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When it comes to validating one’s self as an athlete, jumping is the first request on many training priority lists. Think of the famous sporting feats that are etched in our memory:

• Vince Carter leaping over Frederic Weis in the 2000 Olympics for the thundering slam dunk finish.
• The famous front-flip touchdown by Jerome Simpson of the Bengals.
• Bo Jackson leaping and running up the outfield wall following a running catch against Baltimore.

Sure, it’s embarrassing to get beat down the court or on the open break by an opposing player, but it’s far more humiliating to get dunked on (Weis lost the opportunity to play in the NBA due to his notoriety as the 7 foot guy who got jumped over), your shot blocked, or a spike rammed down your nose. Nobody is “posterized” by simply getting beat by an offensive player downfield. It is as if Stan Lee decided that the superhero version of the modern athlete was one with unbelievable jumping ability. The marketing engine, as it exists, likes to cater towards those athletes with these superhero aspirations. Who wouldn’t want a program that will turn them into the Batman of athletes for only $67?

Speed wins games, but jumping seems to be the envy of those who want to impress. It also doesn’t hurt the cause of becoming a better athlete. Real vertical jump training with the goal of advanced performance can be muddy waters, particularly through the efforts of those who have seized up much of the available information with marketing based information, directed towards novice athletes.

The goal of this article is to provide some philosophies and guidelines for the rest of us, those who are interested in the long-term process of sport mastery, and the journey of taking athletes to their best possible performance. These points are often left up to debate in the various training forums and roundtables of the world on the subject of increasing vertical leap ability so I am sharing my thoughts on them, all in one place, right here. I derived these from my time as an athlete, a track coach, a strength coach, as well as in my work with online clientele of various backgrounds.

Let’s start with a common point that most coaches already know, but one that may need a bit extra clarification in regards to jumping.

Exercises are in your program for a season, and sometimes a lifetime, but are only a means to an end.

I hear it all the time:

“You need to be doing X exercise if you want to jump higher.”

In athletic performance training and particularly vertical jump training, there is a recurring theme of “exercises”. Often athletes swear by this or that exercise, or exercise sequence, in regards to their athletic ability. Track athletes often carry with them an exercise that “they need to be doing” because there was “this one time” in their athletic career when they were performing that particular exercise and competition went well for them.

The truth is that there is a window of time each exercise will be effective in providing a significant short-term boost to vertical jumping ability, largely due to the skill improvement that the particular exercise delivered to the athlete’s jump technique. Once the skill improvement is transferred, there isn’t as great of a need to keep introducing the exercise in such a volume during the rest of the athlete’s career.

For example, as far as speed training is concerned, I have found that the barbell hip thrust is a fantastic way to get an athlete’s glutes up to speed in terms of activation and pelvic posture, but once I have brought an athlete to the appropriate activation level, bringing their max from 500lbs to 550lbs by continual focus on that exercise is probably a waste of time. With the new level of activation gained from hip thrusts, many of the other exercises that they do will help to maintain that improved strength and size of their posterior. It is a similar story with jumping.

The following are some examples of traditional jump exercises, and the corresponding skill of the jump that they can bring up to speed.

• Jumping rope provides a rapid boost in ankle function and stiffness for an athlete who tends to live on their heels.
• Squatting provides a rapid boost in athletes who need to learn to apply forces for longer periods of time to the ground in two leg jumping. (Vertical jump height off of two legs is a stark contrast to one leg as the amount of time that an athlete can input force into the ground directly correlates with the final vertical velocity of the jump).
• Plyometrics provides a rapid boost in performance in athletes who lack stretch shortening cycle efficiency and general foot strength.
• Pistol squats provide a rapid boost in leg stability and linking of the feet and hips.
• Olympic lifting gives an immediate infusion of posture and coordination through triple extension of the hips, knees and ankles.
• And so on and so forth.

These exercises will provide a rapid boost for a period of time, as they but in order to attain long-term progress, many of them will need to take a back seat to what is truly important. Clearly they should be kept in the program in some form, or rotated to prevent a lack of accommodation. Also, we know that a rotation of exercises that are very close to velocity and mechanics to the primary exercise are vital in long-term athletic improvement for motor learning and accommodation reasons, so strategic use of exercises will also rotate based on these needs.

Although many exercises must be kept in a program for the purpose of maintenance in particular qualities, the primary areas that truly need to be addressed for continual jump improvement during all periods of specific and competitive preparation in order of importance are:

• Specific work capacity in the type of jumping that one wishes to improve (the ability to jump maximally and in enough volume to deliver repeated, specific training effects).
• Speed. Specifically, acceleration.
• Rate of force development in the specific motor pathway an athlete utilizes to jump. Quick jumpers prefer specific plyometric based movements, while power jumpers ofen prefer specific barbell oriented movements such as squats or barbell step ups).

Understand the squat to bodyweight debate. Lift for explosiveness and complimentary benefits, not to hit a magic number.

“To die as a warrior means to have crossed swords and either won or lost, with no consideration for winning or losing.” — Miyamoto Musashi

What in the world does the above quote have to do with lifting for athletic performance?

Well, aside from giving me an excuse to put a samurai reference in this article, it also represents a nice ideology for the purpose of strength training as far as increased athleticism is concerned.

Just like the warrior who enters battle for the ritual of combat, and not so much the determined outcome as a means of validation, the athlete who enters strength training does so for the transfer of skills to the field of play, and not the outcome goal of lifting itself.

Why would anyone validate their ability as an athlete based on a means used to train, and not the actual competition itself? This happens regularly with strength. Although barbells are a great and often indispensable training means, when the urge to utilize the barbell as a form of athletic (or personal) validation creeps in, the whole training system can be thrown out of balance.

This mentality can also cut athletes career progressions short as athletes thrown through the barbell grinder in high school or college can often scrape out nice performances for that particular time period, but struggle and regress in the next phase of their athletic journey.

Another thorn of this mentality, particularly with high school athletes, is that those high school athletes who responded well to year-round heavy lifting in high school will mentally rely on this type of work as a means to success in their college years. This often spurs a negative cycle of regression on their part, which the solution to is often, “more heavy lifting!”.

As far as improving athleticism, lifting weights serves the purposes of:

• Improved posture
• Body awareness
• Coordination
• Joint stability
• Potentiation of proximal speed and power training sessions
• Positive hormonal changes (testosterone and growth hormone)
• Increased cross-sectional area of relevant muscle fiber pool (when done correctly, and there is a limit to this based on an athlete’s genetics)
• Increased strength at key joint angles and torques

Looking at these benefits it is easy to see that strength training is an important tool to making the rest of training better; any of the benefits are those that can easily be “maxed out”, early in their use or an athlete’s career. For example, an athlete will reap immediate body awareness, explosive coordination and postural benefit from a well-designed lifting program, but those benefits will only take them so far. There isn’t an infinite improvement rate as far as posture and coordination are concerned.

As far as vertical jumping goes, athletes with a great squat to bodyweight ratio will jump higher than their weaker counterparts, all other factors being the same. There is an important chicken-or-the-egg consideration to make with these athletes, however. Athletes who are naturally strong and explosive will experience a rapid train of improvement in barbell exercises, along with lots of psychological momentum. Athletes on the weaker end will find rapid improvements via lifting, especially in the motor benefit realm, but their results will taper off far sooner than their stronger counterparts. Unfortunately, rather than playing to their more natural plyometric and elastic strengths, these weaker athletes will sometimes put their heads down and strive for a particular lift number that hamstrings (sometimes literally!) their long term athletic progress.

“I was pretty average until I decided to work hard to hit that 2.5x bodyweight squat, after which I won the Olympics,” said no athlete ever.

Athletes who tend to improve their vertical jump the most by focusing primarily on the lifting portion of their program are, more often than not, athletes with a lot of fast twitch muscle mass, who generally jump in a style resembling their lifting. Their lifting makes their jumping better (to a point), and their jumping makes their lifting better. Realize that many athletes are not built like this.

Lift maxes are a trick of sorts. Maximal strength often indicates the functional motor pool available in an associated movement, but intensely pursuing maximal strength doesn’t transfer well to speed based activities. The goal in lifting to bring maxes up that help athleticism is to do so in a way that doesn’t look like you are actually training for it; lots of powerful work in the 60-80% range, coupled with plenty of explosive plyometric, jump and sprint work. Believe it or not, many explosive wired athletes will find that their lift maxes will actually go up by following this methodology over a powerlifting style of training. Bottom line, speed builds useable strength more than strength builds speed.

Use Olympic lifts for skill development and speed, not to end up on AllThingsGym.

As long as we are on the topic of lifting, find me an NCAA strength program that doesn’t use any Olympic lifts. The Olympic lifts can be very effective in the right context for building vertical jump related qualities, but they can also be lousy when they are worked in the wrong direction with the wrong cues, especially in athletes seeking to break through to the higher end of their genetic abilities.

Let’s make this as simple as possible and talk about the benefits of an Olympic lift in regards to vertical jumping skill. Regarding vertical improvement, any lift is only as good as it can improve the skill of a jump in an explosive manner. Here are the positives of Olympic lifting:

• Teaching coordination in triple extension.
• Providing a new set of motor instructions in regards to explosive concentric triple extension.
• Teaching basic force absorption qualities in the catch.
• Teaching advanced force absorption qualities, in transfer to two leg jumping, in the full catch.
• Teaching posture in conjunction with explosive efforts.

