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The use of caffeine within sports is rampant. Banned at certain dosages by the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) until 2004, today almost three-quarters of anti-doping urine tests contain a measurable amount of caffeine. In addition, when questioned as to whether they were planning on consuming caffeine during their race, most athletes competing at the 2005 Ironman World Triathlon Championships said they were. This indicates that the vast majority of athletes believe that caffeine has performance-enhancing effects, and that its use is widespread.

The Uncertain Benefits of Caffeine Use

It’s not entirely clear how caffeine elicits its performance-enhancing effects. A number of different mechanisms have been proposed through research. These include an increase in calcium within the muscle, which allows for an increase in cross-bridge attachments, improving muscular contractions and muscle fiber recruitment. This, in turn, allows for a greater amount of force to be produced. Caffeine also increases fat burning, which allows athletes to use up less of their muscle glycogen stores, saving them for later in the race and hence improving endurance performance.

Caffeine also appears to reduce rating of perceived exertion (RPE) and pain, which again allows exercise to continue for a longer period of time. While all of these mechanisms are sound in terms of rationale, one issue is that the support for each is inconsistent across the published research. Where one study suggests that caffeine improve fat burning, another finds no evidence of this; the same is true for improvements in motor firing rates.

In the absence of a firm physiological mechanism, it’s possible that the use of caffeine by athletes is due to their belief that caffeine improves performance—in other words, caffeine might have strong placebo effects. Christopher Beedie, a researcher based at Canterbury Christ Church University in the U.K., has examined this extensively. In a paper published in 2006, Beedie and colleagues reported the results of an experiment conducted on six well-trained male cyclists.

In this study, the cyclists underwent three experimental 10-km cycle time trials. In each experimental trial, the cyclists were told they were consuming differing dosages of caffeine: either none, 4.5mg/kg, or 9mg/kg. When the subjects were informed they were consuming no caffeine, their performance decreased on average by 1.4% as compared to baseline tests. However, when they were told they had consumed caffeine, their performances increased, by 1.3% in the 4.5mg/kg trial, and by 3.1% in the 9mg/kg trial.

From this, it seems obvious that caffeine improves performance, except that in each trial the subjects had actually consumed a placebo instead of caffeine. In this particular experiment, it wasn’t caffeine that improved performance, it was being told you had taken caffeine that improved performance. Interestingly, being told you hadn’t taken caffeine actually reduced performance when compared to other trials where caffeine wasn’t consumed, illustrating the possibility that there may well be a nocebo effect also present with caffeine use.

Caffeine didn’t improve performance; being told they had taken caffeine improved performance. Share on X

Researchers based in Torino, Italy, published another interesting paper in 2008. In this study, the authors got the subjects to carry out the leg extension exercise to failure at 60% of their 1RM. For the next two testing sessions, the subjects got a dose of caffeine and carried out the test to exhaustion at 60% 1RM again, before a final test, again at 60% 1RM. In this final test, only half the subjects got the caffeine, while the other half received nothing. The group that received the caffeine produced significantly more power in this test than the group receiving nothing. At least, that’s what the subjects thought had happened. In actual fact, neither group had received caffeine at any time; it was just an inert placebo.

Even better, in the second and third testing sessions, the researchers had surreptitiously reduced the weight lifted by the subjects to 45% of 1RM. This had the effect of making the exercise feel really easy, which the subjects put down to the ergogenic effects of caffeine. This belief carried through to the final test, carried out at the correct weight, with those who believed they had consumed caffeine seeing a performance enhancement when compared to a control group.

Overall, this indicates that if you think caffeine improves your performance, your performance will improve. In addition to this, if you think caffeine improves performance, and you think you’ve taken caffeine, your performance will improve—even if you haven’t taken caffeine! The downside to this is that, if you think caffeine improves performance, but you think you haven’t taken caffeine, then your performance will likely suffer. A study published in 2016 by researchers based in Brazil backs up these findings. They found that, during a caffeine placebo trial, those that correctly identified they hadn’t taken caffeine saw a loss of performance compared to a control trial, while those who thought they had taken caffeine saw an improvement in performance compared to a control trial.

