighing about 135lbs. I was amazed when a young strapping athlete who weighed about 280lbs could not take him down.

When asked about Bruce Lee’s proficiency with knives and nunchucks, Ted Wong replied, “Bruce was exceptional with everything. He could grab any household item and turn it into a deadly weapon. I remember one time when he grabbed a candlestick in his living room and was flinging it around like he was born to do it. Then, the candlestick flew out of his hand, and it almost took one guy’s head off!” There’s nothing like a firsthand Bruce Lee story to drive a point home.

My experience with EMS is no different. In my early work, I was always looking to purchase bigger and better devices to provide more profound results. As I acquired more expensive devices, I found that they didn’t deliver proportionately better results. Similar to my other training experiences, the more I focused on perfecting basic parameters such as timing, frequency, volume, and intensity of work, the more thorough and sustainable my results were. My experience with training athletes for sprinting speed was very similar. The more fixated we were on fancy shoes, supplements, training facilities, and resistance devices, the more the training went sideways. And the results were unsatisfying.

Effective electrical stimulation needs to be based on foundational principles that accumulate desirable outcomes on a consistent basis. If the athlete is not improving, something has to change. Making appropriate adjustments on the fly is critical, but it takes keen observational skills and an idea of how to optimally manipulate the protocols to yield positive responses. This is not a skill set that can be imparted in a book or video. It has to be honed over time through practice and more practice. I can point you in the direction, but you must find your own specific path. We must cultivate skills and intuition before accumulating tools and roadmaps.

Individual Variability Can be Extreme

The great thing about EMS is that the device is consistent and predictable. If you dial in 40 Hz as your frequency and 50 milliamps as your current intensity over a duration of 20 minutes, you can be pretty sure that the device will operate under those parameters (assuming you purchased the device from a reputable company). However, the responses that you observe from different athletes may be highly variable. In fact, it’s been suggested that the muscle adaptations induced by training with electrical stimulation could very well be more variable than those induced by voluntary training modalities.³

It’s important to recognize that not all EMS subjects are created equal. Responses can vary significantly depending on numerous factors, including:

• Muscle fiber composition. Research has confirmed that stimulation frequencies must be adjusted to elicit the most profound responses in individuals with a predominant muscle fiber profile. Athletes with a higher proportion of fast-twitch (Type 2) muscle fibers will require higher stimulation frequencies (70 to 100 Hz) to elicit a strong contraction for strength, power, and speed improvements using conventional EMS technology. Athletes who are slow-twitch (Type 1) dominant will respond more favorably to lower stimulation frequencies (30 to 50 Hz) to develop muscular endurance qualities.⁴

  It’s also important that different muscle groups have different composition profiles. Hence, stimulation frequencies must be adjusted based on the muscles groups you’re targeting. Hamstrings and the rectus femoris muscles tend to have a higher proportion of Type 2 fibers while erector spinae, deltoid, and soleus muscles tend to be slow-twitch oriented. EMS frequencies should reflect these differences during application. Also recognize that all muscles have a combination of fiber types that we must address through appropriate proportions of work.

• Athlete preparedness. Individuals who are in better overall physical shape will respond more profoundly to electrical stimulation than athletes who are poorly conditioned. Typically athletes who are healthy and in good physical condition will require lower levels of current to elicit positive responses. Consider this when implementing electrical stimulation sessions among a variety of athletes. Just because one athlete can tolerate a very high current intensity doesn’t mean that you apply the same current to another athlete. The athlete who’s in better shape may require significantly less current, and driving up the intensity to an extremely uncomfortable level may make the athlete less likely to continue with the protocols.
• Athlete readiness and fatigue. Research has shown that athletes who are fatigued will require higher levels of EMS current to elicit a strong muscle contraction. Thus, it’s very useful in monitoring athlete fatigue levels over time.⁵ We can argue that the brain intentionally won’t allow a muscle to be recruited if the athlete is not properly recovered to engage in vigorous exercise again. If an exogenous power supply is having difficulty recruiting a muscle group, then it leads to reason that an athlete may not be ready to participate in training or competition and that further participation may lead to muscle failure and a potentially devastating injury. This underscores the importance of maintaining ongoing records of previous sessions to establish baselines that you can compare over time. Also, while using EMS to identify fatigue, it can also enhance recovery from intensive training, particularly during sleep and travel.⁶
• Previous injury or trauma. When an athlete incurred a previous injury, we often need to increase stimulation intensities to achieve an adequate muscular contraction. This could be a short-term adjustment, or it may persist indefinitely depending on the severity of the previous injury. In some cases, the stimulation frequency may also need adjusting. Fast-twitch and slow-twitch muscles can atrophy at different rates, and we can often overlook slow-twitch recruitment in the desire to target the large motor units. Depending on the injury’s nature and location, we may need to apply different frequencies over time for a successful outcome.
• Chronic pain. Individuals with chronic pain may require a different approach. In my experience, chronic pain sufferers can tolerate extremely high intensities of electrical stimulation in the areas of the body where they feel pain. Lower back pain sufferers can often max out a machine because they’re so accustomed to the severe pain signals emanating from their back. In these cases, I’ve had more success targeting sites away from their chronic pain locations, where stimulation intensities are much lower and are felt much more profoundly, to create an adaptive response. The jury is still out on how EMS truly impacts chronic pain as it relates to the nervous system, and there are many theories behind the mechanism, whether inhibitory or excitatory.⁷
• Personality traits. In my experience, athletes who are considered “high strung” or observed as “anxious” required much lower current intensities to elicit a profound response. However, these athletes also responded much more profoundly to recovery-based protocols that involved lower frequency pulsing. In many ways, the athletes were over-responders to EMS, with a relatively low stimulation intensity required to provide a positive effect.
• Current medications. Athletes who take certain prescription medications may experience atypical results with EMS. It’s not uncommon for medications to have an impact on the efficacy of EMS. Several athletes who reported taking antidepressant medication could tolerate much higher levels than those who were not taking these medications. Take care to address these cases individually. Asking athletes about their medical history and current prescriptions could be extremely useful in ensuring a proper treatment approach.

  The drug naloxone, used to reverse the effects of opioids, particularly in cases of overdose, works by reversing the depression of the central nervous system caused by opioid compounds. When naloxone is applied intravenously, it results in a total reversal of electrical stimulation’s pain-relieving effects on the nervous system.⁸ Thus, nervous system activation or suppression via pharmaceuticals can have significant effects on the benefits of electrical stimulation and must be considered.

  Sometime it’s not advisable to increase the current’s intensity to the athlete’s maximum tolerance, particularly in the initial sessions. An iterative approach of choosing a relatively high intensity for the first few sessions allows you to assess the impact on the athlete the next day without creating undue soreness or discomfort that could negatively impact the athlete’s perception of the technology.

• Occupation. While this factor may not impact athletes, I find it interesting that the individuals most fearful of using EMS were those who were most commonly exposed to electricity in their occupations. Electricians and electrical engineers expressed the most apprehension about having electricity introduced into their bodies, and for good reason. The average person’s perception of electricity is that it’s dangerous and that feeling an electric shock is a negative experience. While we do not want to curb an individual’s natural fear of electricity, we can educate them about the specific parameters of EMS technology that allow us to use it for performance and therapeutic purposes.

Human Adaptability: Both the Question and the Answer; the Problem and the Solution

By using EMS, I’ve obtained a very good education in understanding human beings’ adaptability over time. My work with individuals experiencing long-term chronic pain has changed how I approach my work with athletes. EMS provides a very precise method to facilitate changes in the nervous system via current intensity that’s far and above the influence of other parameters.

With EMS, we can teach athletes to fire muscles more efficiently, relax muscles and minimize pain. Share on X

Neuroplasticity is the brain’s ability to reorganize itself by forming new neurological connections and pathways. With EMS, you can teach an athlete to fire muscles more efficiently, relax muscles and decrease tone, and minimize pain. These functions are the product of neuroplasticity and can be developed and sustained with long-term EMS use, as well as many other techniques, to impact afferent pathways and influence sensory and motor cortices.⁹

I’ve had exceptional results using EMS not only for improving performance but also managing injury. I can very safely introduce a very powerful stimulus into the body and nervous system while keeping track of the intensities achieved from session to session. I can also rotate the stimulus around the body to keep the nervous system adaptive, taking advantage of the neuroplastic benefits of EMS. In adult humans, rapid plastic changes in the motor and sensory cortices has been induced by alteration of afferent input.

By keeping the nervous system off balance and adaptive (plastic), we can advance the athlete much more quickly and profoundly without having to change many other elements in their training program. In this way, electrical stimulation can amplify the signal qualities of other training elements.

Electrical stimulation can amplify the signal qualities of other training elements. Share on X

The process becomes even more complex upon understanding that the brain can reorganize itself to resurrect, retain, and amplify past signals and tendencies. As Dr. Norman Doidge points out, “chronic pain is basically neuroplasticity gone wild.”¹⁰ The nervous system becomes more efficient at processing pain. An individual’s neuroplastic abilities can amplify and adapt the body to maintain chronic pain sensations as if the body is sounding an alarm about an injury that may no longer exist. When dealing with chronic pain, EMS must be profoundly intense but also extremely dynamic in how the stimulus is rotated and how other qualities, such as movement, are introduced in the treatment approach. The afferent properties of electrical stimulation and exercise, particularly in combination, can help re-pattern the brain to reflect a state of function, health, and wellness that does not require the production of chronic pain.

EMS can help re-pattern the brain to avoid the production of chronic pain. Share on X

The Brain Governs All

It’s important to know that your brain regulates everything that happens in your body, regardless of your beliefs regarding specificity of exercises and muscles. As soon as you begin to understand these neurology and physiology facts, it becomes easier to organize your thoughts around training and rehabilitation.

When I first started working with EMS, I was overly concerned with pad placement and precisely targeting specific areas of the body. While pad placement is important, I must stress that it’s not always obvious. For injury and pain management, working away from the symptomatic area has always yielded more sustainable and complete results. In situations where I attempted to improve excitability or readiness, working away from obvious locations has always produced enhanced results.

Stimulating quadriceps always improved hamstring performance. Targeting hip flexors resulted in improved posterior chain performance and reduced lower back pain. Stimulating the upper body has been extremely effective in preparing the lower body, and vice versa. Using EMS to produce powerful muscular contractions has ultimately resulted in a muscle relaxation effect and a sense of recovery. Most conventional recovery and loosening protocols involve lower intensity pulsing actions, and rehabilitation approaches have been overly cautious, leading to further down-regulation and disuse both centrally and peripherally.

While these responses may not make intuitive sense at first glance, when we begin to examine these scenarios from the brain’s potential responses, things begin to make more sense. Applying a strong stimulus in one area of the body tends to produce adaptive and compensatory responses throughout the body, particularly in the short term.

We have the ability to take advantage of these adaptive responses within specific windows of opportunity. In my opinion, EMS should always be followed by voluntary work to solidify new pathways created by these adaptive windows. For strength, power, and speed development, use of profound EMS on the hip flexors should be followed by dynamic hip extension work. Active lengthening of the hamstrings, whether by sprinting or kicking, could follow electrical stimulation of the quadriceps.

Individuals experiencing chronic pain have typically responded better when we provide intense stimulation away from the symptomatic areas. Although these approaches may not make sense to the individual receiving the treatment, their brain will recognize the opportunity for an efficient reorganization process and a more effective redistribution of organism energy.

Practical Tips

Here are some tips to get you started on your EMS journey:

• Documentation is critical. Take notes after every session and record all parameters applied (frequency, intensity, duration, work-rest ratios, etc.) and the observed and reported responses. This type of data collection is critical to compare case studies and determine the best approach for future cases. It will also remind you that there’s never a one-size-fits-all solution.
• Using electrical stimulation should rarely be a static experience. Incorporating different positions, joint angles, and movements can be more beneficial in providing a variation in afferent messaging for the brain. While my initial forays into electrical stimulation involved lying or seated positions–likely thrust upon me by the physical therapy community’s passive approach–I’ve achieved my most recent successes with protocols involving standing and moving, sometimes under high velocity or high load conditions. When athletes cannot move, for example after major surgery or injury, using EMS with immobilization is indicated. The goal, however, is to always push toward activity and movement.
• Exercise caution in an aggressive manner. When it comes to electrical stimulation–or simply training, for that matter–there’s a fine line between creating a profound response and torturing someone. There is no doubt that applying a high-intensity stimulus can yield exceptional results. However, balancing the highs with the lows is critical for both performance and rehabilitation success. As in training, high-intensity work must be followed by larger periods of recovery and measured doses of volume. In my experience, EMS microdosing has always produced greater effects than longer sessions of moderate intensity. The acute nature of high-intensity EMS appears to break up the malaise and stagnation experienced in conventional training, as well as in life. It’s advisable, though, to develop a progression of work that prepares individuals for the “shock” of electrical stimulation without obliterating their enthusiasm for the technology.