An Olympic lift is a “jump”, but with one caveat: there is a bar that manipulates the athletes’ center of gravity (just like any barbell lift). Although a proper Olympic lift is done where the bar never passes more than a couple of inches away from the body, this is often done in-correctly more times than it is done correctly.

Getting into the 1RM race as far as cleans are concerned is also a battle that many athletes will eventually lose when it comes to building a better vertical jump. In order to bring a clean or snatch to its own highest level far past the initial complimentary benefits, the body must adapt itself to a different set of neural instructions that jumping requires, especially in regards to the feet (which we’ll get to in the next point).
Bryan Mann, in his great book, Velocity Based Training, recommends keeping a bar speed of at 1.2-1.4 m/s on cleans with perfect technique, the bar never straying far from the body. Doing heavy and relatively slow cleans with a bad bar path is one of the best ways to keep an athlete below the rest of the crowd, as this type of work has zero, or even a negative transfer to vertical jump height.

Teach the feet.

In nearly every athlete I train who has a lousy standing vertical jump, the primary deficiency isn’t one of power, but rather one of foot function and force transfer through the torso. I have female high jumpers clearing 5’10 who regularly vertical jump under 20” because of ankle function. For high jump, this isn’t hurting them (and I am not on a mission to improve these girls standing jumps), it just reflects itself in the way that they jump off of two feet, as their primary reaction in directing force though the ankle is based around negative shin angles to perpendicular shins, where standing jumps rely more on positive shin angles.

Many athletes who have a well-rounded athletic background have pretty good foot function in regards to jumping. It is often over-specialization, coupled with the over-use of standard barbell training performed on a regular basis that can cause dysfunction in this area. Wearing shoes all the time also tends to put a damper on fast, reactive feet, as the plate of the shoe causes foot neurons that usually fire individually, to all wire together in one brute reaction to the ground.

In athletic performance, the faster an athlete can direct pressure to the big toe, and the more powerful the extension of the plantar flexion, the higher an athlete will jump. When an athlete lowers their frequency of re-enforcing this quality, and starts to spend two or three days a week performing exercises where they focus on directing force away from the big toe, or delaying it until the very last second, such as the way that cleans and snatches are often taught, this can wreak havoc on vertical athletic qualities. I see this all the time when we test the jumps of strong collegiate athletes who have been on a regular lifting program through high school. The ones who display the best vertical jump mechanics in the lower leg are often those who haven’t lifted much in their past, and played a jumping sport in their earlier school years.

So what to do?

The solution here is to make sure that athletes are being cued correctly in lifting activities (not lifting through the heel, and keep plenty of lifts that allow for some extension through the toe at the top of the lift), and perform lifts in a low enough volume as to not interfere with the correct lower leg action. It is also good practice to mix and superset barbell work with exercises and drills that do encourage the correct foot function, such as low-level plyometrics, assisted jumps, and lower leg jump drills. If I have the space, I’ll always superset Olympic lifting sets with a few vertical throws, focusing on complete ankle extension, or low-amplitude speed bounding, depending on the vertical outcome goal.

I’ll also say that many of these exercise prescriptions may be a bit primitive in light of Chris Korfist’s ankle rocker drills, while are one of the best new areas of jump training I have read in a long time, and they can restore foot and ankle function in a hurry.

Know how to do a depth jump correctly and use energy efficiently.

If you look up “depth jump” on YouTube, be prepared for a cluster $%& of the highest magnitude. Depth jumps are rarely taught the way that they should be. I was fortunate to come across a vertical jump program (The Science of Jumping) when I was in high school that revolved almost entirely off of the correct performance of the depth jump exercise and its variations. Here are some common faults in typical YouTube videos on the topic:

• Improper posture during the drop and land phase (often looking down).
• Improper or minimal use of the arms (very small or non-existent arm swing).
• No emphasis on landing softness whatsoever. No emphasis on where the foot pressure should be (the balls of the feet, and possible initial mid-foot pressure for single leg jumpers).
• No emphasis on landing stiffness. Many athletes go into far too much knee flexion upon landing. Since the goal of depth jumps is rate of force development under increased load, knee flexion should be less to allow less ground reaction time.
• No emphasis on the need for maximal upwards explosion on each repetition (this is the number one offense). Depth jumps are maximal efforts. In order to maximize upwards explosion, an outcome goal, such as an overhead target (for force) or a collapsible hurdle (for rate of force development) should be implemented. Athletes should seek to improve these outcomes throughout training sessions.

Let me talk about one aspect of depth jumping, and plyometrics in general, that coaches and athletes need to know: smoothness.

Good jumpers… really good jumpers, have one main thing in common. They make their jumps look incredibly smooth and easy. Good jumpers are quiet. This is something that is easy to say, but rarely put into practice. Check out this force/time graph of a novice jumper vs. an accomplished jumper to see what I’m talking about from a force perspective.

What is the best way to improve one’s ability to produce force efficiently? A plyometric progression, starting with correctly coached drop jumps. Drop jumps (dropping from a box of appropriate height with an emphasis on landing mechanics) is a great way to teach force absorption. Once an athlete knows how to do this right, then to make lasting changes, a somewhat high volume of work is needed to wire it in. This is where submaximal plyometrics, coached with the same cues as the drop jump can help to gear an athlete’s nervous system and muscle-tendon structure towards transferring force in a more efficient manner.

Understand the difference between body types in training.

Not every athlete is destined to squat twice their bodyweight. Not every athlete is born to master a depth jump from a 1 meter platform. Athletes need to eliminate weaknesses that are liabilities to their jump performance, but they shouldn’t pursue their weaknesses past this point to achieve their highest vertical potential.

Ultimately, athletes are built, and subsequently, developed for a particular jumping style. Through their adolescent development, their neurons that fired together to form a particular platform of movement, wired together to make that movement more powerful in their maturity.

Imagine taking a competitive swimmer at age 22, who had no real land based sport background and expecting them to be able to perform a technically perfect triple jump within a few months, or even years! Imagine taking a competitive triple jumper at age 22 and expecting them to perform a perfect butterfly stroke! Once the way our bodies tend to move are “wired in” those sequences generally represent the most powerful way that a person can move and apply force, and future specialization in the body’s current weakness is an impossibility.

When an athlete learns to produce force in a particular manner through adolescence (this is usually done in accordance with the athlete’s individual strengths) these patterns are wired in, and it becomes impossible to wire over it with another pattern that eclipses the old pattern in terms of power and efficiency. Athletes sprint and jump from just a few years old, so these patterns are very hard wired. Granted, there are technical refinements that can and should be made to anyone (otherwise, we might as well give up coaching!), but in general, wired movement patterns are hard to break.

What I am really talking about here is that some athletes will utilize little knee bend and elasticity in jumping (they often make good high jumpers and single leg jumpers), while others use considerable knee bend (they tend to make good 60m dash athletes and football players). You can’t take either of these athletes and expect them to jump like the other. In the same vein, you can’t take one athlete and expect that training like the other is going to bring them to their highest potential.

Don’t stop playing team sports and realize it’s power as a maximal jump incubator.

Within team sport play comes a wealth of explosive movement patterns. The highest levels of explosive power as exhibited in jumping are the product of other more basic movement patterns found in sport, such as the acceleration found in the jump approach, or the rapid decelerations that the lower limbs encounter during the absorption phase of the jump.

Team sport play also helps to maintain elasticity and build stronger lower legs, ankles, and feet. They deliver some of the strength that can be built only through repetition. The constant, rapid fire cuts, accelerations, quick hops and outcome based sport movements (such as jumping for a blocked shot) offer a unique training stimulus that can’t quite be attained via traditional training methods.

Remember, training in many cases is putting together very close variations of the primary movement you are trying to improve. In the scope of jumping, an athlete is getting plenty of jumps, no two of which are exactly the same which builds a bigger “bank” of motor patterns that the body can use to create a stronger movement. The variety also prevents injury, and perhaps of the greatest benefit, utilizes the important principles of fun and competition. Anytime you can make hard, effective work fun, it is generally a win-win.

Although experienced jump athletes who are specializing in something aside from basketball, volleyball or football need a base of team sport play in their younger years, they clearly shouldn’t be playing games constantly in their time of specialized performance. Despite all this, they should never completely lose touch with their team sport roots. Matt Hemingway re-vitalized his high jump career through his love of basketball in his later years of competition. A few 30 to 45 minute sessions of off-season, controlled team sport play for a few sessions a week goes a long, long way in keeping the movement bank of track and field jumpers full for their long competitive seasons. (Side note: hurdling is a great way to keep the movement bank full with slightly less risk of a rolled ankle)

Conclusion

My vertical jump journey, and the way that I coach athletes has been heavily influenced in some way, shape or form by the above principles. Most of them took around a decade for me to truly understand, but now that I do, I am a better coach and mentor for it. Each of these points on their own can be helpful. Together, they can make a great difference in producing the next great aerial touchdown or center-clearing dunk, or at least, the aspiring junior athlete who finally impresses his friends by shoving the round-ball through the rim.

“By changing the way you do routine things, you allow a new person to grow inside you.” — Paulo Coelho

For more information on the vertical jump see Joel Smith’s book “Vertical Foundations”, now available in both print and eBook.