These effects aren’t just limited to caffeine use, either. They’re also present with the consumption of other ergogenic aids, such as carbohydrates. For example, a study published in 2000 put 43 competitive cyclists through two 40-km time trials. The first trial was to establish baseline; in the second trial, the subjects were randomized to receive either a carbohydrate drink or a non-caloric placebo. Some subjects were told they had been given carbohydrates, some were told they hadn’t been given carbohydrates, and some weren’t told anything. Overall, those who were told they had consumed carbohydrates saw an improvement in performance, regardless of whether they had actually consumed carbohydrates. Those told they hadn’t been given carbohydrates saw a reduction in performance—even if they had actually consumed the carbohydrate drink.

Are Performance-Enhancing Drugs Just a Placebo?

Finally, we have performance-enhancing drugs. It comes as no surprise that anabolic steroids improve strength in athletes. A review article from 1991 found that, in trained athletes, the use of anabolic steroids improved strength by an average of 5%. That’s a pretty handy improvement, and subsequent studies have shown similar results. One such study is that from Maganaris and colleagues from 2000, where subjects were given anabolic steroids, and improved their bench press by an average of 10 kg. Given that their previous bench press personal best was around 200 kg, this was a 5% improvement.

Of course, by know you can probably guess that the subjects in this study weren’t given anabolic steroids, but an inert sugar pill. The researchers then told half of the group that they had, in fact, been taking a placebo pill, and got all subjects to repeat the test. Those told they had consumed a placebo lost pretty much all of the strength increases gained when they thought they were taking steroids, while those who still thought they were taking steroids either maintained their strength or saw further improvements.

The key point here is that it’s not always the effect of a supplement or drug that is important; instead, it’s the effect that the athlete believes the substance they’re taking will have that can improve performance.

Given that the placebo effect can have a real performance-enhancing outcome, this can put coaches in an ethical dilemma: Is it OK to lie to athletes, in order to get them to believe in the efficacy of a supplement or training method? Many might see this as unethical, and I would tend to agree. However, what is clear is that athlete-coach relationships become crucial, because if the athlete trusts in the coach’s ability to improve their performance, the chances of their performance improving are higher.

It’s more important for coaches to improve an athlete’s performance than it is for them to be right.

Similarly, when working with athletes who have a belief that something is performance-enhancing, that belief itself is likely performance-enhancing—perhaps more so than the training method or supplement itself. This leads to the potentially uncomfortable fact that providing evidence to an athlete that a particular method has no basis in science could actual reduce their performance. What is worth remembering, and something that I often forget, is that it’s more important to improve an athlete’s performance than it is to be right. Sometimes coaches will just have to bite their tongue.

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 Fibonacci sequence is named after mathematician Leonardo of Pisa, known commonly as Fibonacci, and is a series of numbers where the next number in the sequence is the sum of the previous two: 0, 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, 34, 55, 89, 144, 233, etc. In nature, the Fibonacci sequence looks like this:

Early in the sequence, the step-by-step changes are fairly linear, but as the sequence develops there are larger transitions in place and the amount of change needed to grow increases. Athlete development demonstrates this same relationship. The time between each victory and real performance change increases substantially. If you only look at the process as a series of outcomes, then the opposite is true, i.e., large changes followed by progressively smaller and smaller alterations. But if we evaluate the process by the amount of growth that occurs then the parallels displayed are fully revealed.

In this article, I will dissect the training process in order to detail and show the type of growth that must occur to achieve high performance, the interdependence of the micro and macro relationship, and the keys to effective planning and action.

Mastery vs. Complexity

In the book, “The 5 Elements of Effective Thinking,” a story is told about a music teacher having his students attempt a more complex piece of music [1]. The students struggle, so the teacher brings them back to a simpler piece of music. They perform it better, but there is still something missing. The teacher then plays the simpler piece, and the nuance of it is fully expressed in his mastery of his instrument. This leaves the students with an understanding of “do less, better” [2]. Dan Pfaff puts this well when he embraces a willingness to reject unnecessary complexity based on current needs, and to simplify tasks, thus allowing for more mastery to occur [3].

The table above compares Edward Sarul, the 1983 World Champion in the shot put, to nine competitors who have all also thrown over 21 meters [4]. While Sarul was slightly stronger in his relative squat, bench press, and power clean strength, the true differentiator was his lifting velocity and the resultant “power” expressed at higher percentages of load. This demonstrates a level of mastery in strength-power expression that could not be matched, even by competitors who achieved >97% of Sarul’s competitive shot put performance.