Concluding Remarks

When people ask me what brand of electrical stimulation device they should purchase when working with athletes, I’m pretty unbiased. Although I’ve worked closely with Globus products–primarily due to the flexibility of the platform upon which to build new protocols–I suggest people work within their budget first and foremost to gain competence and confidence. As I mentioned earlier, I’ve worked with dozens of different devices over twenty-two years, and I benefitted from all of them.

Having an EMS unit gives you a chance to learn how electricity interacts with your body and brain, and how different frequencies and intensities elicit different responses. In many ways, using an EMS device is very much like learning to use a camera. You’re much better off spending less money in the beginning and learning the basics through research and trial and error before spending a large amount of money. I’ve always maintained that using electrical stimulation helps us to better understand how to train or rehabilitate an athlete. I’m now more adamant about this point. My recent experiences working with individuals who have chronic pain reinforce this assertion. Learning is best facilitated by doing, observing, reflecting, and communicating on the fly.

After all is said and done, I’m relatively confident that the most effective application of EMS will closely mirror the philosophical approach that one uses in training athletes through conventional means. In the long run, those who truly understand that the goal of training is to create windows of opportunity for the organism to adapt and move forward in a manner that produces the most beneficial and applicable results will always tend to be more successful. In many ways, we need to think about specificity as it relates to the brain and central nervous system responses, as opposed to obsessing about peripheral applications. You will only truly understand this approach once you’ve jumped into the deep end and immersed yourself in the world of electrical stimulation. I invite you to start a refreshingly new era of training, recovery, and rehabilitation.

Since you’re here…
…we have a small favor to ask. More people are reading SimpliFaster than ever, and each week we bring you compelling content from coaches, sport scientists, and physiotherapists who are devoted to building better athletes. Please take a moment to share the articles on social media, engage the authors with questions and comments below, and link to articles when appropriate if you have a blog or participate on forums of related topics. — SF

References

1. Filipovic, A., Kleinoder, H., Dormann, U., and J. Mester. Electrostimulation – A Systematic Review of the Effects of Different Electromyostimulation Methods on Selected Strength Parameters in Trained and Elite Athletes. The Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research. 26:9 (2012) 2600-2614.
2. Nescolarde, L., Yanguas, J., Terricabras, J., Lukaski, H., Alomar, X., Rosell, X., and G. Rodas. Detection of Muscle Gap by L-BIA in Muscle Injuries: Clinical Prognosis. Physiological Measurement. 38 (2017) L1-L9.
3. Minetto, M.A., Botter, A., Bottinelli, O., Miotti, D., Bottinelli, R., and G. D’Antona. Variability in Muscle Adaptation to Electrical Stimulation. International Journal of Sports Medicine. 34 (2013) 544-553.
4. Behringer, M., Grutzner, S., Montag, J., McCourt, M., Ring, M., and J. Mester. Effects of Stimulation Frequency, Amplitude, and Impulse Width on Muscle Fatigue. Muscle and Nerve. 53:4 (April 2016) 608-616.
5. Del Coso, J., Hamouti, N., Estevez, E., and R. Mora-Rodriguez. Reproducibility of two electrical stimulation techniques to assess neuromuscular fatigue. European Journal of Sport Science. 11:2 (2011) 95-103.
6. Taylor, T., West, D.J., Howatson, G., Jones, C., Bracken, R.M., Love, T.D., Cook, C.J., Swift, E., Baker, J.S., and L.P. Kilduff. The impact of neuromuscular electrical stimulation on recovery after intensive, muscle damaging, maximal speed training in professional team sports players. Journal of Science and Medicine in Sport. April 2014.
7. Benabid, A.L., Wallace, B., Mitrofanis, J., Xia, C., Piallat, B., Fraix, V., Batir, A., Krack, P., Pollak, P., and F. Berger. Therapeutic electrical stimulation of the central nervous system. C. R. Biologies. 328:2 (2005) 177–186.
8. Hosobuchi, Y., Adams, J.E., and R. Linchitz. Pain Relief by Electrical Stimulation of the Central Gray Matter in Humans and Its Reversal by Naloxone. Science. 197:4299 (1977) 183-186.
9. Chipchase, L.S., Schabrun, S.M., and P.W. Hodges. Peripheral Electrical Stimulation to Induce Cortical Plasticity: A Systematic Review of Stimulus Parameters. Clinical Neurophysiology. 122:3 (2011) 456-463.
10. Doidge, Norman. The Brain’s Way of Healing: Remarkable Discoveries and Recoveries from the Frontiers of Neuroplasticity. Penguin Books, New York (2015).

“Say all that you want about periodization, about macrocycles, microcycles—or bicycles—which is about the only cycle I can relate to at this point in my 42-year coaching career. The fact remains that I run two meets a week for over eight weeks with runners who hate to train and complain about racing, yet somehow expect to run their best times and their brightest efforts at the biggest meets of the year.

If I get this done, I call it a motorcycle.”

There isn’t a high school or collegiate coach in the U.S. who doesn’t understand the concept of periodization. But there also isn’t a coach who can tell you, with certainty, that the approach they take guarantees the best athletes will peak for the most important competitions of the season.

This has nothing to do with their lack of knowledge or insight. They all have plenty of that. The reality is that high school cross country and track is just screwy. In high school, cross country meets may begin in August, just weeks after the season begins. Sometimes meets are twice a week. Coaches will tell you they are building for probably three main late-season competitions: conference, sectional, and state. The problem with that approach is that all three follow within a week of each other. Do we know for sure if what we are doing really does have our athletes ready for those meets?

A Two-Phrase Periodization Model: Foundation and Competition

Many coaches will assign phases to their periodization models, such as base phase, competition phase, peaking, tapering, restoration, and transition. I agree with those who simplify their approach to just two phases: General Preparation and Specific Preparation. I like to call this two-phase model, Foundation and Competition. Why? As a high school coach, I view “foundation” as what takes place in the summer after spring track, and “competition” as what most likely begins a week or so after school starts in late August.

What coaches often do—and it’s a good idea—is assign a priority to whatever competition they run beginning in late August. Some coaches describe meets as extended workouts where the goal is to “run through” the meet. They are building toward what they consider their top priority competitions. The top priority meets may be a conference, regional, or sectional for those who know that state qualification is out of the question. They know that it’s difficult to deliver strong performances one after another, and they may adjust training accordingly.

The fact that cross-country courses vary in terrain and distance can be both beneficial and problematic. Different courses can be used to explain time discrepancies, but when time and place are really the only variables for assessing an athlete’s performance, coaches can’t always tell if their training has truly accomplished what they anticipate it doing.

Some coaches like to assign 14 weeks as the point where the foundational phase switches to the competitive phase. I like 14 weeks just because it works for my cross-country season, which runs from early August to the first week in November. This is the reason I am intrigued by the use of Power Meters for training assessment. Instead of relying on a rigid timeline or times and distance covered during training sessions as the way to monitor preparation, I can make adjustments based on the specific data supplied by the power meters.

Power meters can give me the advantage of assessing what is going on with each of my athletes, which may not be exactly what my training timeline suggests it should be. The power meter lets me know how a hilly or curvy course influences a runner’s power output or running efficiency. The 3-D accelerometer gives me data on vertical and lateral movements—things that may change based on the nature of various courses. In other words, I have something to go on after a race other than just a time or place.

As Jim Vance notes in Run with Power, “Long term training history, fitness level at the start of training, injury history, weakness or physical limitations, motivation, confidence, and their factors all play a part in the training response. This is why a power meter is such an amazing tool: you’ll know how all these variables affect you, and know your training is addressing them.”

So, if I’m looking at summertime as the foundational period, I consider two things: first, my runners may be coming off a spring competitive track season, and second, some of these same runners will be entering summertime competition through a local track club. This can make any periodization plan more challenging. When do we do what we want to do?

Improving Foundational Abilities

Joe Friel presents what he refers to as the “training triad,” the three specific abilities an endurance athlete must develop early on: aerobic endurance, muscular force, and speed skill.

If you are training to improve aerobic endurance, your workouts focus on things like stroke volume and capillarization, with the goal of getting more oxygen to the working muscles. Many coaches refer to this as LSD—long, slow distance runs—or moderately paced shorter runs, which should help the coach assess changes in running efficiency.

Why look at efficiency? What if a runner’s times aren’t faster? A power meter is the way to let the runner know if his or her efficiency is improving. As Vance points out, “If you are maintaining the same pace but seeing you are using less power to maintain it, that’s a strong signal of more efficient movement and aerobic fitness gains.”

But if you run faster, do those speeds affect your efficiency? We know that efficiency tends to decrease exponentially as speed increases. As a result, a power meter lets you know if you are pushing that point of decrease further out. As Vance describes it, “The more efficient you are in your aerobic endurance intensities, the better prepared you are as a runner.”

What about Friel’s next two points on his training pyramid—muscular force and speed skill? Muscular force refers to the ability of muscles to contract and apply big forces to overcome gravity. Strengthening both the legs and the core—and by core, I mean everything from the upper leg to the shoulders—is a way to improve muscular force. We do things like kettlebell swings, goblet squats, and trap bar deadlifts over the summer.

We also do hill sprints and short, high-speed flying start sprints. I like 75 meters, but some coaches prefer much shorter distances. Here again, a power meter will show you if muscular force is improving. If your cadence hasn’t changed, but your power has increased, your force production has improved. The bottom line: higher speed and greater force means power is improving because power is force times speed.

The third part of the Friel triangle—moving at a high rate of speed—is what improves power. Jim Vance notes that speed is the “most precious resource a runner can have, and so it is arguably the most important skill you should train.” As distance runners get faster, their efficiency at slower speeds increases, but Vance make it clear that efficient runners don’t win races—the fastest runners do.

Developing Competitive Abilities

Once the foundational training has addressed aerobic endurance, muscular force, and speed skill, athletes can begin to develop muscular endurance, anaerobic endurance, and sprint power. Friel refers to these as “advanced abilities.”

Muscular endurance is a matter of big forces applied over a longer time. Coaches have historically addressed this by way of tempo and threshold runs. Even for these, power meters can help by letting a runner know if he or she is improving or maintaining efficiency at faster paces.

Anaerobic endurance combines aerobic endurance with speed skill. Near maximal effort—what describes our ASR workouts—will improve aerobic capacity, which is more generally referred to as V02 max. Coaches address this by having runners train at the V02 max level on their training tables. A power meter can assist here as well. A good indication of improvement is an increase in efficiency in the V02 max zone.

Sprint power is at the base of Friel’s performance pyramid. The speed in meters per second is a good assessment, but power meters will even indicate peak power output, which has an additional motivational benefit. Of course, sprint power is not what Arthur Lydiard would have incorporated into his training pyramid, and I can understand why coaches would view high speed as high risk. I haven’t experienced this risk aspect so I agree with Vance, who believes that the higher the max power you can produce, the higher the ceiling you have as an athlete.

But the question still remains: Can power zones tracked by power meters really help athletes run faster, or is this just a sophisticated data generator that simply confirms what coaches already know? I like what Vance suggests: “Certainly, they have the potential to create a breakthrough in training and performance. But the technology is so new that it is hard for us to say definitely that training by power meter is the best way to train.”

Power Meters Provide ‘Golden Feedback’

My bottom line is this: I like to be on the cutting edge of training approaches and new technologies, but as Mel Siff once reminded me, “If you’re always on the cutting edge, you’re holding the knife the wrong way.” In this regard, I need to work these accelerometers into my training on a more consistent basis before drawing more definitive conclusions. However, I also agree with Vance that the best coaches are the ones who innovate, and who devise training sessions and periodization plans that meet the individual needs, strengths, and weaknesses of the athlete on a regular, daily basis.