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

 

This tweet from Mladen Jovanovic, football physiologist at ASPIRE Academy for Sports Excellence, and the responses it generated illustrate a subject many who work in competitive sports environments are pondering.

From my knowledge of institutes in the UK, any university can designate its student gym as a “high-performance” center, as if such a grandiose title gives the impression that anyone other than the BUCS (British Universities and College Sport) competing football team trains there. There are of course some genuine high-performance facilities attached to universities with elite athletes training there. However, that does not change the fact that many institutions abuse the title.

High performance is not something you can justify by simply giving yourself, your institution, or facility that title. So, is high performance about the equipment and facilities in which you work with your athletes? The latest equipment certainly adds value to your program. Having velocity-based training (VBT) tools like GymAware, Tendo, or Push Bands advance strength and power training in your gym. Guys like Bryan Mann, Dan Baker, and Mladen Jovanovic or his articles, “The future of Velocity Based Training” or “Velocity Based Strength Training” put out quality information on how these tools can enhance your athletes’ training programs.

Advanced GPS Systems such as Catapult provide coaches and sports scientists with a wide array of sports analytics information. Performance management systems such as Omegawave allow you to monitor training, holistic, and lifestyle stress and readiness to train so you can adjust your training program if need be.

You can go on and on about the wide array of different technologies constantly being developed and updated to offer anyone involved in athletic performance development all the information they could require. But coaches and athletes were achieving world-class performances in years gone by without all this data and information. So how could you fail to be high-performance today with access to all those gadgets and numbers?

Does having all this equipment automatically qualify you as high-performance? No. Can you be high-performance without this stuff? Yes. Don’t get me wrong. Of course, it is awesome to have access to these tools, high-level facilities, the latest treadmills, running tracks, properly maintained courts and fields, and so forth. But not having it is not a barrier to high performance and excelling in competition.

Are the latest greatest, biggest, and brightest new types of equipment and facilities a prerequisite of high performance?

High performance is about much more than the name and facilities and equipment. It is not merely about capturing data. As many have said before me, collecting data has no value unless you utilize it properly. Are you monitoring athletes’ progress to gauge how your program is working for them, or to adjust future training practices? Spreadsheets, folders, and filing cabinets full of numbers are useless unless they impact your coaching.

Why is it so hard to understand that data without context is just a collection of random numbers.

— Vern Gambetta (@coachgambetta) September 11, 2015

What, then, is a real high-performance environment? To me, it consists of three simple, yet major facets: people, philosophies, and culture.

People

People are, or should be, your greatest commodity, your greatest resource in a high-performance environment. Talented, driven, inquisitive and ambitious people are essential You should never lose sight of the fact that people are at the center of everything when it comes to high performance.

Nice amenities do not cultivate talent … hardship does. – Brett Bartholomew

People use facilities as an excuse when in reality it is a failure of creativity. – Dan Pfaff

Learned, experienced, and forward-thinking coaches. Talented athletes with the right blend of innate physical gifts and psychological makeup: the right character, openness to coaching, discipline, and willingness to work hard. Support staff with the skills and knowledge to augment the training process, enhance the delivery of programs to athletes, and complement the coach–athlete relationship. All these people are far more important than equipment and facilities. World-class coaches working with top athletes can produce world-class performances with only basic equipment and facilities. The reverse does not necessarily hold true. Producing a high-performance environment with elite facilities but without world-class people is virtually impossible.

Philosophy

While you must attract, recruit, and hire elite performers in all areas of your organization, that is only the start. Once you have the right people in the right positions, you need to educate them, develop them, and allow them to grow. This must be a basic tenet of your overarching philosophy.

Many coaches have a very large toolbox but cannot decide what to do because they don’t have a philosophy. – Dan Pfaff

Dan Pfaff has 40 years’ experience at the sharp end of sport, including helping Olympic long jump champion Greg Rutherford complete a clean sweep of major titles by winning the World Championships in Beijing in August (Fabrice Lapierre, also coached by Dan, took silver).

High-performance environments produce high-performance results.

Working out of Phoenix, Arizona-based Altis, Dan believes successful coaches require a governing philosophy. How can you generate logical, sensible, and effective programs and adapt them to the chaotic environments of elite sport and human physiology and psychology without a defining philosophy?

Dan recently summed up his philosophy: “Training should be enjoyable, educational, and mechanically efficient.” All coaches need a similar guiding philosophy. They should be able to define it in relatively simple terms, clearly and precisely.

In an interview, UK-based sports scientist and strength and conditioning specialist John Kiely also advocated the benefits and necessity of a coaching philosophy underpinning everything you do: “Your background philosophy steers all training designs and decisions: it should be a fusion of all your experiences and learning. If you want it to be robust, you need to invest time and energy; you need to evolve it.”

You get pretty consistent messages coming out of Phoenix (though the guys at Altis are not afraid to disagree with each other). Stuart McMillan also champions the need for a coaching philosophy in his excellent series of articles, “A Coaches’ Guide to Strength Development.” I strongly recommend the entire series.

“Good coaches are better able to learn from history—because they have a philosophy,” he says, and adds that “a philosophy protects from the comings and goings of the various trends that permeate the profession. Good coaches maintain a core set of principles—and are far less influenced by the current trends of the day.”

Stuart records his philosophy annually, restricting himself to a single side of paper. Being that exact and precise allows him to dial in on what is really important. Stuart identified his major principles as

1. Mastery of the Basics
2. The Planning Trap
3. Micro dictates Macro

If one line sums up mastery of the basics, it is this—consistent application of the fundamentals. Only through applying consistent stimuli and analyzing the results can you make more confident predictions of how athletes will respond and adapt to current and future training.

Emotional attachment to a painstakingly prepared training program is what Stuart terms the planning trap. Coaches often write these detailed plans weeks and months ahead of being carried out. Devoting so much time and energy to constructing an intricate plan makes it difficult for the emotionally attached coach to deviate in the midst of delivering it, according to the physical and emotional state of athletes and how they are responding.

McMillan’s micro-organization has certain repeating fixtures throughout each cycle. For example, Monday is potentiation day, followed by acceleration day on Tuesday. There is little variation in the program in terms of structure and loading in relative terms. So in this way the micro dictates the macro.

Altis, therefore, is the very definition of a high-performance environment, with their athletes picking up five medals at the World Championships in August. Hopefully, these examples highlighting the emphasis they put on creating a guiding philosophy show how vitally important it is to operate as a high-performance coach within a high-performance environment.

Culture

The remaining vital facet in operating a truly high-performance program is culture. Culture encapsulates the ethos, values, principles, and beliefs of the people and the environment as a whole. Culture can be a powerful driver in your organization by instilling a subconscious driver of desirable behavior among everyone involved in the program.

Build a program and a culture that is built on positive expectation and accountability. – Chidi Enyia, sprints coach, Altis.

Rugby fans are fully aware of the culture of the All Blacks, the New Zealand national rugby team with probably the best all-time winning percentage of any team, a staggering 78%!. That percentage has climbed to 84% since the sport went professional. Part of the reason a team from such a small country (population 4 million compared to 50+ million in England) can be so dominant in the Rugby Union is its culture.

All Blacks Captain Richie McCaw and Coach Graham Henry celebrate winning the 2011 World Cup. Culture plays a critical role in their unparalleled success.

For a sports team littered with superstars, there is a humility, dedication to hard work and doing what needs to be done. “Ego has to be left at the door; there is a rigidly enforced ‘no d—head policy’ in the squad, and every player takes turns in sweeping the changing room clean after each game,” says assistant coach Gilbert Enoka. Players themselves—not just the coaches—enforce standards. Players who transgress are answerable to their teammates.

The All Black mantra is “leave the jersey in a better place.” There is strict accountability and responsibility. The team, the jersey, and the role models they are required to be stand far above and beyond the needs or wants of the individual. This is an exceptional culture at work.

Culture drives Habits
Habits drive Behavior
Behavior drives Results!
– Alan Stein

Working in an established high-performance culture is one thing, but what about developing your own culture? Brett Bartholomew often extols the importance of creating a culture. In this article, he discusses his views on nurturing the right culture. In the gym and in training, athletes must move with a “violent grace.” He links the explosive intent of a squat or Olympic lift to a sprinter exploding out of the blocks or a throwing athlete launching their chosen implement to their training—in every case, bringing a focused intent to the work they are doing.

Brett remarks that there are many painters but few artists in coaching. Many coaches have all the paintbrushes and color palettes but cannot paint a picture. Starting the session with the “why”— the desired outcomes of the session and their relevance—brings the painting to life for the athlete. This idea is reinforced at the end of the session by helping the athlete to identify and understand what just took place.

This ties in neatly with Dan Pfaff’s coaching philosophy and the overall philosophy of athlete education at Altis. Altis proves that high performance is not about equipment and facilities. They utilize a University track and rent the strength and conditioning suite. Altis coaches expect athletes to “become PhDs in their sport.”

This approach can be summed up by Altis founder John Godina: “My only hope is that we can continue to be able to help everybody that could possibly want help from us; it is a good problem to have when your biggest concern is being able to keep up with the demand. I work hard to make sure our coaches and administrative team have everything inline for what they need, so they feel like they are pursuing what they love to do the best way possible. If we take care of our people, then I know that the athletes will always have a great place to be.”