This level of expertise was not developed by an exposure to maximal loads, but through an improved understanding of the intent to be strong and explosive across the entire developmental sequence. There is a wonderful visual of this in the Werner Gunthor training videos as well. These performances show that it is not a race to maximum weights. Performance is like an orchestra where the key players will vary in their contribution based on a necessary sequence and timing. Showing this commitment to the physical preparation process allows for a fluidity to be achieved where there is no distinction between strength, power, or endurance. There is no difference between warm-up weights and maximum efforts; there is only excellence in the task at hand.

In training environments that emphasize high performance, embedding good process within the culture is critical, especially if that environment is interdisciplinary. A quality process trumps analysis by a factor of six [5]. As such, the clarity of the signal received from the training process in athlete evaluation and monitoring is of the utmost importance. First, leaders need to establish standards and expectations that create an appropriate environment for teams and athletes so they may flourish. This training culture is to talent what soil is to a garden. Second, athletes need to restructure how they view the monitoring process.

It is critical to embed good process within training cultures that emphasize high performance. Share on X

Many athletes begin each session evaluating how they feel. This guides their behavior, and ultimately forms their character as an athlete. They need to reverse this strategy and begin with who they want to be as an athlete—this guides their Attitude and Behaviors as the No. 1 thing they can Control (A+B = C), and there is a power developed in the feelings they then have [6].

Training Process and Workload Distribution

The O-O-D-A loop—short for Observe, Orient, Decide, Act—is a decision-making framework that can guide the development of such a training environment. This approach focuses on agility over raw horsepower [7]. The OODA loop allows practitioners to know what matters, through athlete observation and monitoring; to measure what matters, through needs analysis and testing; and to change what matters, through the impending decisions and action taken [8]. Each phase of the OODA loop also allows for alternative pathways to be used to re-orient the process when necessary. The OODA loop optimizes process and knowledge of results, and performance can be evaluated immediately, leading to the next logical iteration.

In applied environments, the challenge is generating the right training stress, at the right time, in a way that allows for the appropriate qualities to be developed and expressed specific to current needs, but done so that we are also working toward a team and athlete’s ultimate potential. Whether training loads focus on developing or expressing a current power or capacity indicates the kind of adaptive potential those specific loads have.

Maintenance loads seek to neither develop nor express a high percentage of current power or capacity. They function to remove fatigue so adaptation reserves can be concentrated elsewhere or so the athlete can make a more fluid transition towards another season or training phase while minimizing losses of fitness [3].

Stimulating loads concentrate on either an acute or chronic potentiation of training to develop greater power or capacity.

Stabilizing loads focus on spending more time with a recently developed power or capacity so that quality can be expressed with greater consistency. It is important to note that expressing that quality with such consistency does, in fact, lead to the development of a general, special, or specific work capacity. This occurs within a narrower window of adaptation and, as this commonly occurs in performance, represents a gray area in development.

Adaptive loads take athletes to the absolute edge of their ability. As such, athletes must be observed and monitored closely, and such loads should be reserved for those who have technique that is well-engrained [9] (Table 3). These loads have the potential to help athletes to greatly explore and expand their current power and capacity capabilities, and should therefore be aligned with current development or expression needs.

This process basically represents redlining, and the time spent pushing the envelope in such a way is dependent on previously demonstrated resiliency and an athlete’s current form. At the high-performance level, this intensity is not an option, but it has to be intelligently planned and performed. This type of intelligent action can be demonstrated through a backbone of sport science: When you are attempting to push limits in this way, why guess what an athlete is capable of when you can know for sure?

Periodization that can coordinate athlete monitoring, the potentiation of our current training phase by the last phase, and the optimization of preparedness towards a targeted physical performance can be defined as fluid periodization [10]. This fluidity is adaptive readiness personified. It represents the willingness to embrace the knowledge of the athlete’s ultimate goal and their current capabilities, and then align training so they can give their absolute best to today’s loads based on planning and our ability to execute that plan.

Today, this intent is represented with what is commonly accepted as best practice, where monitoring directly influences the day-to-day training performed, based on specific “windows of adaptation.” However, athlete observation and monitoring has always been important to good coaches and this has been reflected in how they have approached microcycle construction (e.g. high-low models, vertical integration, etc.).