This is the reason I agree with his insights on the possible benefits of power meters. Athletes know the exact type of training they need to target, they know the specific pace they can execute, and they have a clear picture of how efficiently they can run at that pace. They also know how effective their training is in terms of improving that intensity and pace. Vance calls this the “golden feedback” of power meters.

I also don’t see the use of power meters as deviating from what coaches are currently doing. Most will follow a Jack Daniels formula, and that’s been a significant part of my approach to training since 1979. And most coaches would look at the realities of their situation the same way I do: end of track, summertime, and fall cross country for 14 weeks. Coaches are generally happy with the results when they apply a Daniels-type block approach—or some derivation of that approach—during the foundational and competitive phases of their sport. If they weren’t happy, they would make some changes.

The real value of power meters may be in the kinds of assessments that accelerometer technology can provide. For example, I can analyze the progress toward peaking for a couple of key races in late October and early November on something other than what I currently review: finish time and where my runners have placed overall. If a training objective or race time is slower than what I and my runners have anticipated, I have variables in addition to things like course complexity, weather, injury, or overall physical health to explain that.

Author’s note:

I have both RunScribe and Stryd.

RunScribe is heavy on locomotion information, and perhaps that’s why others have described it as more of a mobile running lab than a training tool. It provides a wide range of biomechanical data in addition to pace and cadence.

Stryd provides data on power, efficiency, stiffness, and speed. I can analyze cadence, vertical motion, and upper body movement. If runners can effectively change these to become more efficient, their running economy will improve.

Since you’re here…
…we have a small favor to ask. More people are reading SimpliFaster than ever, and each week we bring you compelling content from coaches, sport scientists, and physiotherapists who are devoted to building better athletes. Please take a moment to share the articles on social media, engage the authors with questions and comments below, and link to articles when appropriate if you have a blog or participate on forums of related topics. — SF

References

Dijk, J. C. Van, and Ron Van Megen. The Secret of Running: Maximum Performance Gains through Effective Power Metering and Training Analysis. Aachen, Germany: Meyer & Meyer Sport, 2017. Print.

Friel, Joe. The Power Meter Handbook: A User’s Guide for Cyclists and Triathletes. Boulder, CO: VeloPress, 2012. Print.

Vance, Jim. Run with Power: The Complete Guide to Power Meters for Running. Boulder, CO: VeloPress, 2016. Print.

You can have your Laker girls, your hot dog races, your T-shirt cannons, and even your San Diego Chicken. For between-action entertainment, give me the Freeze.

In case you missed it, the Atlanta Braves recently started a between-innings promotion called Beat the Freeze, where a spectator is given an enormous head start and is then chased down by Nigel Talton, a.k.a. the Freeze. Nigel is a five-year veteran of the grounds crew and former collegiate sprinter with personal bests of 10.47 in the 100m dash and 21.66 in the 200m dash.

Let’s get the obvious out of the way. There is almost nothing more fascinating than a come-from-behind victory. Lose a 3-1 lead in a playoff series and you will hear about it for the rest of your life. Blow a 28-3 lead in the Super Bowl and your fans will cry. In track & field, nothing gets people on their feet faster than watching an athlete come from the depths of hell to overtake the competition. We love come-from-behind victories.

The reason this article is on a coaching blog instead of a newspaper is because track nerds like me cannot help but analyze a race, even if that race is between a weekend warrior and a grounds crew worker in a racing suit and ski goggles. I’m interested in the wonderfully brilliant come-from-behind aspect of the race, and the fact that two of the competitors have fallen flat on their faces while trying to beat the Freeze. Other than the inherent comedy in seeing a grown man fall on his face in front of thousands of people, my interest is in an overlooked aspect of sprinting: Coordination.

Coordination Is Key

Coordination is one of the three emphases of my early-season training. Most people, even most athletes, vastly overlook the importance of coordination in sprinting. Thankfully, The Freeze (or, more importantly, his competitors) has shown us the significance of coordination at the end of a race.

The “Beat the Freeze” race from foul pole to foul pole is around 160 meters, which means the alactic system becomes fully taxed and the body shifts into using the lactic system as its primary energy source. Since the distance is so short, the aerobic system barely comes into play, so people are not falling down at the end of a race because they are aerobically tired. They are falling down because their central nervous system (CNS) has eroded to the point of affecting their coordination.

Distance runners are significantly more aerobically tired halfway through the mile than a sprinter is at the very end of a 200m dash, yet you never see a miler falling down from aerobic exhaustion halfway through a mile. So many sprinters fall at the end of their races due to CNS fatigue that I wrote an entire blog post about it (“Acceleration, Coordination, Variation: Three Ingredients for Sprinting Success”) after last summer’s Olympics.

Re-acceleration Simply Isn’t Happening

Another reason for the falls you see against the Freeze, as well as many of the falls you see in less-experienced track athletes in early-season races, is that the competitors try to accelerate again when their top speed has clearly diminished. Once you are upright in a full sprint, acceleration is over. Any attempt to reaccelerate while running means you naturally lean forward to help pick up speed.

Once you are upright in a full sprint, acceleration is over. Share on X

The casual fan sees this all the time in football, basketball, baseball, soccer, and even video games. Going from a jog to a sprint is a good idea. But when you are starting at your current top speed, which has slowly eroded as your muscles fire and your coordination wanes, leaning forward becomes a very bad idea. You can see this very clearly in the following video, which is perhaps the most famous video of the Freeze.

Video 1: This may be the most famous video of the Freeze, a between-inning sensation at Atlanta Braves home games. The end movements of the Freeze’s racing competitor demonstrate why leaning forward at full sprint speed is a bad idea.

My advice to beat the Freeze? Work on your coordination, improve your top speed, and realize that once the Freeze has passed you, the race is over.

Since you’re here…
…we have a small favor to ask. More people are reading SimpliFaster than ever, and each week we bring you compelling content from coaches, sport scientists, and physiotherapists who are devoted to building better athletes. Please take a moment to share the articles on social media, engage the authors with questions and comments below, and link to articles when appropriate if you have a blog or participate on forums of related topics. — SF

One of our favorite times of the year at my facility is when our college football sessions begin in May. What makes our job unique when it comes to this 12-week program is our near absolute control over what Mike Robertson and Patrick Ward call the athletes’ stress bucket. When these guys come to train, there’s no external stress. Aside from a girlfriend and a landscaping job, their lives are a piece of cake. And it shows every day during the warm-up. We simply cannot get them to shut up (a very simple way to determine their level of central fatigue or lack thereof).

What do I mean when I say we control their level of stress? To today’s physical preparation coaches, the figure below is nothing new, but it demonstrates how we truly are the organisms’ stress managers over the course of the summer. We structure our athletes’ training around the General Adaptation Syndrome (GAS) by the day, by the week, and by the month. Seems simple enough, right? Apply a stimulus to the point of fatigue and watch the athlete recover and supercompensate leading to the next training session.

Wrong. In reality, each athlete has his own GAS, if you will. Different positions (lineman, receiver, etc.) require not only different stressors but also varying levels of intensity and volume. Our program fills the need for the application of unaccustomed stress. I believe this system is the ultimate guide for building today’s American football player.

The Summer Macrocycle

Before we dive into the daily training sessions, let’s look at a 10,000-foot view of the whole program for the three months we have these guys in-house. Let it be known, I in no way consider myself a “programming sensei,” I simply try to instill what others much smarter than I have found successful.

At first glance, you’re probably rolling your eyes with the assumption that there are too many moving pieces to this puzzle. It is much simpler than it appears. I like to refer to it as Modified Block Periodization where we’re linearly building athletic movement, meaning triphasic, concurrently raising all aspects of athleticism, all while respecting residual training effects (aerobic endurance, maximal strength, maximal speed, etc.). The big picture is nothing more than transitions from slow to fast, general to specific, and simple to complex using legend Al Miller’s suggested prescription of volume first, intensity second.

Mesocycle One

When the session begins in early May, some of the guys have been keeping up on their training since the end of spring ball while others have kept up with Call of Duty and Taco Bell. With that in mind, we adhere to the least common denominator and take everyone through two weeks of anatomical adaptation.

The benefits of this period are two-fold:

• It raises work capacity.
• It increases resiliency in the connective tissue while preparing the players for the more violent demands to come, i.e. sprinting.

Our speed work for the four weeks focuses on starts from a static position and is incredibly simple. Our go-to is two-point starts with the emphasis on front side arm mechanics and, most importantly, posture. We also emphasize posture, rhythm, and relaxation through extensive tempos during this block. In the weight room, we want the speed of the barbell to maintain relatively high speed. We are constantly cueing the guys to “rattle the plates,” as athletic movement starts from the ground up.

The first four weeks is a fan favorite (sarcasm) as we employ slow eccentrics to the main movement in the weight room, and we perform them in a cluster fashion. I would be remiss if I failed to mention that Cal Dietz and his work greatly influenced the resistance portion of our training session.

The goals of the eccentric phase, or block, are:

• To reach a level of hypertrophy necessary for the sport’s violent demands.
• To improve neuromuscular synchronization of the afferent/efferent pathways between the muscle spindles and central nervous system and desensitizing the Golgi tendon organ (GTO), which will then allow the organism to absorb high levels of force all while not triggering the over protective mother (GTO).

The only problem with eccentrics? They’re extremely stressful to the organism, which is why we use cluster sets during this block. Clusters are phenomenal for performing each rep at or near maximal velocity during the movement’s concentric contraction. This results in maximal power output, ultimately leading to greater improvements over time.

If you’re familiar with Coach Joe Kenn, you are without a doubt acquainted with his Tier System Strength Training template. I’ll explain why we implement it later in the article. For now, know our focus is on hypertrophy (“R” for repetition effort, or in our case, slow eccentrics and time-under-tension), then max effort, followed by a dynamic movement which could be a jump, throw, or use of accommodating resistance.

As for jumps during this block, we’ve had tremendous success with max effort, single response jumps. More specifically, static overcome by ballistic jumps (seated box jumps) with knee bends of at least 90 degrees to mimic the start of the acceleration phase.

Mesocycles Two and Three

June

As we progress further into the summer, the program becomes more demanding. The emphasis continues to center on the one biomotor ability that separates the terrible from the bad, the bad from the good, and the good from the great: speed. From a bioenergetic standpoint, we focus on alactic power rather than capacity. Why? It does not matter how many times a guy can run a 5-flat forty, he’s still slow. We find it more prudent to start building a Ferrari rather than a Ford Bronco.

As far as biodynamics are concerned, we begin to push the alactic envelope with longer accelerations and sprints. A staple in our program is flying 10’s (build 30, sprint 10) and medicine ball starts with great awareness on the height of their hips and their front side mechanics.
The fun part for my staff and me during this block is to witness the athletes realizing that as their speed increases, they’re able to generate more force with each ground contact. It’s even more rewarding to explain that the challenge they face as speed increases is that there’s less time available to apply force. A cue that’s worked time and time again for us is, “The only difference between flying and sprinting is ground contact.”

The only difference between flying and sprinting is ground contact. Share on X

Once they meet the sprinting requirements, they transition to the weight room with isometrics as well as true dynamic effort a la Westside Barbell. Isometrics seem to be all the rage again in the industry, so I’ll spare you the physiology lesson. Here are the benefits from isometrics that deserve mention:

• Motor unit recruitment which will increase the number of muscle fibers that will engage or fire.
• Rate coding will increase the rate at which the motor units fire, which then leads to a spike in muscular tension.
• Isometrics will divert maximal energy from the eccentric phase directly to the concentric phase with minimal (or no) loss of energy.

During this block, we’ve had great buy-in and greater success with max effort, double response jumps to mimic the acceleration phase by still employing a somewhat deep knee bend. A tried and true variation we love is double broad jumps–effective and efficient. That’s a win-win.

July and August

Moving into July, we progress toward sport specific or what I prefer to call sport transferable. Our tempos become more intensive, and we center sprints on absolute speed. Bioenergetically, by having shorter distances and rest times for the tempos while giving the athletes a more powerful engine and larger speed reserve, we’re giving them the best opportunity to not only survive during a game but to thrive. Football is an alactic-aerobic sport with an emphasis on capacity.