Altis provides graphic evidence that people, philosophy, and culture are the key pillars to a high-performance environment. These three elements are intertwined, difficult to separate, and there is a great deal of overlap. How much does one drive the others? It is a bit of a chicken and the egg situation. Good people with strong, enlightened and efficient philosophies drive a positive and effective culture but each pillar reinforces and develops the other.

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

 

When running a business which deals with high school athletes, parents sometimes contact me when their child seems to lack a skill that is forcing them to fall behind their peers. Even if the child was at the top of their game at one time, they’ve fallen behind and are frustrated. To help their child succeed and achieve their goals, the parents bring in outside help.

One of the first traits the parents always mention is first step quickness. From what they’ve seen, there’s something that causes the child to be a step slow. Or the child can’t get past the opposing players as they once did.

When we plan a path to improve this, they’re often disappointed that the issue is not about being quicker. It’s about moving the body’s center of mass faster.

As I have mentioned in previous blogs, JB Morin’s research on acceleration has surfaced recently. For those who want to cut to the chase, look at Peter Weyand’s and Ken Clark’s review of Morin’s research. They conclude two things. First, horizontal force applied in a useful manner is a key determinant of speed. We will focus on this in a coming blog.

Second, there’s a speed difference in the 0 step. The 0 step is the acceleration from the block to the first step. Morin’s research showed a 0.5m/s difference between the 10.0 athlete and the 10.5 athlete. It accounted for 80% of the difference among the athletes tested.

After reading these papers, my “rabbit hole” turned into researching the 0 step. It took me months to truly understand the concept.

I had two flashes that helped me put the idea together. The first was in Austin, Texas, where I was hosting a Reflexive Performance Reset seminar. Peter Holmertz, President of 1080 motion, gave me a tour of the city and took me to notable, cutting edge facilities in Texas. We stopped at one of the best planned facilities I’ve seen called Xceleration Sports Performance Labs owned by Matt Neel. He commented, “It is great if we know all of this stuff. The trick is to communicate it with your athletes.” He had a special grid that communicated to his athletes their 0 step. It suddenly made sense to me.

My second epiphany happened during the first night of the TrackandFootballConsortium IV. I spoke before Stuart McMillan of ALTIS and talked about the importance of the 0 step. In his great presentation, he talked about five things a coach can do better. One of his topics was the 0 step.

However, he had a much better term than 0 step. He called it projection. This is a far better word to use to communicate to my athletes what we are striving for when coming out of the blocks.

When explaining the 0 step, talk to your athletes about projection. Share on X

With these new guiding principles, I went to work on my project to figure all of this out. I wanted to see what it would take to get my athletes to project their body further “coming out of the blocks.”

Using my 1080 Sprint to collect data, I wanted to see how and why some were better than others at this. I wanted to use the MySprint app as well, but Chicago had some bad weather that made running outside difficult. (I don’t know which hinders runners more, 0-degree temps, 8” of snow, or that to save money, the village does a poor job of plowing and salting.)

In conjunction with that, I stole Matt Neel’s idea of measuring the athlete’s hip distance when their foot hits the ground. Currently, I’ve measured about 25 athletes, with more to come. I picked four of them to show different aspects of what I’ve found. I am looking at N/kg, w/kg and velocity at 0.5m, and their projection distance. The first three numbers were taken from the Sprint 1080 with 1KG of resistance.

From these examples and others that I have stored on my 1080 chart, we see that force is an important factor in getting the body out. I like to use force/body weight because it puts all athletes on an equal playing field. Also, from all of the data I’ve collected over the last 18 months, N/kg and w/kg seem to be the determining factors in acceleration.

Force gets the body out of the blocks. N/kg and w/kg help determine acceleration. Share on X

Isiah doesn’t quite fit into the scheme. While having the best time and power output, his N/kg is not the best. He is an athlete who gets his feet down quickly, pushes quickly, and generates power quickly. All athletes are different and get there the way they know best. So, where do we go from here? Stay tuned. More to come.

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 love training my athletes with kettlebells. Have I been influenced by folks like Pavel Tsatsouline and Dan John? Yes. I also understand that the hype over the kettlebell results from its re-introduction to American coaches as some secret Russian special forces training device when, as David Landau points out, the kettles are really “tied to the Circus, Vaudeville, and good old Show Biz.”

Landau refers to the kettlebells as “faux entertainment, a crude weight implement that has many shortcomings.” So how do we explain the excitement over the kettle comeback? Landau believes it’s a belief in the apparent superiority of Russian training systems. He refers to Rocky IV as evidence. In the movie, the Russian boxer Ivan Drago is the product of high-tech training and sophisticated diagnostic equipment. He’s not like ole Rocky training in a barn and doing core twists with an oxen yoke across his shoulders.

It was Rick Bruner who clarified the reality of Eastern Bloc training in his book, Soviet Training and Recovery Methods. “In real life,” he says, “the scenario is just the opposite. The Soviets are training in barns and basements, and the equipment is forged from old railroad car axles. They also run in the snow. Most Soviet athletes have never seen a computer, let alone a computerized Cybex machine, a Lifecycle, or a Stairmaster.”

Landau confirms this, recounting how Americans visiting Russia in the 1980s found athletes using crude training implements. When asked where they were getting their training information, they “pointed to an old stack of Weider Muscle Magazines.” In addition to barbells and isometric racks, there were “a few odd weights that may have been kettlebells.”

So the kettlebell we know today is not a modern version of scientifically researched strength training equipment. It appears to be, as Landau concludes, a “rather crude weight implement that has many shortcomings.” Weightlifters from those early days admitted that the kettlebell had limitations and shortcomings. As Alan Calvert said in 1911: “The man who buys only a kettlebell and thinks that he is going to be able to train all the muscles in his body to the same degree of development is going to be very badly fooled.”

Why I Use Kettlebells With My Athletes

If this is the case, why are these big balls with handles a staple of my program as well as so many others? Proponents of kettlebell training—and there are many–raise some valid points. For example, John Powers notes that “one advantage of kettlebells over dumbbells, barbells, and machines is the dynamic, ballistic nature of the moves.”

His point is that athletes can use kettles to lift, push, pull, and reach. Their most significant benefit is that the “demand for greater inter and intramuscular coordination and kinesthetic awareness remains stable during the exercise.” More muscles and joints are involved in each kettlebell movement, and “the core, hips, and other muscles involved in stabilizing the body are constantly working.”

Kettlebell movements demand muscular coordination and kinesthetic awareness. Share on X

Dan John has often commented that “if all I do is teach a proper swing and encourage some form of deadlift, I know I will have an impact. The kettlebell swing remains my go-to for both fat burning and building athletes.”

I use kettles as a transition to my primary lifts: the trap bar deadlift and such variations as single leg deadlifts, single leg cleans, and step-ups.

Video 1. The athlete performs a single leg, split leg deadlift with two kettlebells.

Video 2. A deadlift with a trap bar is demonstrated here. I also have an open back trap Superbar that allows athletes to extend the back leg during these variations. I call it a half-trap.

Kettles serve as a good lead-in to these lifts. I specifically like the goblet squat and the kettle swing.

Video 3. This athlete demonstrates the goblet squat while holding one kettlebell with both arms.

Video 4. This goblet squat is performed with two kettlebells.

Video 5. The athlete demonstrates the classic kettlebell swing.

Video 6. The video shows the athlete performing a reverse kettlebell swing.

An article entitled “Kettlebell Lifting as an Effective Means of Physical Education” appeared in the 1984 Russian Weightlifting Yearbook. The article concluded that kettlebell lifts were suitable as a means of education for a wide range of sports:

“The appropriateness of kettlebell lifting is associated with the possibility of individual workouts, the technical simplicity of the exercises, the ease of obtaining, and the possibility of training and competing with people of different ages. Kettlebell lifting develops basic physical qualities and increases physical work capacity. All of these lead one to consider kettlebell lifting an effective means of physical education.”

Even though a considerable number of athletes are discovering and defend their use, is the kettle a magic orb that improves all aspects of physical performance? Is kettlebell training any better than training with dumbbells or barbells? Might the current hype surrounding kettles be nothing more than an example of what the great Dutch Speed Coach Henk Kraaijenhof used to describe as “old wine in new bottles”?

I like kettles because my athletes like using them, not because I view kettles as better than other strength training protocols. I also understand why kettles are just one of many worthwhile approaches coaches can take for strength training. I think Mel Siff said it best, “Kettlebell training can be great, it can be fun, so can dumbbell training, so can barbell training, so can many other forms of strength training. Only don’t let one’s love for anything turn you into a fanatic who fails to see the merits in other walks of life.”

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. Bruner, Rick, and Ben Tabachnik. Soviet Training and Recovery Methods. Pleasant Hill, CA: Sport Focus Publishing, 1990. Print.
2. John, Dan. Intervention: Course Corrections for the Athlete and Trainer. Aptos, CA: On Target Publications, 2013. Print.
3. John, Dan. Now What? The Ongoing Pursuit of Improved Performance. Santa Cruz: On Target Publications, 2017. Print.
4. Landau, David. “Kettlebells?” David Landau Exposes Exercise Frauds. ExerciseFraud.com, June 2017.
5. Powers, John. Kettlebell: The Ultimate Kettlebell Workout to Lose Weight and Get Ripped in 30 Days. Kettlebell, 2014.
6. Siff, Mel. “Re: Kettlebell Cult?” Blog comment. Mel Siff Supertraining Archive. Mar. 2003. Web.
7. “Voropayev Kettlebell Lifting as an Effective Means of Physical Education (1983) and Others, in English.” StrongFirst.com (Forum for Strength). June 2017. Web.