A good planning and training process anticipates the need for alterations in day-to-day training in advance, and considers issues of compatibility and complementarity in design, in line with the slogan of the Israeli Defense Forces, “Plans are merely a platform for change.” [11] Do not let language that sounds new and different allow you to forget what you already know.

Program Structure and the Contingency-Necessity Model

The question must then be asked, “What does this actually look like?” Reconciling the differences between research settings, where clarity and constraints are high, and applied environments is a huge leap. Resources are often limited and this negatively influences process and a training program’s capabilities. In the field, predicting training responses is far less certain. Insights from research must be tempered against that which you are more certain of.

A challenge exists in weighing sport science and research insights against training performance. Share on X

A challenge exists in weighing sport science and research insights against performance in day-to-day training environments. This is where the contingent-necessity model can help practitioners achieve greater clarity (Table 4) [12]. The contingent-necessity model lays out a rationale that shows why contingencies, i.e. future events and circumstances, may interfere with good process through things that are outside of our control as practitioners. But, more importantly, the contingent-necessity model also includes necessity, or constraints, as those things that can work for and with us to better control and direct development in the short-term, notably the laws and theories of physics, biology, and pedagogy.

No one knows what results an athlete will ultimately achieve or the failures they will endure. But we can use current sport science knowledge to establish the environment, standards, and expectations, so we are best prepared for contingencies. We can then integrate science with the art of coaching to create a shared consciousness that gives the training urgency and an initial momentum.

We use necessity and constraints to:

1. Test and monitor changes, weighed against standards and expectations in the short and long-term; and
2. To allow for the maximum development and expression of specific qualities, but done so implicitly so we can focus much of our language on team, communication, and successful collaboration.

Collaboration is about developing trust, affirming a joint purpose, and demonstrating excellence in the work together. This approach overcomes the cynicism many coaches have for sport science with a pragmatism applied in the day-to-day work performed. This is how the micro dictates the macro, how the key performance indicator (KPI) eventually outweighs the program, and how the specific complements the general (Figure 3).

Long-term development is as much a function of enhanced training quality and the clarity of the signal generated, where micro dictates macro, as it is dependent upon minimizing or reducing the impact of problems and interference (contingency-necessity). In the early stages, the program takes precedence over KPIs, but this should quickly change as we achieve more meaningful insight into an athlete’s adaptation process through the coordination of training, testing, and the athlete monitoring process. As we move closer to key competitions, specificity increases and general loads now function as an “anti-virus,” like software in a computer functioning to keep things operating efficiently [13].

How these loads are vertically integrated and horizontally summated is like the ripple effect of a stone thrown into a body of water. This, again, is how the micro dictates the macro, and shows us that, in the moment of victory, having paid the price of what it takes to win is all worth it when the work you have put into the process generates a clear and successful outcome.

References

1. Burger, EB and Starbird, Michael (2012). The 5 Elements of Effective Thinking. Princeton University Press: Princeton, New Jersey.
2. McKeown, Greg (2014). Essentialism. Crown Publishing Group: New York, New York.
3. Pfaff, Dan (2006). “Training Theory” and “Chronic Loading” Lectures. The Canadian Athletics Coaching Center.
4. Cronin, J. and Sleivert, G. “Challenges in Understanding the Influence of Maximal Power Training on Improving Athletic Performance.” Sports Med 2005; 35(3); 213-234.
5. Lovallo, Dan and Sibony, Olivier. “The Case for Behavioral Strategy.” McKinsey Quarterly 2: 30-45 (March 2010)
6. Greitens, Eric (2015). Resilience: Hard-Won Wisdom for Living a Better Life. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt: Boston, MA.
7. Coram, Robert (2002). BOYD: The Fighter Pilot Who Changed the Art of War. Back Bay Books: New York, New York.
8. Jordan, Matt (2016). “Functional Asymmetry and Eccentric Deceleration” Webinar. Jordan Strength.
9. French, Duncan (2015). “Advanced Power Techniques” Lecture. NSCA Coaches Conferences: Louisville, Kentucky.
10. Martinez, DB (2016). “The Use of Reactive Strength Index, Reactive Strength Index Modified, and Flight Time: Contraction Time as Monitoring Tools.” J Aus Str & Cond 24(5): 37-41, 2016.
11. Sands, WA, Apostolopoulos, N, Kavanaugh, AA and Stone, MH. (2016). “Recovery-Adaptation.” NSCA SCJ 38(6): 10-26.
12. Sands, WA and McNeal, JR. “Predicting Athlete Preparation and Performance: A Theoretical Perspective.” J Sport Behav 23: 1–22, 2000.
13. Evely, Derek. Modern Trends in Periodization. HMMR Media: Feb 2016.