Here’s how we prepare our athletes on a typical Saturday afternoon:

• Average play is 5 seconds.
• Average rest between plays is 28-37 seconds.
• Average series is 5-6 plays.
• Average rest between series is 9-10 minutes.
• Average special teams play 7-8 seconds.

The game dictates what we do bioenergetically. While we’re not perfect, I’m confident we’re on the right track.

It doesn’t take an MIT graduate to understand we’re now placing a premium on “displaying your strength quickly” in the weight room, with the institution of the concentric or reactive phase, the short and multiple response jumps and plyometrics, and the priority Tier being dynamic.
A quick note on deloads: use them before your athletes need them. We back our guys down once a month. As Dr. Bryan Mann said, “Our body runs in three-week adaptation waves.” With that, we extract as much as we can from a given stimulus and then rejuvenate the organism. It’s not what you can do; it’s what you can recover from.

High/Low CNS Training

We use the high/low approach made famous by the late Charlie Francis. We are our athletes’ stress managers for the twelve weeks they’re with us, and this approach allows them to supercompensate constantly rather than seek homeostasis.

High CNS Training

After reviewing our weekly template, one could safely assume that our program revolves around sprinting. Why shouldn’t it? Speed kills. Allow me to quell your concerns regarding having only one day that addresses agility and jumps/plyometrics. We’re able to improve agility without venturing into that realm through linear acceleration and sprinting. How? Having your athletes sprint farther and faster in training allows them to reach higher speeds, thus achieving higher ground force. As we all know, high velocity=high force. Derek Hansen has touched on the multitude of benefits sprinting has when it comes to agility:

• Improved change of direction.
• Improved jumping ability (sprinting is a plyometric due to the flight phase).
• Ability to decelerate quicker.
• Less wear and tear (due to a decrease in agility/COD training).

When the organism is in a state of high velocity and high force, they reap the rewards of agility training without any of the risk. If we’re honest, we know agility and change of direction are hard on the organism. Knowing that, why venture into that realm of risk when it’s accomplished by sprinting full-speed?

Linear acceleration and sprints train agility, allowing us to reduce risky plyometrics. Share on X

Real world example: when Michael Vick was in his prime, he achieved maximal speeds at over 20 miles per hour (21.63 mph to be exact). When he was achieving at least 95% of his best times in max velocity speed training, submaximal velocities would be that much easier on him.
I believe that all team sport athletes need to tap into max velocity (absolute speed). Forget the benefits it has regarding jumping and change of direction, sprinting alone has a plethora of benefits, including:

• If it’s strength you seek, max velocity sprinting will drive up weights, because it is 5x ground reaction forces, 7x muscle-skeletal forces, and the organism is applying anywhere from 600 to 1,000lbs of force with each stride.
• It’s the safest expression of fight or flight. Derek Hansen said, “When a cheetah is chasing a springbok, does either animal pull a hamstring?”
• Sprinting enhances the organism’s speed reserve. Simply put, as we increase an athlete’s absolute speed, their submaximal velocity (or game speed) raises as well. Sprinting builds endurance; endurance does not build speed.
• Performing max velocity sprinting is a method of injury prevention. We’ve all seen a breakaway run in American football where the player blows his hamstring. This is because he did not do max velocity sprinting in training or practice, which led to a neurological misstep in his recruitment patterns.

Aside from the benefits of exposing our athletes to sprint work thrice during the work week, there are also substantial costs. The most glaring is the residual training effect of maximal speed. The benefits gained from training at or above 95% of maximal speed last a measly two days (depending on the athlete) as the residual training effects of this biomotor ability are five days ± three days.

A Typical CNS Day

On a typical high CNS day, we use my friend Mike Robertson’s R7 protocol:

• R1: Release
• R2: Reset
• Dynamic Warm-Up
• R3: Reactive
• R4: Readiness (Game Changers)
• R5: Resistance
• R6: Resiliency
• R7: Recovery

Release–For the release portion, we prescribe no more than three areas for the athletes to perform self-myofascial release. We stick to three because I believe if we prescribe more, we start to venture into the parasympathetic realm. As all of you know, we’re trying to shift to sympathetic dominance on a high CNS day.

Resets–I admit we’re not postural restoration wizards, nor are we great with functional movement screening when it comes to resets. However, my director of performance, Thomas Bowes, is a mobility guru on all things Supple Leopard. We know what we’re proficient at, and our guys feel good, mobile and stable, and that’s all that matters.

Dynamic Warm-Ups–After we’ve relieved some tension and moved the guys into more advantageous positions, we start our dynamic warm-up. Trust me, it’s nothing earth shattering. Again, I may not be the smartest guy in the room; I just apply what the best have done. We have great success with flowing yoga movement patterns as well as Buddy Morris’ high CNS warm-up.

Reactive–The optimal volume for a world-class sprinter is 600 meters of max velocity. Newsflash, I do not work with world-class sprinters, so we adjusted our sprinting volumes based on position to meet the demands of our athletes. Our reactive segment taps into 100-300 meters of sprint volume. Dan Pfaff says, “Acceleration is a skill.” We believe that any skill needs to be addressed daily. The lineman will do at least 60 meters every single day, big skill will perform at least 100 meters every single day, and skill will be exposed to at least 150 meters every single day.

The closer an athlete is to the football, the more he requires strength. Share on X

This is where our program may be unique: a linemen’s exposure to the reactive segment is rather brief, but his time during our resistance segment is much more extensive. This is because the closer an athlete is to the football, the more he requires strength. The relationship between strength and speed is inverse for our skill players. Their time during the reactive portion will be far greater than time spent in the weight room as their position demands more sprint volume with less of a premium on strength and weights.

Readiness–The bridge from sprint work to the weight room is what we call game changers, or readiness. Joe Kenn calls it halftime. Vernacular does not matter, substance does. This portion consists of:

• Posterior chain–hinge, knee flexion, or spinal erector
• Posterior shoulder–abduction, adduction; downward, upward rotation; protraction, retraction, or elevation, depression
• Abdominals–anti-extension, flexion, rotation
• Neck

We’ve found this is highly effective at the beginning of the weights segment to ensure the proper muscles are firing before the “meat” of the lift. For example, hinging before a deadlift or performing a knee flexion variation before squatting. From a more practical standpoint, as the workout nears the end, what athlete is going to be fully engaged if we place this portion at the end?

Resistance–We love Coach Kenn’s Tier System for resistance; this game is played head-to-toe, toe-to-head. I have yet to see a football player use only his upper body in the first half and his lower body in the second half. That alone provides enough rationale to address the total body each weight session. Our weights are extremely simple, efficient, and effective. We only use three exercises each workout–yes, only three. Volumes are adjusted based on position, but we make it known that we are concerned with speed, not weights. A typical session would look similar to this:

Resiliency–For us, resiliency means bringing the athletes through movements that are cyclical (running A’s, ankle jumps) because of the following:

• Typically all movements in the weight room are acyclical.
• Sport is cyclical. We want to bring them back to what they’ll face on the field.
• Cyclical movements re-establish proper intermuscular coordination between the agonist and antagonist. As Charlie Francis once said, “It is not how fast you can contract a muscle, it is how quickly you can relax.”

Recovery–Again, nothing ground breaking when it comes to recovery. We prescribe the guys elevate their feet and achieve a parasympathetic state, or “rest and digest” to help kick-start the recovery process. With early 20-year-olds, this is a popular time for Snapchat sharing and selfies–not a bad promotion for our facility. If it gets them to relax, I’ll take it.

Low CNS Training

On the low days, we prescribe tempos based on position. Larger athletes (lineman) won’t have the same volume that a cornerback performs. Our ranges will vary anywhere from 1000-2000 meters; at the beginning of the summer we focus more on extensive tempos and progress toward (slightly) more intensive and glycolytic tempos in July and August.

Along with the tempos, we prescribe upper body circuits that include medicine ball throws. This accomplishes a few things for the athletes:

• The nutrient rich blood, or the pump, will flush out any toxins and waste accumulated from the previous day’s high CNS session. And let’s be honest, it provides a psychological benefit as well. The guys feel good after a brief upper body workout.
• The low volume from the circuit will aid in recovery for the next day’s high CNS session.
• If you pay attention to Charlie’s system, you can have a high CNS component on a low CNS day as long as it’s brief. With that in mind, we moved our medicine ball throws (with indirect transfer to sprinting based on the specific variation) to our low days a la Buddy Morris.

Conclusion

By the end of the summer, these young men have developed bonds that carry over into the season as they mention one another on Twitter, post pics of their new friends’ success on Instagram, and are truly invested in each other’s careers. It’s one of the best parts of being in the private sector–the relationships.

My goal for this article is not to brag or boast, but to simply shed light on how we’ve found great success. And, speaking candidly, I hope this will encourage other coaches to be as open as I am so we may all benefit and continue to learn from one another. I am not naïve to the fact that, with this article, may come criticism. I have zero issue with this, as there is no perfect program. The program I presented to you is different from what we did in years past and will continue to change and evolve because training, by nature, is incomplete. In fact, as Buddy Morris once told me, “The best program is the one you’re not on!” With that in mind, let us professionals continue to pay it forward, grow, and ultimately help those we serve. This is truly what this industry is all about.

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To Catch or not to Catch, that is the question!

Let’s get to it—I prefer the Clean High Pull to the Power Clean in the competitive, athletic population. I will provide some common sense and scientific support for my claim that might persuade some readers and, at the least, get folks to think a bit. Note that I’m not implying that Olympic-style weightlifters (who I refer to as weightlifters from here on out) are not athletic. However, for this article, “athletic population” will refer to non-competitive weightlifters: those who weight lift to help them in their sport. “Weightlifters” will refer to those athletes whose sport is only weightlifting.

The Power Clean and Clean High Pull in Athletics

The power clean has been around for at least my 35-year coaching tenure and will continue far past it. As a former short-time competitive weightlifter and mentee of the likes of John Garhammer, Bob Takano, Bob Ward, Harvey Newton, and Al Vermeil, not only do I love the lift but some of the best coaches taught me the lift and the science! This includes the 1980 Garhammer paper I still believe is the foundational work on the lifts, “Power production by Olympic weightlifters” in Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise (MSSE). More about this body of work later.

So, full disclosure, I love the lift and the physiological and biomechanical contributions it makes to the appropriate sports. That said, and as I have said many times before, I don’t want to do what works… I want to do what works best! Over the years, I have questioned several philosophies and methods (as we all should), and have proven to myself through educational recourse that just because we have done something for a while, it doesn’t confirm that it is the best option.

Thomas Paine said, “A long habit of not thinking a thing wrong, gives it a superficial appearance of being right…” No place exemplifies this like athletics; in particular, strength and conditioning. And it wasn’t until 10 years ago, after several re-reads of Garhammer’s research, that it hit me that the power clean might fall under the “this-is-what-we’ve-always-done” heading.

Problems with the Power Clean

It’s easy to adopt the power clean as THE lift to do for athletes, considering that jumping high and running fast are important for athletic success. There is no shortage of papers on Olympic lifts and their relationship to vertical jumping. These include Canavan, P.K., et. al. (1996), Garhammer, J., et. al. (1992), and Stone, M.H., et al. (1980), to name a very few. Vertical jumping and the power clean have similar biomechanical characteristics.

In addition, physiology and biomechanics can lead one to a safe hypothesis (there are very few focused studies) that, if an athlete can jump high, they most likely are fast in sprints shorter than 20 yards. Anecdotally, we’ve all heard the stories of those who power clean big weights and jump high as well. Jim Schmitz, in the article “Jumping and Weightlifting” for IronMind, talks of world-class weightlifters and their jumping feats:

“When Ken Patera (the first American to clean and press and clean and jerk 500 lb. (227 kg) was training with me in 1972, I told him that I had read that Paul Anderson (1956 Olympic Champion and considered the strongest man that ever lived) could do a standing long jump of 10’ (3 m). Ken said he was sure he could exceed that and told me to get a tape measure. I did and we marked his starting point. With a slight dip he jumped, and we measured 10’-6” (3.2 m). He said, “Let me try that again,” so he did and this time we measured 11’ (3.35 m)! Ken said he was sure he could go further, but the landing was hurting his knees since he weighed 335 lb. (152 kg) at the time.