If there’s one nutrient that’s most strongly linked to athletic performance, it’s protein. There are so many myths, or bro-science, regarding protein requirements that it’s easy to be misled and confused. Further complicating the issue, supplement companies aggressively target athletes with marketing about the need for protein. In this article, I’ll look at what the research suggests is the best practice for athletes when it comes to protein intake and timing.

Protein Explained

Before we dig into the sports-specific research, I’ll quickly explain what protein is. There are three major macronutrients: carbohydrates and fat, which our bodies mainly use as fuel, and protein, which we primarily use for growth and repair (in certain situations it can also be used as a fuel). Each gram of protein provides about four kilocalories (kcal) of energy–the same as carbohydrates.

Proteins are long chains of amino acids joined together by peptide bonds. Some of these amino acids cannot be produced by the body, so we need to get them from our diet. These are called essential amino acids, of which there are nine. Six amino acids are termed conditionally essential; while the body can produce these from other nutrients, this ability can be significantly reduced during periods of stress. Finally, there are five amino acids which the body can produce itself; these are called dispensable amino acids.

Whenever we eat protein in whole forms, such as food and protein powder, we are consuming a mix of these amino acids. Within the essential amino acids, there is a sub-group called branched-chain amino acids (BCAA), which again are aggressively marketed by nutrition companies. These BCAAs are leucine, isoleucine, and valine, and they have important roles. Ideally, about 35% of our protein should be in the form of BCAAs. Fortunately, that’s the rough ratio of BCAAs found in most food products.

Protein has several roles in the human body, many of which are important to athletes, and is abundant in our bodies. There are structural proteins, such as those found in muscle and skin, and functional proteins, such as enzymes, growth factors, and parts of the immune system. When we exercise, we cause damage to our muscles. As our muscles are largely comprised of proteins, we need to repair and replace the damaged proteins; this can also lead to hypertrophy. Amino acids also play a role in a variety of different metabolic pathways, support immune function, and can be used as energy.

Protein Requirements for Athletes

It appears logical that athletes, who are engaged in a greater amount of exercise and will suffer from greater protein damage and turnover, will need more than a “normal” human. The typical recommendation for non-athletes is around 0.8g of protein per kilogram of bodyweight per day. Individuals who consume animal products regularly will likely get sufficient amounts through their diets.

How Much Protein Do Athletes Need?

But how much do athletes need? Several research papers have attempted to answer this question, and one of the key researchers in this field is Professor Stuart Phillips from McMaster University. In a paper from 2006, Phillips explained that many studies support the notion that athletes of all kinds have higher protein requirements than sedentary individuals.

In a 1992 paper, Lemon and colleagues reported that, in a group of twelve resistance training males, protein requirements were 1.6-1.7g per kilogram of body weight per day–double the recommended daily allowance (RDA). There appeared to be no benefit regarding muscle strength or size with higher protein intake (the researchers tested 2.6g/kg/BW). These results were mirrored by Tarnopolsky and colleagues in another 1992 paper finding that 1.76g/kg/BW of protein per day was optimal for strength-trained athletes.

It’s not just strength and power athletes who require increased protein, however, with research suggesting that amounts above the RDA are also important for endurance athletes. Increased protein intake by athletes also supports immune function and guards against overtraining. Clearly, it’s important for performance athletes to have higher intakes of protein than the RDA.

Protein Requirements for Weight and Fat Loss

From time to time, athletes are also interested in losing weight and fat. In non-weight category sports, athletes usually want to decrease fat mass while maintaining or gaining muscle mass to improve the crucial power to weight ratio. It’s important to note that the optimal amount of body fat is highly individual, depending on a person’s unique makeup and sporting demands.

In sprinting, for example, during the general preparation period, athletes need to consume sufficient calories to support training adaptations. However, before the competition periods, sprinters typically aim to “lean out,” and lose a bit of fat while maintaining muscle strength and power. In weight category sports, athletes tend to live day to day at weights well above their category and then cut their weight before a competition. Again, maintaining lean body mass is important; if an Olympic weightlifter loses strength before competition, they likely won’t perform their best. Higher than normal protein intakes give them an advantage.

Several studies of non-athletes suggest that higher protein intake helps with fat loss by increasing thermogenesis as protein requires greater energy to metabolize than required by fats and carbohydrates. Protein also improves diet adherence by increasing satiety, keeping you feeling full longer.

While restricting calories, increased protein helps athletes keep their hard won muscle mass. Share on X

During periods of caloric restriction, increased protein intakes appear to successfully maintain lean mass levels, allowing athletes to keep their hard won muscle mass. A 2004 paper, authored by Stuart Phillips published in Sports Medicine, suggested that athletes undertaking a calorie restricted diet may need to consume as high as 3g/kg/BW per day to offset the loss of lean body mass.

Can Athletes Consume Too Much Protein?
Is there such a thing as too much protein? We often hear too much protein can damage the kidneys, but research indicates that protein intakes of up to 2.8g/kg/BW per day are safe for healthy individuals with no previous history of kidney issues. Higher amounts may also be safe, but it isn’t clear due to a lack of data. In an 80kg athlete, this would equal close to 900 calories of protein (224g of protein), the equivalent to 800g of chicken breast.

When Athletes Should Consume Protein

We’ve established that protein is important for athletes and that they almost certainly need intakes higher than recommended for the general population. The next question is: when should athletes consume their protein? Research indicates the BCAAs, especially leucine, activate a number of key enzymes involved in muscle hypertrophy and repair. Based on this, it seems obvious that we want to consume at least some protein around the time of our training session to allow this activation to occur.

After resistance training, combining protein and carbohydrates increases muscle protein synthesis when compared to carbohydrate intake alone. We can enhance this increase by adding leucine to the protein-carbohydrate drink. However, it’s worth pointing out that the subjects in the research study were in the fasted state–they hadn’t eaten since the previous evening. This is a common practice in research because it removes the effect of a pre-training meal; individuals might consume different foods which might alter what the researchers are measuring. This is a great example of how science doesn’t always carry over to practice, unless you’re performing resistance training in a fasted state.

Consuming protein before training may be more important than after training. Share on X

In fact, some research suggests that consuming protein before training is more important than post-training. Again, this is logical, given that it takes time for the protein to digest and be transported to the muscles. Based on these findings, it’s sensible to suggest that athletes consume protein both before and after training.

Placing this into a real world context, if you have a meal before training, ensure it contains protein. After training, have another meal with protein or a protein supplement (possibly with added leucine). It appears that 20g of protein post-training is the minimal amount. In a really good review on whether or not the post-training anabolic window exists, the authors suggested that protein intakes of 20-40g both before (one to two hours pre-) and after training were optimal for building muscle.

There’s considerable scientific debate about how often athletes should consume protein. There is evidence that the “muscle full” effect exists, where protein intake above a certain level does not further enhance muscle protein synthesis. For example, this study found that 20g was sufficient to maximally stimulate muscle protein synthesis, and any intake above this amount led to an increase in amino acid oxidation for energy. An earlier study had similar findings, stating the optimal protein intake was 20g every three hours while greater intakes potentially reduced muscle protein synthesis.

Ingesting more than the optimal amount of protein may reduce muscle protein synthesis. Share on X

We can conclude that we want fairly regular intakes of protein spread throughout the day, as opposed to one large serving. For an individual training in the morning, this could mean having protein at breakfast (this is the meal with typically the lowest protein intake), followed by a post-training protein shake. The athlete should have protein at lunch and dinner and possibly an additional protein snack between lunch and dinner or before bed, depending upon meal times. Three to four hours between protein intakes is considered “ideal.”

Protein Sources for Athletes

We can find abundant protein in our diets, provided we eat the correct foods. Animal products, especially meat, typically have the highest protein. And these proteins are complete proteins, containing all the essential amino acids. Protein shakes, which often consist of whey or casein, and amino acid supplements are also protein sources. These have the advantage of being convenient but are typically devoid of other nutrients. One way around this is to use protein powders in a smoothie. I tend to mix mine with frozen berries, spinach, and almond or coconut milk for additional nutrients.

For vegans, protein sources can be harder to come by, and vegan proteins are often incomplete proteins. Vegan athletes must combine numerous protein sources to ensure they meet their protein needs. This isn’t to say that vegans can get sufficient protein, just that it may require additional planning.

Conclusion

We’ve seen that the RDA for protein is insufficient for athletes in all sports. Intakes of about 1.5g/kg/BW are likely optimal for endurance training athletes, with slightly higher amounts–1.7g/kg/BW–ideal for resistance training athletes.

Higher protein intakes may be ideal at certain times, for example during a low-calorie diet. Eating protein throughout the day, including pre- and post-training, is better than a single large protein intake. As such, at least 20g of protein should be present at all meals three to five times a day, ideally with three to four hours between each meal. Finally, these amounts of protein are safe for healthy athletes, contrary to popular myths.