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 venturing into a biomechanics lab, it can be surprising to see all the work involved in motion analysis. Not only do researchers need to set up their costly high-speed, light sensitive cameras, they also have to attach reflective markers onto the test subject’s key joints while they’re filmed running on a costly high-speed treadmill.

 

Much of the current research has been valuable for identifying the mechanics by which elite sprinters apply big forces in limited ground time. What coach wouldn’t want to present to their athletes visual evidence of what they do mechanically? And to show them how their mechanics deviate from the “golden positions” that legendary Dr. Ralph Mann has used for years as his mechanics template for high-speed running.

 

Most coaches can’t afford this kind of equipment and don’t have easy access to university labs with the time to set up testing procedures for an entire team of high school runners. Fortunately, we can purchase or secure licensing for software programs that let us gather valuable biomechanics data without having to connect the dots the way the lab guys do.

Coaches have long understood the benefits of video for evaluating stride length, contact time, contact length, and the position of the limb at various points during leg swing recovery. This information is valuable because we know that stride length is essentially the function of flight time and velocity, with contact length a factor in additional distance.

As Jon Goodwin pointed out, “Since flight times are largely fixed during sprinting regardless of ability, stride length is largely the function of the velocity of the athletes during the flight phase. Stride rate is a function of contact time and flight time.”

The sophisticated features of many current software programs allow coaches and athletes to see that their attempts to lengthen stride can result in over-striding and that attempts to influence stride rate can reduce ground force and shorten flight times.

Software Programs

Programs such as Dartfish and Siliconcoach have served the coaching community for quite some time, and their software offers the features and ease of use coaches want. Other programs such as Hudl (formerly Ubersense) have taken analysis acquisition to a whole new level.

Some programs have a few requirements that are essential to generate the data coaches are looking to analyze. With Siliconcoach, for example, I need to include reference markers in the camera viewing area. The program uses the markers to generate accurate length measurements. I usually set two small cones one meter apart. The reference points could be anything in the viewing area for which you know the exact distance.

 

The camera also needs to be fixed and not pan to follow athletes as they are running. This does limit the number of strides that can be captured. The farther the camera zooms out to catch more strides, the smaller the runners will appear during the evaluation.

Tracker video analysis, which is a free download from Cabrillo College, captures accurate distances for moving objects. It’s a little more complicated than Siliconcoach, but the software is very popular and has enough tutorials to help even the most challenged coach use the program’s numerous powerful features.

Video 1. Here is an example of a video tutorial for Tracker video analysis software. The program is available to download free.

Cameras

Shooting at high speed requires a great deal of light. This explains why indoor images are darker and grainier. There are several excellent low-cost cameras that will capture high-speed video. I started with the Casio EX-FH20, which was a great low-cost camera with high-speed capability.

 

At the time, I thought I was scooping Dr. Mike Young on this model, but when I emailed him years ago, he was already using the camera. In fact, he had two FH20s before they were commercially available.

Although the FH20 was a nice camera for its time, Mike correctly noted that it was terrible in low light conditions and would “eat batteries like the cookie monster eats cookies.” Mike switched to a Sanyo which was much better in low light and could capture 1080 megapixels at 60 to 600 frames per second with higher resolution than the Casio cameras.

Over the years, I moved from the FH20 to the Casio Exilim EX-ZR200, the EX-ZR300, and now the EX-ZR800. I like the Exilim cameras because they’re easy to use, have many valuable features, and are small enough to fit in a jacket pocket.

 

All these cameras have improved greatly over the past eight years. My best advice is to look for models that can deliver high resolution at faster speeds while still performing reasonably well in low light conditions. But understand that any camera in a modest price range does not easily achieve the combination of high speed with high resolution in low light.