…Another lifter who could jump was Tom Stock (1978, 1979, and 1980 U.S. champion super heavyweight), who could do a vertical jump and reach of 39.3” (1 m) at a bodyweight of 303 lb. (137.5 kg) and height of 6’-1” (1.85 m). Mark Henry (1992 and 1996 U.S. super heavyweight Olympian) could dunk a basketball at a bodyweight of around 374 lb. (170 kg) and a height of 6’-2” (1.87 m). Shane Hamman (U.S. super heavyweight record holder and 2000 and 2004 Olympian) was also reported to be able to dunk a basketball at a bodyweight of 352 lb. (160 kg) and at a height of 5’- 9” (1.75 m).”

I certainly understand all this and have for nearly 35 years, but here are a few of my problems with the power clean:

1. Nothing about the catch (turning the bar over and landing it on the shoulder) translates to the field, pool, or court.

The only non-athletic thing about the power clean IS the catch! This is biomechanically and physiologically useless for an athlete to help improve sports performance. Yet, special steps must be taken to teach the maneuver—increase flexibility of the wrist, include front squat into a program to help teach the “rack,” or separate rack flexibility exercises. Wrist inflexibility seems to be the biggest issue with the catch, and at times detracts from the very thing we are trying to achieve—power!

For example, both Athletes A and B pull the same load (140kgs) to the same height, proportional to their stature. Athlete A “racks” the bar in good form for a max 1RM. However, due to wrist issues, Athlete B cannot rack the load but was successful at a lighter load (120kgs) for no other reason than it was lighter; his 1RM is 120kgs. We all know this happens too often.

In this case, the power developed during the second pull was the same for both athletes, but Athlete B gets penalized not for power output, which we are trying to achieve, but for wrist inflexibility. Also, because of that, the power clean data—data indicating power—is now unreliable because Athlete B (and perhaps others) are being judged on wrist flexibility and not peak or average power.

2. Catch depths are different from athlete to athlete.

Split catches, catching the bar with feet spread even wider than a wide squat stance, and ¼-½-¾-full squat catch positions all significantly change the dynamics of the lift, specifically pulling height and squat strength contribution. Here again, any data gathered for team averages is not valid or reliable unless every athlete catches the bar at the same height in a similar manner.

3. The catch is more important than the lift.

In other words, as long as you catch it, it’s good! Whatever happens between the ground and the catch is an “oh well” proposition. It’s painful to watch bad technique on posted videos and there is no shortage of that. Some folks should plead the fifth because the clips are incriminating evidence of bad coaching. Legs straightening at liftoff (moment of separation—MOS); backs rounding coming out of a squat of any depth; hips rising before the shoulders; bars rolling from chest to shoulder upon contacting the body; bar trajectories that are too far from the body and, as a result, the lifter hops forward; elbows too close to the body; and on and on.

When I watch these videos, I can only assume that the catch is all that is asked for. I’d be the first to say—although I might be Boyleing (a Mike Boyle saying turned into a verb)—that you can literally correct some technical aspect of the power clean on every rep. It’ll never be perfect, especially with a population that does more than just lift. Still, the most important parts of the lift are everything except the catch, from the moment the bar separates from the platform to the second pull just above waist height. A fact that is not trivial: If an athlete’s MOS is not good, the remainder of the lift cannot be corrected and therefore is not good… Even if there is a catch, it should be red-lighted!!

Using the Power Clean Way Too Early in the Training

During Robert Newton’s presentation, “Latest in Strength and Conditioning – ACSS 2013 Keynote Address- Part 1 of 2,” he illustrates and discusses power training versus strength training. His question is the same as ours with “not strong” athletes—collegiately, this would be the inexperienced and weaker frosh group or those that have not acquired a strength standard—is “What do we do?” Do we do power training (e.g., Olympic lifts), or should we get them strong first?

Beginning with the power clean early in the training experience is ineffective in creating power, says @Coach_Alejo. Share on X

My hope is that I force you to watch the entirety of Newton’s fantastic presentation by not going into too much detail here. Nevertheless, his conclusions show that those that start power training first produce less power than those who strength train first and power train later in the same given time period. Then there’s the four weeks or more of teaching the phases of the lift (I’ve seen coaches spend too much time on the phases, most of which the athlete never adopts), where there is not enough load to get any sort of strength OR power adaptation during that time period. And, with all the time constraints collegiately and coaches complaining of how little time they have, beginning with the power clean early in the training experience is ineffective in creating power and a poor use of time.

As a side note, squat cleans are killing the emphasis on vertical explosion—pulling height, triple extension.

As a reminder here, I am talking about the athletic population, not the weightlifting community. However, the weightlifters are my comparison. Weightlifters perfectly match the speed, load, and effort so that the height they pull the bar is as high as they can pull it. It is a rare athlete that matches the speed, load, and effort.

What I’m seeing is athletes pulling the bar just high enough—when it appears to be a load that can be pulled higher—to get underneath the bar to squat it. And, in several cases, the weight being squatted looks to be pretty damn heavy in comparison to the pull as witnessed by rounded backs. The opposite is true for many weightlifters—it’s the pull that is the most difficult piece; rising out of the squat is easier if not the same difficulty. By the way, when a light weight is pulled to sub-max height, this means the athlete has purposely slowed the bar down. What other top-end powerful movement arises when velocity is purposely decreased?

So then, I ask, “Why are we performing the clean?” Clearly not for power, if it’s not max speed for the load and therefore not max height. If the answer is that squat strength is being targeted, then why not just have a great squat program and work on power by producing more speed and effort and catch the bar higher in a quarter-half squat position? Or taking a page from weightlifters, why not do a 2+2: two power cleans + two front squats?!

Looking at the Clean High Pull

“…most of the mechanical work of lifting the barbell (snatch) and his (athlete) center of mass by the time the bar has reached a position slightly above waist height. At this instance his body is fully extended and supported on the balls of the feet, the bar has reached its maximum velocity, and the force applied to the bar has decreased to almost zero.”
–John Garhammer, “Power production by Olympic weightlifters”

Although Garhammer is alluding to the snatch here, you can hypothesize that the power clean and most of its virtues come to an end after the bar reaches approximately waist height or so. My concern is that most coaches know how to coach the lift, or at least have gone to good sources to learn how to coach the lift, but do not know the kinesiology of the lift. I think the lift is taken for granted for no other reason than everyone does it.

There’s always talk of the physiology and movement related to the lift, its benefits to sport, and how it must therefore be good—and it is—but I don’t think it’s the best option given the intent. I know the clean high pull is the best option for producing power effectively, triple extension, and terrific technique, all of which contribute to common physical characteristics needed for success in sports.

Why the Clean High Pull?

Part of this answer has already been mentioned earlier as some of my issues with the power clean. Here are a few more reasons: The clean high pull is easier to teach and execute, is more versatile in relation to different speeds and pull heights, has less (if any) of a chance of cutting the pull short if coached correctly, is easier to assess individually or as a team, always matches load to effort, and can always match load to speed.

I know the clean high pull is the best option for producing power effectively…and great technique, says @Coach_Alejo. Share on X

1. Focus on Vertical Explosion

With the clean high pull, there is no wondering about when to get under the bar, producing vertical power, catching the bar but not being able to come out of the squat—thus missing the lift—or worrying about wrist inflexibility at heavier loads. You just pull as hard and as high as possible! And there are no worries about coming off the ground in proper position—if coached well, the weight will be submaximal to weights lifted prior. I have experienced my share of high pull maxes surpassing the clean deadlift maxes at some point, so that’s something to think about. At every weight, the athlete pulls as hard and as high as possible. So much so that it’s not unusual for stronger athletes to pull the warm-up loads nose-high or at some point begin with light snatches as a warmup.

2. Absolute Measure of a Green-Lighted Lift

I remember reading in a research paper that, in that particular study, during the competitive snatch the barbell was fixed overhead at two-thirds of the lifter’s body height. Higher or lower is not the issue, but I knew I couldn’t test the pull unless I had a stable testing protocol; a conclusive point. I also knew that I wanted a faster, higher pull because the athletic population needed that versus a slower/lower pull—I wanted an extended pull, not a jump shrug, which I think is a training mistake. I settled on sternum height at the xiphoid process. In a team setting, I wasn’t going to record every lift in slow motion to see that the lift was exactly at sternum height, if only as a practical matter. But for my purposes, it was reliable across the groups.

3. Teaching from the Bottom Up for an Earlier and Better Strength Base

I like the bottom up, or if pushed, another method that I and Craig Sowers, the former Director of Olympic Sports at NC State, termed “convergence.” My primary reason for teaching from the ground first is so that we can immediately work on strength. Very, very few exercises connect the posterior chain in unison better than the clean deadlift. Okay, the first day or two is limited to technical aspects, but every day after we add weight. Plus, if I have a strong belief in the MOS, the fundamental piece of any pull from the ground, wouldn’t it be the first thing I would work on?

It’s called intent: What am I doing and why. Convergence is working from the bottom up and from the top down within the same training phases. If a coach is compelled to work on the top portion of the lift first, so be it. Nevertheless, you can’t ignore the necessary strength needed from the floor if you want to produce optimal and peak power and speed. So, perform a solid clean deadlift routine one to two times per week and schedule some low-volume and low-intensity work on the second pull one to two times per week.

4. Less Complex Technique Than the Power Clean and, Thus, Easier to Learn/Teach

It’s all in the title. There are two teaching phases of the lift, and they’re easily taught and therefore easily learned. All for more power and speed! I will emphasize that the clean deadlift makes a huge contribution to learning the clean high pull for one reason: half of the clean high pull is technically sound and the athlete is adequately strong after 30+ weeks of repetitious technique and strength acquisition.

No one can deny that it takes weeks, if not months, for a power clean to look like a power clean and to use a load that allows for any benefit while learning. Haug, et al., 2015 (thanks Tim Suchomel) points out that it took a “minimal investment of 4 weeks to achieve increases in vertical power production.” Aren’t we always talking about how little time we have?! I promise you that on the first day and first rep of high pulling, a benefit is gained. Here again, density of training and time is the key—less time to teach for more power and speed.

5. Better Manipulation of Intensities for a Full Force-Velocity Effect

As Dr. Suchomel puts it (more about Tim and his research later), “force-velocity overload” can occur over a variety of successful pulling ranges. With a power clean, it’s a clean or it isn’t—there’s no work in between. Essentially, there are more benefits from the pull that cannot be achieved with a catch.

If you want to work on the strength end of the spectrum, work at heavier loads can be executed and remain at high speed with a slightly lower pull height. Higher velocities (higher pulling heights) can be performed at lighter loads without compromising technique. Unfortunately, the power clean is one of the few exercises where the load must be heavy enough to correctly execute it; a pull too high means the bar crashes the shoulders on the catch. In addition, assigning an arbitrary range of 70-80% for best power outputs is a mistake, especially when the pulls are not max effort or height.

With a power clean, it’s a clean or it isn’t—there’s no work in between. Essentially, there are more benefits from the pull that cannot be achieved with a catch.

Tracking bar speeds and power out of the clean high pull with the Power Lift laser, I found that top power outputs were occurring at 75-82.5% with speeds of 2.39m/s-1.59m/s, and I programmed each individual based on their max speed or power where applicable. Not coincidentally, the strongest athletes had the best pulling speed.

The First Step: The Clean Deadlift

First, the progression begins with the clean-style deadlift! I believe as strongly in this as I do the clean high pull. I propose that collegiate freshmen, transfers, or a beginner at any age for that matter, clean-style deadlift for at least 15 weeks of strength and technical emphasis in addition to one in-season cycle. I have found the percentage increase in strength, as well as the downside of staying too long in a strength phase, dictate the length of period I mentioned. You can count on the athlete setting a new deadlift 1RM during the season.

In the example of a freshman NCAA basketball player, it will be 16-21 weeks of strength and technical acquisition depending on what summer session they attend. This will happen in a 25-week period that has four weeks of no training due to breaks in the academic calendar. Next come 18 in-season weeks (low to very low volume, 60%-90%), not including post-season play. After two to four weeks of complete rest at the end of the season the new athlete will start the first day of clean high pulls.