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

The era of sports science in the world of competitive team sports is just getting started, but the movement’s technological underpinnings are beginning to settle. Motion sensors and computer vision track athletes movement patterns and force production. New platforms for chemical sensors tell more and more about athletes’ physiological makeup. And the simple, everpresent questionnaires, anthropometric measures, weigh-ins and heart rate calculations have proven value. All of that data gets funneled into computer interfaces, and sports management moves irreversibly towards evidence- and analytics-based decision-making.

Teams will prioritize some data and ignore others. They will emphasize some results and downplay others. And they will be ready, or not, for the next-generation of sports science tech to come on-line. Those choices, for better or worse, are becoming a sports organization’s recipe for athlete performance, the secret sauce of their team’s won-lost record.

One core piece of emerging sports science technology is Athlete Management System (AMS) software (like CoachMePlus). Think of it as a scaffold for teams to build their sports science programs and their secret sauce. The increasing adoption of these software platforms speaks to the value they have for teams, but heads up, these are new products in a relatively new market.

The newness of AMS’ products has implications for customers, namely:

• These products will change, evolve and improve.
• A community of technically-minded AMS users will emerge, connect, and in time, grow to define itself.
• AMS’ technical advances will lead to users’ (and teams’) innovations in workflow, analysis, and tactics as the product developers and the community make progress toward interface and usability standards.

Culture and community are forms of collaboration. (So are sales, software development, and transition defense.) Successful collaboration defines teams’ success. And collaboration will be critical to shape how teams take to an athlete management system and make it into something valuable, now and in the future.

Understanding the Athlete Management System

It’s best to know how to walk before you learn how to run. Progressions are essential for athletes’ development. And no surprise, there’s a progression for moving through the learning curve of sports science collaboration and AMS adoption.

Team sports at every level benefit from measuring athletes’ performance systematically. The decision to begin measuring starts an organization down the path of applied sports science. More sports science decisions follow, and a big one is whether to purchase and use an athlete management system or to stick with a custom solution, often assembled from Excel spreadsheets or custom databases. Either way, AMS or no AMS, the data collected and the interfaces for the athlete data are going to be as much a part of the makeup of that team as any staff member, any trainer, any player, any coach.

The athlete performance data and interfaces are an opportunity for competitive advantage; together they are the secret sauce teams use to assess talent, develop players and, ultimately, win games. The measurement technologies, in practice and from vendors, are often new and, in some cases, still emerging — biomarkers, sleep, FMS, player tracking, force plates, RPE, questionnaires, Catapult, and Omegawave.

AMS software, like CoachMePlus, is, by necessity, opinionated software. It’s software with a vision and an approach for how best to get work done. CoachMePlus’ vision and approach come from the best practices of applied sports science. (Also, the opinionated-ness is not a lack of flexibility or control for users; users have both. Lots of both in fact.)

If you use Microsoft Excel or something else custom (and less opinionated) to manage athlete performance, you are in complete control of the data, it’s input, output, and management. You are the developer and the user, and out of necessity, you make lots of data management and presentation decisions. Excel is not opinionated software, and it creates more work.

Most times the decisions that get built into the user interface involve steering a user through the tasks that software has been built to help with. “Software requirements” are what software developers call these task definitions that, once built, are important elements of the software’s services. Tasks that are not defined well enough to be included in requirements documentation will not get designed into the user interface, and determining requirements is the crucial early step for building useful digital tools and services.

Having an already-built, commercial AMS helps a team to avoid starting its applied sports science program with a completely blank slate. Fill in the forms and click buttons on whatever starter template to get to a useful place with the technology. But work remains to go from starting out with the basics to making an AMS into something that reflects a team’s approach to sports science.

There can be significant advantages to going without an AMS though. The legwork in using Excel, or even paper, to manage athletes health and performance creates a useful, hands-on, personal relationship with athletes’ data. Manually entering data can be an effective, practical way to see athletes’ patterns. It is also time-consuming, sometimes to the point of being impractical for taking lots of measurements and for managing larger numbers of athletes.

An AMS might be necessary, but it’s important to understand what it means to surrender some degree of control to an opinionated technology. It’s also important to understand what you as a software customer can do to influence, evolve and improve opinionated technology.

A team can guarantee that its data systems evolve according to its needs by developing its own systems, but the team that goes with a commercial AMS needs to remain aware of how changes in data can lead to workflow changes that might call for changes in the user interface. The task definitions that are scoped out as requirements can be inaccurate, imprecise or fail to keep up with users’ needs. It helps to remember that sports science is a young discipline, and the technologies are new.

The inability to make sense of the data takes time away from coaching, training and otherwise helping athletes. The situation is a user interface failure. Like so many efforts that do not succeed it is also a learning opportunity, a chance to examine what’s happened, apply the lessons and make progress.

Software tends to work better when the task and the analysis are well-defined. Technology gets better as developers, designers, and engineers improve their understanding of how it should be used. Requirements that start off murky eventually become clear.

“Design Patterns” are what often maps the requirements for a user task to its implementation in a software interface. Design patterns also provide a helpful way to understand how good software takes advantage of modular components that work together. One design pattern is a reusable solution to a specific problem, like the easy solution to gathering health data by assigning clickable zones to a simple representation of the body. Good software is built component by component, where each component does its job, much like what coaches ask for from players. Design patterns provide a common language and helpful shortcut to bridge what users need from software to the code that helps do those tasks.

More than with any other task, an AMS shines when asked to provide an overview, helping busy users see the big picture on a dashboard: that athletes are thriving, who might be injured, what practice patterns seem to get the desired results.

Stephen Few, a noted information design consultant, has articulated what makes for good dashboard design, “Visual monitoring involves a series of sequential steps that the dashboard should be designed to support.”

• The user should begin by getting an overview of what’s going on and quickly identifying what needs attention.
• Next, the user should look more closely at each of those areas that need attention to be able to understand them well enough to determine if something should be done about them.
• Lastly, if additional details are needed to complete the user’s understanding before deciding how to respond, the dashboard should serve as a seamless launch pad to that information.

It’s here, at the dashboard, that the AMS and the team using it have to be in sync. Software for athlete performance is going to incorporate a wide range of data inputs: weight, body composition, hydration, questionnaires, velocity-based training, sleep, nutrition, blood markers, fitness tests, movement screens, heart rate, heart rate variability, athlete tracking, readiness monitoring, load, video analysis and game analytics. The dashboard needs to reflect the priorities of the team, or it isn’t putting users’ attention where it should go.

Applied sports science depends on an effective athlete management system that has to do two very different things at the same time. It has to value the simple presentation of good dashboard design. And it has to capture the complexity of all the different facets of athlete performance. The tension to maintain simplicity while also adding new complex features is another fundamental consideration of user-center design.

The tension between design simplicity and feature complexity is likely always to be an issue for athlete management systems. New sensors and data sources continue to be invented. Teams are adding sports science personnel who bring a range of backgrounds and place new demands on the software. If you agree that AMS is opinionated software, you will want to pay attention to how an AMS is set to evolve on these fronts in the future.

In addition to the tension between simplicity and new features, supporting collaboration among users is another design dimension that will shape the future of the AMS. Collaboration plays a role in turning information into actionable insights that will improve athletes and teams, and in using the evidence at hand for organization decision-making about players.

Authorities on effective collaboration point to the “shared artifact” as the thing that everyone has in common and which provides a single frame of reference for the group discussion. An AMS can be the shared artifact for all of the different stakeholders in a sports organization that helps them work together.

This is the AMS progression for doing sports science:

• Start by simply entering data.
• Do basic analysis.
• Develop a unified dashboard.
• Incorporate a wider range of sports science data inputs.
• Increase the complexity of the data interface.
• Ultimately make the AMS a tool for collaboration.
• A progression, yes. An easy progression, no.

Advocacy, Customers and the Future of Athlete Management Systems

The goal for CoachMePlus (and our product development roadmap) has us getting more flexible and more collaborative as the product evolves. Inside our organization we are building out the APIs, data modeling tools and dashboard functionality for our internal product teams, These are the technical tools that will improve our internal collaboration, setting us up to work better with our customers and partners.

Already, customers can call with an idea they want to try and our tools enable less than a 24-hour turnaround. Eventually, the APIs, modeling tools, and dashboards should become self-service interfaces for teams to take greater ownership of how they use their data and which will help teams to extract maximum value of athletes’ data.

There are many pathways to realizing potential; it’s true for athletes, and it’s true for technology. Each athlete management system is going to have unique elements for the team operating it. If the team has someone whose job is to administer the AMS, all of the ongoing change in sports science is going to make for challenges.

High up on the list of challenges is the way an AMS administrator has to represent all of the different stakeholders and be an advocate for athletes, coaches, clinicians, trainers and team management as he or she guides the evolution of the AMS and the workflows a team uses with the AMS. The point: It’s not enough to simply passively administer the team AMS, not when these products are set to evolve rapidly, even within the timeframe of a team’s season.

AMS administrators are advocates when it comes to working with CoachMePlus or any of the developers of the technology. Administrators are the voice of their team’s otherwise voiceless stakeholders who benefit from the technology. The better those team-side communication channels are working, the more aware AMS administrators are of their needs when they have their conversations with their technology partners.

Teams that make the most out of sports science will need to make the most of their athlete management system, and that will be difficult for teams that choose to be passive participants in AMS evolution.