Video Analysis

After choosing a good camera fitting these requirements, you’ll find that most analysis programs have comparable features. What matters most is how you intend to use the software’s power to devise creative ways to deliver valuable data to your athletes.

For example, one feature that I especially like with Siliconcoach (which is available in other programs), is the ability to take overlay clips and “ghost” the images, a process referred to as alpha blending. With this feature, I can take clips of two athletes from different years and overlay them so that it appears the runners are racing against each other. I call this SIM racing.

As long as I film athletes from the same camera position on our track and cover the same number of strides, the runners from my current team appear to be racing against past legends. Better yet, in slow motion, team members can see which factors influence how one of the runners appears to pull away even though the beginning of the overlay shows them landing at essentially the same time.

Video 2. In this video overlay, we see two runners who appear to be racing each other. Coaches and athletes can compare and analyze each runner’s strides.

I also like overlaying images of one athlete from one year to the next to see if there are any significant changes in their posture or mechanics. I can also use this to assess if any ancillary protocols—like strength training—might have factored into any improvement; we like to believe that our workouts, and not just the natural age-related growth of high school athletes, contributed to the performance leaps experienced by our athletes. Video analysis also helps athletes see the progress they’re making.

Case Study

The following image (taken as a JPEG) of a video overlay reveals some pretty significant changes that may account for improvements in time from one year to the next. The sprinter came out for track as a sophomore. He ran 14.69 in the 100 and 31.94 in the 200. In his junior year, he lowered his time in the 100 to 13.13 and in the 200 to 29.11. What changed mechanically from his sophomore year to his junior year? Note the changes from one year to the next. The images were taken in the same stretch of the hallway at the same point in the training sequence one year apart.

 

This athlete was, by most standards, a below average sprinter. But he enjoyed the track and looked forward to anything, not just finish times, which indicated he was taking positive steps toward improvement. My goal was to find these things. For example, he achieved the Bearpowered deadlift Hall of Fame by pulling 2X his body weight (265 pounds) during his senior year.

 

“I think it is all about getting people excited in activity by showing them how they look and how they can improve,” noted Steve Stanley, research officer and lecturer at the Auckland University’s School of Physiotherapy and coordinator of Siliconcoach’s US market.

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 topic of nature versus nurture presents itself in the world of elite sporting events as a sustained debate. Are world-class athletes born or bred? Is there a certain amount of practice that can turn the average athlete into an elite? There are two main theories that aim to explain both arguments in the spectrum of the debate: the genetic influence model and the deliberate practice model.

Nature

The genetic model argues that a predetermined set of genetic traits predicts athletic potential and success. These physical traits are polygenic, or coded by many genes, producing the ultimate elite phenotype (Tucker & Collins, 2012). The four most influential traits include: gender, height, skeletal muscle composition, and VO2max. The most obvious influence on athletic performance is the drastic segregation of male and female performances; this is proof of genetic predisposition to athletic potential. Height is developed by both nature and nurture (nutrition), and is very predictive of sport-specific success—or example, the height required for basketball players is not conducive to long-distance running.

Studies have found a number of VO2max genes in untrained individuals, which are inherently genetic, and also genes activated by training, which are environmentally influenced (Tucker & Collins, 2012). VO2max is a strong predictor of maximal aerobic capacity and, thus, performance in endurance-based events. Being genetically gifted with a superior aerobic capacity automatically places the athlete in an advantageous position for accelerated graduation to the elite level. Skeletal muscle properties are subject to similar genetic and environmental influences. Hence, an athlete born with greater strength capacity in their musculature will have an easier time transitioning into strength-based sports, such as football or wrestling.

The dominance of East African runners in the middle- and long-distance events is well-known, especially in the last decade where 85% of the Top 20 ranks in the world have come from this region (Vancini et al., 2014). These runners are primarily of Kenyan and Ethiopian descent and classically possess high VO2 max, hemoglobin, hematocrit, tolerance to altitude, bland diets of rice and beans, optimal running economy, and optimal muscle fiber type composition (Wilber & Pitsiladis, 2012). Much research has explored the possibility that genetic factors have yielded an advantage in this particular population, especially genes responsible for anthropometric, cardiovascular, and muscular adaptations to training (Vancini et al., 2014).