Using NCAA soccer newcomers as an example, the heavy internal/external load of pre-season practice—magnified by athletes playing on summer teams and having little time for strength or conditioning sessions—is the perfect ground for very low volume technical work with a slow overload progression during the season. In this way, the technique should be solid by the start of the spring strength training cycle, and then it’s just a matter of choosing the right time and pace to overload up until the end of the school year. Returning for the second pre-season, again, it’s a great time for low-volume teaching and acquiring new power with the clean high pull. Coat-tailing onto Dr. Newton’s presentation, stronger athletes adapt to power training faster than those who start with power training, which supports beginning with strength work before the explosive movements.

The question could be, “If you are not performing a ballistic lift, what do you do to create power?” The easy science-based answer is, “We are creating power.” With inexperienced lifters, and experienced lifters that are inexperienced with pulling from the ground, gaining strength means improving power! The formula for power seems to be generally abused, and viewed as one-sided. The discussion is nearly always about creating speed to get power and the strength part of the equation is ignored. More often than not, strength is the limiting factor in creating power for no other reason than coaches like to get to the complex, exciting stuff before the athlete is strong enough to fully benefit from it.

Training for power and power training are two different things with the same outcome. In the weaker athlete, it’s summarized like this: The stronger you get, the higher you jump and the faster you run. Therefore, in that group, getting stronger is training for power. Full disclosure: During this base phase of deadlifting, the athletes performs a jump up on a box (24-36”) after each set for two repetitions. This teaches full vertical extension. The technique is simple to coach: the athlete should land on top of the box in the same position (hip, knee, and hip angle) as the takeoff.

The athlete must be technically efficient with the heaviest weight possible from the ground. To produce the fastest speeds at the heaviest loads while high pulling—or “cleaning”—the athlete must be able to optimize maximal strength AND technique during the first pull. I’m convinced that, to optimize the best weight to high pull, the deadlift must be close to topped out for two reasons:

1. You should never worry about whether you can get the weight off the ground correctly—never a concern for a weightlifter—let alone wonder if you can violently, vertically explode with the bar, catch, or no catch.
2. Reaching close to ceiling-level strength in the deadlift means that significant strength will not be a factor while learning the pull, when beginning at 40-50% of a 1RM clean deadlift.

Progression to the High Pull with the Clean

There are no phases here. My cues are visual (I demo) and audio (I describe what I want) and simple. Plus, they’ve already had the visual of seeing their teammates perform the clean high pull for months. As an example for our interns, I call them over and tell them that, while they’ve heard me describe the simple step in teaching the clean high pull, I want them to witness it firsthand. It goes like this:

Me: Deadlift the bar to just above the knee. When the bar gets here (pointing to the spot above the knee, as well as demonstrating the position), jump and pull the bar elbows high and bar close to the body.

Nine times out of 10 (no actual data for all you era-of-big-data folks), the athlete hits the first rep pretty damn well! That is to say, I don’t have much to fix at all. It’s not as if I have not personally dissected the lift from floor to catch and all positions in between—I have. I also believe that once you understand the entire lift from floor to finish (positions, transitions, cues), only then will the athlete you coach gain the most benefit.

That said, in all my years (with the exception of weightlifters), I have not seen the virtue in emphasizing positions for one to four weeks or more versus my description of the teaching method. Heresy? In the eyes of some. I just think those eyes are not saying “What works best.” It’s kind of like today’s training cards, which have morphed into PowerPoints with all the colors, grids, exercise, warmups, and technical lists! Some say it’s for the athletes’ benefit. I say the athletes could care less. The athletes just want to know what they should do; they don’t care what color or what artistic way somebody presents it. This seems mostly for the coach’s benefit.

Video 1: The conventional clean pull has a lower projection of the bar, but similar benefits. The clean high pull comes farther up than this, and other variations exist, such as using blocks or racks. Source: Brad Deweese.

There are some who say, “I don’t like the high pulls because my athletes drop down after the pull.” To those I reply, “They don’t drop down to catch the bar in a power clean?” Some also say, “I don’t like when they spread their feet out like a jumping jack after the pull.” Frankly, I don’t care if they moonwalk after the high pull. As long as they get to the position shown in the picture, which is the position we are training for, I’m good with it because we are getting the training intent and effect.

Research on Pulling Derivatives and Parting Wisdom

Paul Comfort and Tim Suchomel have been doing great research on pulling derivatives that don’t require a catch. Essentially, they have questioned some previously unquestioned Olympic lifting methods for athletes, such as the comparison of power cleans and clean high pulls and power output, forces during the catch (eccentric, concentric) versus forces on catching a high pull at the hip as the bar is descending, and comparing speed and power at a given percentage of a 1RM power clean and the metrics of the same load in a clean high pull.

The power clean has been a staple of training programs for athletes for more than 40 years. Valuable research has noted the athletic benefits of the power clean (vertical jumps, sprinting). However, the clean high pull appears to have greater versatility in that a wider range of force-velocity training (resulting in higher speeds and power outputs) can be performed without compromising technique.

Clearer testing parameters can also be implemented for the clean high pull, thereby making the data more reliable, and it is easier to teach and learn than the power clean by virtue of fewer steps and less complexity. If economy of time and effect is the intent, along with creating more power and speed at different intensities with a total body movement, the clean high pull just might be your movement!

Everybody seems to be process-driven, and sometimes I worry because I am not. Without a doubt, outcomes are and have always been my driver. I struggle with the concept of putting a process in place so the outcomes take care of themselves. Surely your starting point should be outcomes—how can you even begin to define a process without knowledge of what that process should produce?!

In my early years of S&C, outcomes were easy: a heavier squat, more muscle mass, less body fat, increased aerobic power output, etc. This changed dramatically after a conversation with Professor Yuri Verkhoshansky. I had been questioning the relevance of squat strength to rugby union, assuming it was important and that strength levels would directly impact my players’ abilities. He made two points that stick with me to this day and define how I have tried to work ever since:

1. “The squat strength of rugby players should be very strong, but this strength is a side effect of the training you perform and not the measured outcome.”
2. “The transfer of strength to a sport will depend on how strength is developed. With bodybuilding, this means there can be little transfer; developed through explosive methods there is much greater transfer.”

This made me realize I needed to consider two essential factors in my programming and planning. The first was a sport-specific outcome measure that measured the success of my program. The second was a realization that the way in which you develop physiological qualities is at least as important as the qualities you develop.

Before introducing any process of training, you need to determine your desired outcomes. Share on X

It made me realize that I had to find my outcomes before any process of training was introduced.

Finding an Outcome

Prof. Verkhoshansky’s most-reproduced illustration shows clearly labeled outcomes (Figure 1). The factor “W” is a sport-specific quality that relates directly to performance.

In a distance runner, this sport-specific outcome could be velocity at aerobic threshold. In a sprinter, it might be maximum velocity or time to achieve maximum velocity. “W” is always sport-specific, and it relates to the ability to improve sports performance.

In team sports, finding your “W” is a little more difficult. People might correctly state that all that matters in team sports is the result at the end of the match. Unfortunately, this may not truly reflect the success of a physical development program. Most would agree that budget and recruitment likely have a greater impact on results than any S&C program or system.

For a long time, I persevered with measures of jumping ability or explosive strength, and these had definite advantages in monitoring and predicting performance. However, I have since concluded that they only indicate readiness, and any change in performance probably results from recovery and not a change in actual playing ability.

Over the last 26 months I have gone further, spending a considerable amount of energy and time attempting to determine which on-field actions differentiate good teams from not-so-good teams. What aspects of the game are the champions able to carry out that the also-rans cannot? With knowledge of the on-field actions that have the biggest impact on game result, I should (with enough data) be able to correlate or regress this information alongside players’ physiological abilities and discover which (if any) physical abilities really impact the game of rugby.

I can already hear the purists screaming at me, “Correlation is not causation!” I know this, but it’s a step forward from measuring readiness and two steps on from squat strength. The proof of the pudding comes when development of these physiological abilities produces corresponding changes in measured on-field actions (or doesn’t!).

At this time, I have a small regression equation that defines critical actions. By this, I mean it examines and differentiates between the actions all teams can do and the actions that only the best teams do well. It explains a large variance in the points accumulated this year in the Premier League; this confirms to me that these critical actions can be thought of as my “W.”

With this as my marker, I can go a step farther and look at which physical abilities actually predict a player’s performance in these critical actions. The following tables show summaries of these results. The statistical outcomes used physical data and on-field activity from 50 international rugby players.

Physical Ability and On-Field Performance Markers

From the regression, we can determine that a model based on physiological ability explains around 40% of player variability in critical actions. In a game like rugby union, it’s not too surprising that 60% of this ability remains unexplained; the best players have the physical abilities, plus the technical and tactical awareness to make the best of these physiological qualities. In reality, 40% still gives us a large proportion to try and improve on.

Relative peak power output appears to be an important quality in rugby players. We can examine its relative contribution in comparison to other measure of physical ability (Figure 3).

Type of Training to Improve Critical Game Actions in Rugby Union

Current paradigms instill in us the importance of being specific in the work we do. So, normally we would look at a series of rules to define specific work and produce a selection of exercises and a plan of action based around them. There is an issue with this. I looked through some data regarding training times and where we apply most of our effort in the sport of rugby union. One calculation stood out for me: On average, we spent 84% of our available time performing sport-specific training and 16% of our time on general work.

This calculation assumes that all the work we did in the gym was classified as general (which would not be the case), so my statement would read: More than 84% of available time doing specific work, less than 16% doing general work. This says to me that I should use the small amount of time I have available performing general exercises that give me the most “bang for my buck.”

It probably explains why, over the years, instincts led me to always have squats, dead lifts, or cleans in my program. I am not a big prescriber of unilateral work—it’s not that I don’t think it offers something, it’s more that I feel that don’t cover as many bases. Besides, players spend 84% of their training time doing unilateral or offset activities like running, cutting, and jumping.

If I can’t put in place exercises that are specific to movement patterns when classified according to joint angle, amplitude of movement, muscle work regimes, etc., I still try to focus on producing an athlete engine that is specific to needs and requirements. Thinking about the engine required, it is important to realize that critical actions involve other players. We attempt to move them in some way, whether through tackles or ball carries, and we generally work against heavy objects that weigh between 80kg and 130kg.

With this in mind, I feel much of my time needs to focus on being good at moving objects within these boundaries as fast and explosively as possible. This includes explosive squat jumps, clean and jerk, clean grip power snatch, etc. Sometimes I feel you don’t even need to be that specific about the relative ability of each player. If you’re weak and can’t move those loads fast, it becomes a maximal strength session (and that’s what you need). If you’re very strong and can move the bars quickly, then you’re not wasting time chasing maximal strength—you’re improving peak power output!

The data clearly illustrates that having high levels of peak power production relative to body weight is an advantage for rugby union players. There are several adaptations that can result in improved power output. These include:¹

A. Motor unit synchronization
B. Frequency of stimuli from CNS
C. Inter/intra muscular coordination
D. Golgi tendon inhibition
E. Rainshaw cell influence morphological structure of muscle (% fiber type)

When looking at adaptation, I have always favored Verkhoshansky’s idea that morphological adaption is more meaningful; it allows greater latitude for long-term development and changes may possibly be maintained for longer during detraining phases.

This has always made me curious about changing distributions of fiber types. We know that it’s probably not possible to change the number or percentage of type 2a fibers. We can, though, hypertrophy type 2 fibers selectively or preferentially over type 1 fibers, and different exercise protocols can impact the relative hypertrophy that occurs.^3,4,5,7 An elite athlete has demonstrated this.²

The best explanation I have read for an improvement in athletic ability when we preferentially increase the size of type 2a fibers comes from Carmel Bosco’s manual concerning the Bosco jump test. If you have not read this and want to improve maximal power outputs in athletes, it’s a fantastic resource and bests or matches any current literature.

According to Bosco, consider two subjects pushing one cart, with one subject fast (10m/s) and the other slow (5m/s). When they begin to push the cart at a slow pace, both can apply force. At speeds above 5m/s, the slow subject can make no contribution—he is a passenger and the fast subject does all the work. If both perform a hypertrophy program they can push harder at slow speeds, but at higher speeds the extra weight of the slower passenger he must push negates the impact of the hypertrophy of the fast subject. Only if we enhance the muscle mass of the fast subject will force then improve at high and slow speeds.¹

How Do We Induce Preferential Hypertrophy of Type 2a Fibers?