Ultimately teams will get the AMS they deserve, based on how much they participate in moving the technology forward. In time, there will be communities of practice for applied sports science technology, but until that day arrives, the quality of the tools depends on the quality of the collaboration on teams, between teams and technology providers, and among everyone who comes together in the nascent community of sports science technology developers.

Participation is not mandatory and karma is not guaranteed. But please share so that you and your peers in the present and the future may benefit.

One of the summer activities I have my cross-country runners do is throw a turbo-jav into a trash can. Since I give prizes for the winning toss, every time I do this my runners always want to take some warm-up tosses prior to competition. But are these warm-up tosses improving either their distance or their precision once competition begins?

A classic study from 1957 provides us with an insight on warming up for an activity similar to my “javelin in a can.” Forty-six male students were given a five-minute warmup and then instructed to throw a softball as far as they could. The participants came back a little more than a week later and, like my javelin toss, they would win prizes (in this case, money) if they could throw the softball farther than they did previously, but this time without benefit of a warmup. So, what happened? None of the participants threw farther than they had before.

Does this 60-year-old study suggest the inherent value of a warmup for any movement activity, or am I simply “lobbing a softball” to those who want to use this as evidence to corroborate why it makes sense to do some kind of warmup activity prior to competition?

What Is the Goal of Warmups?

It is a complicated answer because the concept of “warming up” means different things to different coaches. Is warming up stretching? Is it a combination of stretching with various movements? Is it mental rehearsal? Lighting up the central nervous system?

The concept of ‘warming up’ means different things to different coaches. Share on X

Maybe it is all of these and more. But, if warmups are a smorgasbord of various activities with different purposes, do we need to fulfill all of these purposes in order for the warmup to be truly effective? The current debate on the value of static stretching is just one example of the confusion over which items from the warmup smorgasbord coaches and athletes need to put on their plates. That may depend on what specific physiological effect—as well as psychological effect—of warming up coaches most value, and there are many to choose from.

Is it muscle temperature? This makes sense since a temperature increase allows muscles to contract faster and with more fiber recruitment. For example, nerve impulses in people travel eight times more slowly than they do in frogs, which have much lower body temperatures. We know that a warmer muscle is likely to experience less damage, especially during eccentric contraction. Is it increased blood flow to the heart and muscles by way of movement that needs to be addressed? Might it be muscle plasticity?

Distance coaches will point out that a warmup results in increased oxygen and carbon dioxide exchange, and that a more-efficient oxygen transport means more available ATP. Others will contend that a warmup can reinforce important motor skills. I have always considered the warmup a valuable means to achieving competitive arousal. For example, Frank Shellock pointed out that a warmup leads to psychological increases in focus and attention, and that a warmup decreases the fear of injury.

We see examples of unique kinds of arousal techniques used in various sports. Football players will tap helmets together and punch down on shoulder pads, and boxers will glove their faces before the opening bell. Long jumper Mike Powell often slapped his face before taking off down the runway, and many sprinters still jump up and down a few times before backing into their blocks.

Others see the value of the warmup as a form of visualization—what Mel Siff used to describe as “imagineering.” You see this with wrestlers who jog around the mat as they mentally rehearse shooting for a takedown. Some athletes perform specific kinds of rehearsals right before a trial. Dwight Stones, for example, bobbed his head as he visualized his approach steps in the high jump. And there is some performance justification for suggesting that these activities are more than just ritual. Charles Duhigg described how, every night, Michael Phelps would play a mental recording of himself setting world records. Maxwell Maltz introduced this concept back in the early ’60s, and referred to it as “psycho-cybernetics,” the process of enhancing self-image through visualization and mental rehearsal.

Many elite coaches might also choose specific activities in a warmup because they intend to use them to spot any imbalances. In this case, the warmup might be considered a kind of movement screening. This makes sense, since most coaches and trainers say that the key goal of the warmup is to ward against potential injury, while at the same time getting athletes ready to compete.

But some warmup activities make more sense than others. I know cross-country and track coaches who have their runners jog a couple of laps or even a mile, then have them plop down on the turf or track to do 20 minutes of old-school static stretches, with each of those stretches held to a 10-count by the group leader. They then have those runners get back up and run another lap or two because they don’t quite trust that they are ready to race, or because they want to re-elevate things like core muscle temperature and blood pressure, both of which dropped back down during the static stretching. Some say they do this because they want their runners to “re-break a sweat.” Is the value of this approach more about its team bonding and ritual aspect?

I have always liked what Loren Seagrave and Kevin O’Donnell referred to as the “big warmup,” and many coaches include those activities in their pre-competition protocol. I like incorporating various kinds of skipping, hopping, or galloping done forward, backward, and laterally, and it’s extensive enough be its own workout. These kinds of activities seem to accomplish many different things, including elevating the temperature and blood pressure, and challenging runners neurologically. Additionally, since the group must duplicate the speed and amplitude of the group leader’s movements, athletes need to concentrate and stay focused. The activities I select are what I call “gravity constant,” emphasizing such things as timing, core stiffness, coordination, and reactivity.

Video 1: I like incorporating various kinds of skipping, hopping, or galloping done in all directions—forward, backward, and laterally—into warmups, and it’s extensive enough to be its own workout. Here, an athlete engages in complex rope skipping in all directions.

Video 2: In group warmups, the groups must duplicate the speed and amplitude of the group leader’s movements, forcing each athlete to concentrate and stay focused. I select what I call “gravity constant” activities, which emphasize such things as timing, core stiffness, coordination, and reactivity.

The Inclusion of Self-Massage Activities

In recent years, the warmup has involved activities for removing tissue micro-trauma from previous training sessions. Trainers often describe small “hot spots” or knots in muscles as trigger points. They no longer try to remove these knots by way of conventional stretching, believing that if these trigger points are indeed like knots, pulling on the ends of the knot via conventional stretching only further tightens them—kind of like the old Chinese finger trap.

So, a form of self-massage has evolved. Again, at first this seems like nothing new, since the massage stick—which I used to describe as a rolling pin with bicycle handles on the ends—goes back more than 30 years.

Perhaps that stick, refined over the years by way of soft rubber knobs and waffles replacing the original hard plastic rings, will be viewed in a whole new way, thanks to Ben Affleck’s self-massage technique in the film, “The Accountant.”

The theory is that rolling applies pressure to tissue sore spots in the muscle, thereby breaking up scar tissue and adhesions, and thus releasing the trigger points. In this regard, the stick has now evolved to tubes—the original being just sections of PVC soil pipe—but now these tubes consist of various configurations of denser foam. These new massage tubes are now very popular.

The technique used with these foam tubes has a technical name—SMR or Self-Myofascial Release. These rolling techniques increase both flexibility and range of motion through “autogenic inhibition.” And what does that mean? The tension the roller puts on the muscle causes the brain to relax that muscle to prevent it from tearing.

Trainers and therapists often progress to using tennis balls or lacrosse balls to target deeper trigger points, especially those in the back. There is no end to the therapist’s creativity here. Some tape these balls together to form what they call “massage peanuts.”

It Comes Down to a Matter of Taste

So, not only is the warmup a smorgasbord of choices, it also appears that even choices we make continue to undergo changes. I very much agree with Rett Larson, project manager for EXOS- China, who said that the “concept of the warmup needs to shift from simply focusing on the muscles of the body to embracing the multi-factorial nature of pre-training or competition preparation.”

The takeaway from all of this is that many techniques can activate muscles before training. Whatever coaches choose to implement in their warmup, what they are actually accomplishing may be the kind of neurological arousal that they believe best prepares their athletes for the demands of the sport or event they are competing in.

Coaches choose warmups they like through experience, but not everyone has the same experience. Share on X

Like a smorgasbord, we can sample a variety of warmup routines, but whatever we choose to maintain is really the result of an “acquired taste” for what we think works best. These are activities we come to like through experience, but keep in mind that they reflect an appreciation that others might not share if they have not had similar experiences with the athletes they train.

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

Duhigg, Charles. The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do and How to Change. London: Random House, 2013. Print.

Joyce, David, and Daniel Lewindon. High-performance Training for Sports. Leeds: Human Kinetics, 2014. Print

Maltz, Maxwell. Psycho-cybernetics. New York: TarcherPerigee, an Imprint of Penguin, 2016. Print

Rochelle, R., E. Michael, and V. Skubic. 1957. “Effect of warm-up on softball throw for distance.” Research Quarterly, 28: 357363. 2.

Shellock, F.G. (1986) “Research Applications: Physiological, psychological, and injury prevention aspects of warm-up.” National Strength & Conditioning Association Journal: Vol. 8, No. 5, pp. 24-27.

 

My introduction to Dr. Peter Weyand came late last century on a snowy day at Benedictine University in Lisle, Illinois. Respected Illinois high school coach Ken Jakalski led a seminar featuring Weyand and his new research on sprinting speeds.

At the time, Kevin O’Donnell and Loren Seagraves were the rage with their Speed Dynamics VHS tapes. Every coach had their own copy. They could recite all of the drills from “A” skips to whatever the last alphabet letter they used. You weren’t a good sprint coach unless you had all of your athletes lined up doing the drills in unison.

I can still hear the sound of a good practice because everyone’s feet were hitting in unison. And in the back of all the coaches’ minds was the stride rate vs. stride length controversy. This was such a powerful, overriding factor that we even had sticks set out to work length or shorten the distance-to-do rate. And on acceleration days, we threw out the slats with rope to measure the lengths of acceleration. Those were the days.