The first studies performed on this group focused on mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) variation, which is an easy way to phylogenize specific haplotypes, or sets of inheritance patterns, as they were passed through the maternal genetic line. If a haplotype is localized to one area of origin or one people group, it may be considered a strong indicator of a particular phenotype. It turned out that the gene pools between Kenyan and Ethiopian runners varied so greatly that the support for mtDNA’s role in athletic giftedness was inconclusive (Wilber & Pitsiladis, 2012).

Two genes, in particular, have been more recently theorized to produce high performance phenotypes. The first is angiotensin converting enzyme (ACE); an insertion polymorphism on this gene results in a genetic downregulation of ACE, resulting in greater cardiorespiratory fitness and tolerance to altitude/oxygen-deprivation (Vancini et al., 2014). Interestingly, a deletion of the same gene results in ACE upregulation and, thus, increases musculoskeletal fitness ideal for power competitions. The second gene is alpha-actin-3 (ACTN3), which can polymorph into the R577X variant; the XX allele on this gene is found with higher frequency in endurance athletes and does not result in the expression of ACTN3.

None of the current evidence supports a conclusive explanation for either of these genes being solely responsible for East African success. While it is unlikely that a single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP), such as the ones mentioned above, is the determinant of athletic giftedness, there is much promise for the rapidly expanding field of genomics to produce answers in the near future.

Nurture

There are also environmental factors that may play a role in the success of middle- and long-distance East African runners. Physiological adaptations, diet and nutrition, and socioeconomic factors are all worth equal consideration in the development of these superior athletes. Certain physiological parameters have measured higher in this population, such as total hemoglobin, VO2 max, and hematocrit; this is attributed to the altitude at which these Africans live and train, which falls in the range of 2,000-2,500 meters (6,500-8,200 feet) (Wilber & Pitsiladis, 2012).

Exceptional cardiovascular development may be a result of 86% of Kenyan and 68% of Ethiopian international elites using running as a primary means of transportation to school as children (Wilber & Pitsiladis, 2012). VO2 max, a measure of maximal oxygen uptake, did not appear significantly dissimilar than other elite athletes of different nationalities despite their gap in performance, indicating that there is more than VO2 max that plays into the Africans’ success. Similar results were found with the hematological values (Wilber & Pitsiladis, 2012).

The traditional East African diet is low in fat and composed of roughly three-quarters carbohydrates, derived mostly from vegetables, fruits, and high-glycemic index grains such as ugali, a potato-based cultural food (Wilber & Pitsiladis, 2012). Even the staple drink is chai, a milky tea made with significant amounts of sugar, which serves as the main source of glycogen replenishment in athletes post-workout. Socioeconomic conditions provide a substantial amount of motivation to achieve a better quality of life as an individual and also for that individual’s immediate family. About half of Kenya’s population and 40% of Ethiopia’s is under the World Health Organization (WHO) poverty line, calling for a desperate need to utilize the gifted resources present throughout the generations of talented athletes.

While physiological parameters are impressive in East African distance runners, they are not significantly superior to their elite counterparts of differing nationalities. To explain this population’s outlying performance times, we need more pieces to the puzzle that simply haven’t been uncovered by the research yet. It may just be a prime combination of genetic and environmental factors that mold into supreme athleticism and phenomenal endurance capacities.

The deliberate practice model suggests engaging in sport-specific practices during critical points of motor skill development (Tucker & Collins, 2012). Deliberate practice is defined as activities that possess complete focus on developing a particular aspect of sporting performance, which may activate the athletic potential genes present in every healthy individual’s DNA. This model proposes that 10,000 hours of training over the course of a 10-year period will allow an athlete to breach elite level status. According to the theory, any athlete who fails to meet this level of competition status must have violated the 10,000-hour/10-year rule in one capacity or another.
There are many loopholes to this deliberate practice model. For one, it does not explain how some athletes reach the elite/international level of competition in less than 10 years of participation in the sport or with less than 10,000 hours of practice. Secondly, it does not explain why some athletes may meet or exceed those requirements in training and still fail to breach the expert level in sport. These outliers prove the need for additional research in this debate. There must be some other factors at play, whether they be genetic, mental, or emotional drivers that either accelerate or hinder the athletic development process.