We can use Zatsiorsky’s explanation of the recruitment and hypertrophy process to envision how we can put together training programs that give us the potential to produce specific hypertrophy of type 2 fibers while minimizing changes in type 1 fibers.⁶

A. Training adaptation will only occur if magnitude of stimulus is above the habitual level (progressive).
B. Only fatigued or exhausted fibers will receive stimulation to adapt. Muscles fibers recruited but not fatigued will not adapt.
C. The rate of fatigue is differential between fast and slow fibers.

If we examine Figure 4 and Rules A, B, and C, we can safely conclude that the most effective way to stimulate the largest, most powerful motor units will be through high-force movements. We need to do enough work to fatigue these motor units, but not enough to fatigue the smaller, more fatigue-resilient, slower motor units. This way we can induce selective hypertrophy and improve power or explosive strength.

There are, of course, two possible ways that we can produce high-force movements through mass or through acceleration. Acceleration is an excellent method to stimulate many neural adaptations associated with improved power output. It does not, however, place enough mechanical stress on the muscle to degrade protein structures (at least in low rep sets) and ensure fiber hypertrophy.

We need to stimulate and fatigue large fibers with heavy weights, and terminate work at a point before fatigue accumulates in smaller, slower fibers. This sounds suspiciously like velocity-based training. Is it possible the success we achieve with velocity-based training is due to selective fiber hypertrophy, rather than simply being due to “moving the bar quickly,” which is apparently sport-specific?

Changes in the type 2a fiber cross-sectional area have been demonstrated after velocity-based training based on a 20% fall in bar speed. There was no change seen with a 40% drop in bar speed.⁸ Unfortunately, the differences at the end of the study were not large enough to be significant.

Can Weightlifting Offer a Solution to Training for Peak Power and Selective Hypertrophy?

Weightlifting is an extremely effective method for developing power. It has been shown to be more effective than traditional resistance training methods, and results in greater performance improvements.^9,10,11 Weightlifters have also demonstrated preferential hypertrophy of type 2a fibers.¹²

Coaches frequently discuss the triple extension in Olympic weightlifting, and its specificity in terms of movement pattern to many sports actions such as jumping and sprinting. The triple extension is frequently quoted as the reason weightlifters can jump so high. The reason that weightlifters jump so well may be more related to the specific hypertrophy of type 2a fibers than to practicing the triple extension. The Kazakhstan lifting team believes that training should be planned with the specific hypertrophy of type 2a fibers as a desired and essential outcome.¹³

Weightlifting as a training methodology for sports tends to divide coaches. I don’t think weightlifting is essential, but it is a tool to use with the right individuals who have the motivation and ability. It’s also a tool with some unique qualities. I think it is important that coaches realize that placing some power cleans into their program does not make it a program based on weightlifting, no more than adding chins means your program is gymnastics-based. If you are not using a weightlifting program, then you will not see the benefits.

Where possible, I prefer to choose weightlifting exercises that are self-regulating and thus ensure the same benefits as VBT without the need for measures. By self-regulating, I mean that an athlete can only complete the lift while fatigue levels are low and speed of movement is high; this way, I am assured of fatiguing and promoting adaptation in type 2 fibers only.

If, for example, we compare clean and jerk to a clean pull with a prescribed weight of 85% max, you will not be able to clean and certainly not be able to jerk the bar once velocity begins to fall. Type 2 fibers are essential in the movement and, as such, when fatigued the set terminates whether you like it or not. On the other hand, a clean pull allows you to keep moving and “succeeding” at the lift even when velocity falls past “critical.” If you include lifts that are not self-regulating in your program and your desired outcome is preferential hypertrophy, it’s essential to monitor speed of movement. If you can’t do this, lifts need to be low in repetition range (less than three to four reps).

Lifts that I would personally class as self-regulating are:

1. All variants of classic lifts—snatch, clean, and clean and jerk
2. Power snatch, clean grip power snatch
3. Power clean and jerk or power jerk

Can Weightlifting Offer Any Other Advantages When It Comes to Peak Power Production and Rugby?

1. You will likely handle weights that are close to those in a game (bodyweight of other players). This places you in an area of the F/T curve that is specific to the sport. This is not the case with medicine ball work, ballistic exercises, or plyometrics. In terms of power requirements for critical actions in rugby union, it was interesting to note that RSI was only classed as an indicator when peak power output was excluded from the calculations. It had a high co-correlation with peak power and simply indicates players most likely to have the greatest relative peak power outputs, rather than being a defining factor. I am keen to look at a larger sample of elite payers, but currently these results downplay the need for plyometric training.
2. Clusters, which we know are a great way of developing power and explosive strength, are natural to the exercises. Not too many people will complete 3x clean and jerks without stopping to catch their breath!
3. We know that we have to be strong at different joint angles, and areas of accentuated force can change dramatically in team and combat sports where the positions that start and end critical actions will continually change. This can be covered in weightlifting. A complex is a fantastic opportunity to do this in one set: 3x clean and jerks can easily be prescribed as Rep 1) power clean from hips and power jerk; Rep 2) clean from knees and jerk; and Rep 3) clean from floor and jerk. This offers an instant solution to training varied joint angles and regions of accentuated force production.

We cover a lot of bases with a single exercise. For example, six sets of the above complex are 18 reps. In this, we cover at least the same ground as you would with RDL, front squats, and push press.

If you have a healthy athlete with no mobility issues, coaching lifts is easy. If you are having issues, you probably need to revisit your coaching technique rather than blame the difficulty on Olympic lifts.

Producing Your Desired Outcomes

Ensure your process produces the outcomes it should. Have measures in place that gauge your success and allow adjustments to your program to maintain progression and direction.

1. Define your outcome measure.
2. Investigate what physical abilities relate to the sport-specific outcome in your athlete population.
3. Determine how to train these abilities in a manner specific to your sport, what the cost of general fitness and training is to your base, and whether you compensate for any issues through exercise selections or training moralities that give you “bang for the buck.”
4. Is your program doing what is says on the tin? Does it improve peak power outputs of players relative to body mass?
5. Do improvements in athletes’ physical abilities produce improvements in critical activities? If not, change the way you train.
6. Do improvements in critical activities lead to better results? If not, revisit your critical activity analysis.

I hope that this has given insight into the way I view putting a training process together and how I measure a successful outcome. There are many ways to skin a cat and many are successful. I think it’s vital that we all learn to think through and justify our processes and decision-making, rather than relying on simply regurgitating what is spun on Twitter without any thought to the “what” and “why.”

Please feel free to contact me with any queries or questions. If you are keen to read more into selective hypertrophy, I suggest Dr. József Tihanyi’s paper, “Development of explosive strength according to muscle fiber types.”

Since you’re here…
…we have a small favor to ask. More people are reading SimpliFaster than ever, and each week we bring you compelling content from coaches, sport scientists, and physiotherapists who are devoted to building better athletes. Please take a moment to share the articles on social media, engage the authors with questions and comments below, and link to articles when appropriate if you have a blog or participate on forums of related topics. — SF

References

1. Strength assessment with the Bosco’s Test, Carmelo Bosco. The Italian Society of Sport Science 1999.
2. Fiber type characteristics and myosin light chain expression in a world champion shot putter. Int J Sports Med. 2003 Apr;24(3):203-7.
3. Effects of strength, endurance and combined training on myosin heavy chain content and fiber-type distribution in humans. Eur J Appl Physiol. 2004 Aug;92(4-5):376-84. Epub 2004 Jul 6.
4. Muscle hypertrophy in bodybuilders. Eur J Appl Physiol Occup Physiol. 1982;49(3):301-6. Eur J Appl Physiol Occup Physiol. 1979 Jan 10;40(2):95-106.
5. The effect of weight-lifting exercise related to muscle fiber composition and muscle cross-sectional area in humans. 6. Science and Practice of Strength Training. Zatsiorsky. Human Kinetics 1995.
6. The Role of Resistance Exercise Intensity on Muscle Fiber Adaptations. Sports Med 2004(10) 663-679
7. Effects of velocity loss during resistance training on athletic performance, strength gains and muscle adaptations. Scand J Med Sci Sports. 2016 Mar 31
8. Olympic weightlifting and plyometric training with children provides similar or greater performance improvements than traditional resistance training. J Strength Cond Res. 2014 Jun;28(6):1483-96
9. J Strength Cond Res. 2014 Jun;28(6):1483-96. J Strength Cond Res. 2004 Feb;18(1):129-35.
10. Olympic weightlifting training causes different knee muscle-coactivation adaptations compared with traditional weight training. J Strength Cond Res. 2012 Aug;26(8):2192-201
11. Unique aspects of competitive weightlifting: performance, training and physiology. Sports Med. 2012 Sep 1;42(9):769-90
12. Scientific – Methodological Aspects of Training the Kazakhstan Select Team. Bud Charniga. Sportivny Press 2014

“There is no such thing as overtraining, just poor recovery.”
— Shane Sutton, Former Technical Director of GB & Team Sky Cycling

Whether professional athlete or weekend warrior, their desire is to perform their given sport or activity to their optimal levels. To achieve this level of realization in their chosen craft there is no alternative but to practice, practice, practice, and then do more hard work. Athletes undertake training loads so that they, through physical and psychological over-loads, improve their body’s ability to achieve a personal goal in a race, squatting performance in the gym, or pitching performance from the mound.

However, if they don’t accurately manage these levels of workloads, it can cause “overtraining” via too many high-intensity loads and/or too much poor athlete regeneration. Sports/training loads and “life” stressors such as poor quality of sleep, sport or business travel, poor nutrition choices, and weight loss can all affect the well-being of the athlete and push them into a downward spiral of acute fatigue, over-reaching, overtraining, subclinical tissue damage, and time lost to injury and illness.^1,2

Many competitors work hard and push their body’s limits while also wanting to continue exercising day in and day out, without much thought given to their need for recovery and/or regeneration modalities until they fall ill or become injured. Yet, although “regeneration” is an extremely important piece of the “athlete performance jigsaw puzzle” and a balanced training schedule, it is very often the forgotten element.^3,4,5

Solving the Overtraining Conundrum

In my previous role as a performance coach with professional teams, I oversaw the care and well-being of as many as 30+ athletes. The important lessons I learned are that we are not all the same and we do not respond in the same manner to workloads or recovery.

For instance, soccer games were on Saturdays (although sometimes there were mid-week games), and Sunday was generally a travel day back from a game or a recovery day. On a recovery day, players performed “active recovery” (light to moderate loads), followed by hydrotherapy, vibration plate stretches and movements, and the wearing of compression apparel to aid with blood flow. I educated athletes on the importance of a good night’s quality sleep, good nutritional choices, and the timing of that nutrient intake.

Depending on the time within the season and number of minutes played, some players may still not be fully recovered for intense workloads during team training sessions on a Tuesday or Wednesday. These players may need longer warm-up or preparation protocols before joining their teammates. You may also need to hold them out of team loads on that particular training day and have them work with the performance coach in a one-to-one or small group setting so you can more easily monitor and support them.

No two athletes will respond in the same manner to exercise workloads and recovery practices. Share on X

Therefore, there are three main components to this overtraining conundrum and your ability to steer the athlete/weekend warrior down the right path:

1. External loads (their physical load);
2. Internal loads (physiological or perceptual responses);⁶ and
3. Athlete regeneration practices. External loads include measures such as distance run, speed, weight lifted, and even internal loads that capture heart rate, rate of perceived exertion and regeneration practices, and use of modalities such as hydrotherapy, nutrition (timing), compression items, quality sleep, massage, and vibration plates, to name a few recovery routines.

Work Hard + Recover Well = Best Performance⁷

Exercise loads alone will not achieve those personal goals or results, as everyone from the elite to “middle-aged warrior” needs time to adapt to training stimuli and allow sufficient recovery from fatigue or depletion of the physiological and neurological systems involved. Unfortunately, there can be no “one size fits all” mentality, as no two athletes will respond in the same manner to the exercise workloads and recovery practices.