Jakalski’s entertaining introduction reminded us of our journey with speed development, touching on such cool toys as the Kolka Thigh Trainer, Russian parachutes, and other well-marketed devices that caught the attention of desperate sprint coaches who had a spare Benjamin or two in their budgets. He ended with the statement that Dr. Weyand was going to change all of that. And he did.

Dr. Weyand is not a sprint coach. At that time, he was a Harvard University researcher, working at a nearby one-time Nike anti-aircraft missile control center. He had a force plate and high-speed cameras that recorded animals and people running. If my memory serves, he started working for the US Army to look into calorie expenditure and running. From there, he looked into birds running, like ostriches. That led him to limb repositioning.

In his paper “Faster top running speeds are achieved with greater ground forces not more rapid leg movements” (Journal of Applied Physiology, 89: 1991-2000, 2000), he determined that repositioning of legs was just about the same in everything he tested. (Everything except the common house cat. He had every kind of animal and human run on the plate but couldn’t get a cat to do it). He even inherited a lion that had started living at the facility.

What was cooler than the roaming lion was Weyand’s conclusion that what determines speed is the amount of force an athlete applies to the ground. This not only applies to humans but also to animals as well. The really fast ones—cheetahs, ostriches, greyhounds—hit the ground much harder than sheep, lions, and other slower animals. I have Boerboels. They are very fast for big dogs, just for about 50 yards. When they go by, you can hear the thud of their feet on the ground. When my really fast sprinters go by, it is like a drum. Weyand concluded that the harder you hit the ground, the faster you are. He compared the world’s top sprinters to other runners and found the same thing.

The seminar was a game changer. But, it was only a game changer in theory because no one gave any tips on how to develop the ability to put force to the ground. It was a brand-new game. Is it strength or stiffness that needs the work? Do we do a ton of plyometric work? Do we start lifting large amounts of weight?

Both create problems. Plyometrics are often supported by two legs and lack the challenge to the lateral chain that is so important for a stiff contact. The strength portion is too slow and sometimes not in the proper range of motion. I have seen many athletes who can lift the house but can’t run. Others can’t deadlift much but run like a deer. So where does that leave us?

Before I get to the weight room stuff that I found to be very effective, training the test is very effective. Sprinting itself can have a huge impact on vertical force. Like Tony Holler preaches, electronically timed short sprints are the best way to develop sprint speed. There is no way around it. Start with fly 10s and gradually spread out to 30s by the peak of the season. In The Rise of Superman, Steven Kotler writes about the importance of Flow. Flow is the neurological state necessary for optimal performance. Immediate feedback is one of the keys for Flow.

So at our practices, people scream out numbers so athletes immediately know exactly how they did. That creates a reaction in the brain to do better, or ride the wave and do even better yet. Every night after practice, I post times which show improvement (or lack thereof) from the previous workout. All this creates a positive environment. Most times, our practices become more competitive than our meets. So even if all you have is a short hallway, that’s enough for an effective workout. I have had the luxury of a 200m track for the last 9 years. All we need is a straight and that is enough for most of our workouts.

But, if you are short of space or want to change things up, you can try this workout I created several years ago. It has proven very effective for my athletes.

The first exercise is a psoas and glute exercise. If you read my previous post, “5 Effective Glute Exercises,” you know about the relationship between the glute and psoas. I want to establish this relationship in most of these exercises. I also want to establish the scissoring action of the knees.

In his book Strength Speed: Technology and Training for Sprinter Speed and Long Jump, Swedish coach Jan Melén shows the differences between athletes of varying levels and their knee lift. I think we all agree that faster sprinters get their knees high. Part of that knee height is a reaction to the drive onto the ground.

But there is also an element of psoas activity. If the psoas is not firing, the knee lift will come from the hip flexors in the thigh and will not have the power to lift the leg all of the way to a position with the torso past 90 degrees. This exercise drills the knee lift. The athlete has a strap around the thigh and standing straight brings the knee past parallel.

When I tried it on my kBox, it lit my glutes and psoas. Initially, I used a weight that was too heavy. It went to my quads and was ineffective. I called the guys at Exxentric and asked them to build me a very small plate so my body would not cheat. Two weeks later, I received a package from Sweden with a tiny kBox plate. (Thanks Erik and Andreas! Great customer service! Something lacking from some other companies mentioned in my other posts.) The tiny plate rocked it. My glutes were burning after a set and the psoas was jacking my knee up. When I stepped off the machine, I felt like I could fly. Awesome! I tried it with some rubber bands. Not as good. It doesn’t have the eccentric pull that the kBox has, which seems to really fire the psoas.

What does this have to do with ground force? If the psoas and glute are reciprocal functioning mechanisms, the glute will work better if the psoas is firing. And, since the glute is in its peak contraction at the midstance phase, we are strengthening this pattern where we need to. Timing is half of sprinting. But in the weight room we never work on that. Now we are.

 

 

The second exercise is a reactive single leg squat. We challenged the push of the swing leg knee with our kBox psoas lift. Now we will weigh down the stance leg. I use my Hammer Strength deadlift, but dumbbells work well as do rubber bands—or any combination of the three. The athlete picks up the weight and does reactive quarter squats up to his big toe. To work on timing, the swing leg will come high. And the top of extension, the athlete will rapidly drop back down and repeat.

The keys are an ankle bend into a rocker position and a slight hip bend so the glutes and hamstring will need to extend. I usually hook my micro-muscle lab to the bar to monitor force output but it died on me. The Gymaware people don’t respond to emails so I am waiting to hear back from them so I can get back to measuring. I have been measuring this output for years and my fastest runners are the ones who put out the watts. It never fails. I usually vary between 45-135 lbs. After that the power output drops.

 

The third exercise is kickbacks on the Shuttle MVP. Now we are leaving the ground. I adjust the weight to less than body weight for weaker athletes so their contact time is quicker. I weigh down stronger athletes and really force them to hit the plate hard. Some athletes like to be face-down and others on their side. I don’t put them on their back because foot placement is too far in front. No Shuttle? No problem. Hang some rubber bands from the ceiling or the top of a squat rack and do French Contrast jumps, a la Cal Dietz. Again, the body weight can be controlled by the strength of the band.

 

The fourth exercise ties everything together. We call it Boom Booms because I want to hear the foot punch the ground. The second boom comes if we want to do two contacts to the ground. I stole it from Frans Bosch’s Running DVD (I stole a lot from that DVD). Athletes start with a butt bungee around their waist and walk out to tighten the band. This gets more glute function, though I have no proof other than feel. They lift their swing leg and arms to a perfect position. Quickly they step down with the swing leg, scissoring their legs. The swing leg hits the ground and punches back up to the starting position.

In his book, Melén shows the positions of where knees pass each other in a variety of sprinters. The faster the athlete, the further away from the ground the knees pass. From the picture, you can see that there are different surfaces on the floor. I want them always changing the surface. Sometimes I put 5-pound plates under them to make them uneven. There are lots of variations to this exercise that we use but I will cover those on my forthcoming warm-up and lateral chain articles.

 

The last exercise is a fly 10. We do 2-3 to warm up and get a top time and then start to cycle through the exercises. The kBox is great because I can take it out to the track and do kickbacks and single leg squats with it to try to replicate the full indoor workout. The athletes usually feel great when they run and the neural drive for the exercises sometime coaxes some really good times, even after they are fatigued. When their times slow more than 5-6%, I stop them. It is usually 2 cycles.

This is a great workout because it kills two birds with one stone. The athletes get a “weight room” workout and sprint together. I think one of the biggest barriers for high school athletes today is doing too much. Dawn patrol workouts, breakfast club, Animal farm, etc. before school and sprinting after creates a horrible recovery situation. It is just way too much. And it is not just their coaches. It is them too. They will sneak off to Lifetime Fitness to get more in and the body, both neurally and muscularly, never gets a chance to recover. I see it every year. The ones who don’t get better do too much. I see when I muscle test as well. I am sure the Omegawave and Bioforce people are tracking that also. Rest is a workout and drugs are not an option for the people I train.

When I used this workout extensively, my athletes had their best fly 100 times and ran some of the fastest times in Illinois history. Why did I get away from it? I get bored like you do. I constantly look for new stuff when I already have all that I need in front of me.

Here are some ideas I play with. Maybe something to them, I don’t know. The second to last one has John Fox pulling over my 4-way hip machine. That is some power.

 

We all have groups of student/athletes who we hope we can change their lives. Sometimes you have a group that changes a coach’s. This group ran 41.84 and 1:26.06, two of the fastest times in state history. (From left) Tarrance Williams, who graduated from Eastern Illinois. You all recognize him as the Eastbay catalogue model. Jimmy Sullivan threw the javelin for University of Illinois, spent a semester in Patagonia in National Outdoor Leadership School, and then walked across South America. John Fox ran at Illinois, but his career was curtailed with a recurring hamstring injury. He is enrolled in law school. Khara Williams is currently breaking into a career in theater.

 

 

 

This is a 40-inch jump by Khara. Watch the shadow in the background.

 

 

This is another group of athletes. The first one is a long jump state champion and all-state 100m. The second is a girls all-state 400m runner. And last is a good high school sprinter who ran 11.4 FAT.

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