Thus, careful monitoring and tracking of training sessions, external and internal loads, and either observations by a qualified coach or careful self-evaluations (such as recording resting heart rate, noting the quality/quantity of sleep, body weight fluctuations or feelings of consistent tiredness) allows for an understanding of the athlete’s ability to cope with the demands set in the training program. Which regeneration processes are most effective will probably depend on individual preferences and is most likely a combination of practiced methods.^8,9

An Athlete Case Study with Major League Baseball

Now, while an acute injury is more easily identifiable, injuries related to overuse are a culmination of repeated loads leading to tissue maladaptation and they occur gradually over time.² These overuse injuries can appear in many varying forms and are associated with, among others: biomechanical variances due to insufficient loading patterns; extended muscle soreness/tenderness; depletion in muscle energy/health values (Chart 1); various biomarkers showing decreased hemoglobin; decreased serum iron; mineral deficiencies; varying mood swings; flu-like symptoms; swelling of lymph glands; and more.

I worked with this baseball player over the last four years and collected the data in the chart starting in 2013, and going through a seasonal downward depletion of muscle energy values. There were low scores during spring training in 2014. Then, in June 2014, the player suffered a left knee injury resulting in season-ending surgery. August was recovery/rehab from surgery, and the data shows further muscle energy depletion.

During the off-season, the player committed to a re-tooling of his physical conditioning and made improvements to his nutritional intake and timing. By 2015 spring physicals, both RF muscles had a score of 70, emphasizing the improvement in muscle fuel content and muscle health. Now the player had confirmation that all the demanding work was paying off, along with improved nutritional choices and a focus on regeneration protocols. He played in a career-high number of games during 2015 and 2016; all injury-free.

MuscleSound’s patented software and technology enabled the collection of this muscle health data, which gives an athlete the opportunity to take charge of their muscle health. Monitoring muscle health allows for the appreciation of the readiness of the athlete. As mentioned earlier, this readiness is always a balancing act between the physical responses to workload (games/training) and the regeneration from these efforts. MuscleSound technology, along with the collection and analytics for each competitor and team’s objective data, should enable informed assessments on each individual’s race readiness and health status.

Parting Thoughts on Recovery and Overtraining

In summary, overtraining and poor recovery are about managing exercise workloads and following regeneration strategies to help combat those major causes of fatigue. Always include nutritional intake and timing, quality sleep (as sleep disturbance after a game/race is common and can negatively impact recovery), and the utilization of various recovery modalities in your strategies.

Frequent MuscleSound analysis and other biomarkers help in the detection of athlete readiness, fatigue levels, inflammation, and potential muscle damage. Athletes and exercise enthusiasts that follow the “Work Hard + Recover Well = Best Performance” equation will benefit the most, with more optimal performances and better health.

References

1. Drew, M.K. & Finch, C.F. (2016). “The Relationship Between Training Loads and Injury, Illness and Soreness: A Systematic and Literature Review”. Sports Medicine. 46: 861-883.
2. Soligard, T. et al (2016). “How much is too much? (Part 1) International Olympic Committee Consensus Statement on Load In Sport and Risk of Injury.” British Journal Sports Medicine. 50: 1030-1041.
3. Bompa, T.O. (1983). “Theory and Methodology of Training”. Kendall / Hunt Publishing Company. Dubuque, Iowa.
4. Brown, R.L. (1983). “Overtraining in Athletes – A round table”. Physician and Sports Medicine. 11: 93- 110.
5. Kuipers, H. & Keizer, H.A. (1988). “Overtraining in Elite Athletes – Review and Directions for the Future.” Sports Medicine. 6:79-92
6. Gabbett, T.J. (2016). “The Training – Injury Prevention Paradox: should athletes be training smarter and harder?” British Journal Sports Medicine. 50: 273-280.
7. Reaburn, P. & Jenkins, D. (1996). “Training for Speed & Endurance.” Allen & Unwin Pty Ltd. 9 Atchison Street, St. Leonards, NSW 1590 Australia.
8. Al Nawaiseh, A.M., Bishop, P.A., Pritchett, R.C., & Porter, S. (2007). “Enhancing Short-Term Recovery After High Intensity Anaerobic Exercise”. Medicine and Science in Sports and Exercise. 39: s307.
9. Jakeman, J.R., Byrne, C. & Eston, R.G. (2010). “Efficacy of Lower Limb Compression and Combined Treatment of Manual Massage and Lower Limb Compression on Symptoms of Exercise-Induced Muscle Damage in Woman.” Journal of Strength & Conditioning Research. 23: 1795-1802.

One of the most widely used performance-enhancing drugs in the world is 1,3,7-trimethylxanthine. The World Anti-Doping Association has never completely banned it, although the group restricted it at very high doses before 2004. These days, athletes can take as much of it as they like—and they do, with recent research indicating that roughly three-quarters of anti-doping urine samples contain measurable amounts of the drug.

It’s not just athletes that use and abuse this drug, however; many people are heavily addicted to it, and use it recreationally. Indeed, people will consume an estimated 8 billion portions of it today alone. You might even be consuming it now. So, what is this ubiquitous drug? It is, of course, caffeine.

That caffeine improves performance in humans is beyond doubt, and has been known for well over 100 years. This is true for endurance and team sports, as well as repeated efforts that take place in the gym or on the track. The only real performance activity where caffeine doesn’t have a clear beneficial effect is in one-off explosive activities, such as a sprint or maximum weight lift. However, given that caffeine can affect mood and reaction time, there is still a theoretical benefit. And in my experience, many sprinters do use caffeine as an ergogenic aid.

Given the widespread use of caffeine in sport, you might think that we know all there is to know about it. However, that isn’t the case at all. Researchers are constantly finding out new, interesting characteristics of the way caffeine can affect sports performance. Here are seven you might not know:

Caffeine appears to affect well-trained and recreational athletes differently.

This is a surprisingly understudied area, but some research suggests that caffeine affects trained and untrained athletes to different extents. A 1985 study, “Enhanced metabolic response to caffeine in exercise-trained human subjects”, looked at eight trained and eight untrained males given 4mg/kg of caffeine. While they didn’t measure the effects on physical performance, the researchers found that resting metabolic rate increased to a greater degree in the trained athletes than the novices, potentially because they could release a greater amount of adrenaline following caffeine intake.

Some research suggests that caffeine affects trained and untrained athletes to different extents. Share on X

“Benefits of caffeine ingestion on sprint performance in trained and untrained swimmers” build upon these results in 1991, with trained and untrained swimmers assessed over a 100-meter swim with and without caffeine. Only the trained subjects showed an improvement in the caffeine trial. This isn’t always the case, however; a more recent study on caffeine found no real difference between trained and untrained runners over 5 kilometers.

Caffeine affects us all differently.

Even though the caffeine advice for athletes is standardized at 3-9mg/kg, 60 minutes prior to exercise, there is a large range of variation between individuals when it comes to how much a set dose of caffeine improves our performance. A 2008 study, “Ergogenic Effects of Low Doses of Caffeine on Cycling Performance,” showed this very nicely, comparing the effects of low doses of caffeine (1, 2, and 3mg/kg) against a placebo on a 15-minute maximum cycle. The main findings were that caffeine doses of both 2mg/kg and 3mg/kg were ergogenic, improving performance on average 3.9% and 2.9% respectively compared to placebo, and that there was no ergogenic effect of 1mg/kg caffeine.

As the study was small, with only 13 subjects, the authors presented the individual data, which illustrated the large range of caffeine response between subjects. One subject saw a performance reduction at all caffeine doses compared to placebo, while nine others exhibited large variations, finding a performance decrement at some caffeine doses, and a performance enhancement at others. Only four subjects found caffeine ergogenic at all doses. This effect is now well-established, with “Effect of caffeine on sport-specific endurance performance: A systematic review,” a 2012 meta-analysis of 12 studies that utilized time trials concluding that the effects of caffeine were highly variable between studies and individuals.

The variation in the effects of caffeine on individuals is partially due to genetic factors.

A gene called CYP1A2 may potentially modify how much of a performance-enhancing effect we can get from caffeine. A research group first showed this in 2012, with cyclists given the AA “fast” version of this gene having greater improvement in 40-kilometer time trial performances following 6mg/kg of caffeine than AC and CC (“slow”) genotypes. This gene is responsible for 95% of caffeine metabolism within the body, so it may well determine how long caffeine sticks around for to exert its performance-enhancing effects.

It’s also possible that the metabolites of caffeine themselves are more performance-enhancing than caffeine, and so breaking down caffeine to these metabolites more rapidly would be beneficial. Studies presented last year at the ACSM Conference reported similar results, again indicating that fast metabolizing genotypes see a greater performance-enhancing effect. A second gene, ADORA2A, may also affect the size of ergogenic effects following caffeine intake.

The source of the caffeine can be important.

The source of your pre-training caffeine can also alter its performance-enhancing effects, which is partially due to the speed at which different caffeine sources are absorbed and reach the bloodstream. Typically, we expect caffeine levels in the blood to peak around 45 minutes to an hour after ingesting caffeine in liquid or tablet form (which is the reason for recommendations to consume caffeine around an hour before you need it to peak). However, when you take caffeine in the form of chewing gum, your body absorbs it much quicker.

The source of your pre-training caffeine can also alter its performance-enhancing effects. Share on X

A 2013 paper on “Caffeine Gum and Cycling Performance: A Timing Study,” found that chewing caffeine gum an hour before exercise had no performance-enhancing effects on a cycle time trial. However, consuming it immediately beforehand did confer its ergogenic effects. In other good news, coffee appears to be as effective as a caffeinated beverage or tablets, provided the caffeine dose is the same.

You might not even need to swallow it.

Having seen in the previous point that the method of caffeine consumption can matter, it may surprise you to hear that some evidence suggests you don’t even have to consume the caffeine for a positive effect to occur. Similar to carbohydrate mouth rinses, which can improve endurance performance, swilling a caffeinated solution around your mouth can improve performance compared to placebo. Other studies have replicated this, although it is not always found. Nevertheless, the possibility remains that simply washing caffeine around your mouth is enough to improve endurance performance.

Caffeine may help recovery from exercise, too.

While the main use of caffeine is to enhance performance during a training session, there is some evidence to suggest that it might also enhance recovery. A 2008 study compared the use of just a post-exercise carbohydrate drink to a combined carbohydrate and caffeine (supplying 8mg/kg of caffeine) drink following an exhaustive cycle test. The subjects that consumed caffeine alongside the carbohydrate after exercise had greater rates of muscle glycogen resynthesis in the four hours following training, illustrating that caffeine may speed up recovery. Due to caffeine’s extended half-life of three to six hours, provided the training session is short (i.e., less than two hours), caffeine consumed 60 minutes pre-training will also have this positive effect on exercise recovery.

If you believe caffeine improves performance, there’s a greater chance it will.

Finally, your beliefs as to the performance-enhancing effects of caffeine alter how much it improves your performance. A 2006 paper, “Placebo effects of caffeine on cycling performance,” put cyclists through three different 10-km cycle time trials. For each time trial, they were told they were consuming different caffeine doses: none, 4.5mg/kg, or 9mg/kg. When told they weren’t consuming caffeine, the cyclists performance dropped by 1.4%. However, when told they had consumed caffeine, their performances increased by 1.3% and 3.1% in the 4.5mg/kg and 9mg/kg trials respectively.

The interesting part of this experiment is that none of the subjects had consumed caffeine at all—they were just told they had! It wasn’t caffeine that improved performance, it was being told they had taken caffeine that improved performance. This indicates that the belief in caffeine is an important part of its performance-enhancing effects.

The downside is that, if you believe caffeine improves performance but you think you haven’t consumed it, then your performance might suffer. Last year’s “Placebo in sport nutrition: A proof-of-principle study involving caffeine supplementation,” backed up these findings. It found that when comparing caffeine to placebo, those correctly identifying they hadn’t taken caffeine saw a loss of performance compared to a control trial, while those who thought they had taken caffeine saw an improvement in performance compared to a control trial—even if they hadn’t.

As you can see, the relationship between athletes and caffeine can be a positive one, but is subject to many modifying factors. As research in this area expands, we will be able to create much more personalized caffeine use guidelines. In turn, this will hopefully improve the performance of athletes.

Since you’re here…
…we have a small favor to ask. More people are reading SimpliFaster than ever, and each week we bring you compelling content from coaches, sport scientists, and physiotherapists who are devoted to building better athletes. Please take a moment to share the articles on social media, engage the authors with questions and comments below, and link to articles when appropriate if you have a blog or participate on forums of related topics. — SF