Natural Giftedness and Talent

The nature versus nurture debate can stretch to argue natural giftedness over learned ability in determining athletic talent potential. Do natural talent and acquired talent both allow for the same potential to be achieved in the end? Tranckle and Cushion (2006) describe the work of Gagné on the subject of innate and acquired talent. Gagné describes a continuum in which aptitudes/gifts lie at one end and competencies/talent lie at the other. Gifts are genetically inborn, but may take maturation or informal learning for them to become fully expressed; talent, on the contrary, is developed methodically over time, and heavily influenced by external sources of motivation and opportunity. Most often giftedness and talent are thought of as equal and interchangeable terms, though distinguishing between the two is important.

Giftedness & talent are thought of as equal terms, but distinguishing between the two is important. Share on X

Gagné created four categories of natural abilities: intellectual, creative, socio-affective, and sensorimotor (Tranckle & Cushion, 2006). Under these subcategories, there are the following attributes, though not all-inclusive: reasoning, metacognition, innovation, retrieval fluency, originality, perceptiveness, empathy, leadership, and various components of the sensorimotor system. Intrapersonal catalysts such as personality, motivation, temperament, and well-being factor into the developmental process; environmental catalysts also affect the athlete’s development through physical, cultural, social and familial influences, in addition to program participation and coaching interventions.

This continuum is not to say that an athlete must fall at either end of the spectrum, exclusively. Rather, some athletes may start with natural giftedness, mature those gifts, and progress along the continuum to develop skills environmentally, with the end-product being the lump-sum of talent. Other athletes may not be born with innate gifts, but rather begin further up on the athleticism continuum, with only the option of skill mastery to maximize end-talent potential. Talent identification has sparked much debate in the research field and it seems there is no conclusive methodology for recognizing and delineating talent from giftedness in athletes. As outlined above, the distinction is important in order for a coach to know how to approach the developmental process, through informal or formal teaching processes.

It remains uncertain whether giftedness, skill acquisition, or a combination of the two is the optimal route for maximizing talent potential.

The question of potential remains unanswered. By Gagné’s continuum, it would seem as though giftedness allows for a premature advantage in the developmental process, as if starting with a lead. However, there is quite a bit of chance to play into the athlete’s development, with limited areas of black and white. It remains uncertain whether giftedness, skill acquisition, or a combination of the two is the optimal route for maximizing talent potential.

With the athletes that I coach, I reinforce hard work ethics and positive mindsets over any and all natural God-given talent. A coach can embrace the gifted athletes and push them to the top with relative ease, but I find it rewarding to work with the athlete who puts every ounce of effort into the goal, without the reliance on natural giftedness. The latter athlete owns each and every success and failure, whereas the former may easily attribute failure to a lack of maximal work ethic.

The future research surrounding epigenetics holds much promise for the field of exercise science. If coaches can embrace the environmental tweaks necessary for tapping that elite athletic potential in our athletes, then the genetic predilections can not only be maximized, but also expanded upon to build the best performer possible.

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

• Tranckle, P. & Cushion, C. J. (2006). “Rethinking giftedness and talent in sport”. Quest, 58, 265-282.
• Tucker, R. & Collins, M. (2012). “What makes champions? A review of the relative contribution of genes and training to sporting success.” British Journal of Sports Medicine, 46, 555-561.
• Vancini, R. L., Pesquero, J. B., Fachina, R. J., Andrade, M. D. S., Borin, J. P., Montagner, P. C., & de Lira, C. A. B. (2014). “Genetic aspects of athletic performance: The African runners phenomenon.” Open Access Journal of Sports Medicine, 5, 123-127.
• Wilber, R. L. & Pitsiladis, Y. P. (2012). “Kenyan and Ethopian distance runners: What makes them so good?” International Journal of Sports Physiology and Performance, 7, 92-102.

In my previous article, Rugby: A Guide to Developing a High-Performance System, I briefly referred to the physicality involved in the sport. As a rule of thumb, a male professional player is likely to weigh between 90 kg and 110 kg. In the women’s game, although their mass can be significantly lower, the external forces are always going to be relative to their size. For both male and female rugby athletes, their ability to tolerate repetitive force is essential.

The objective of rugby is quite simple, in all honesty. The goal is to advance up the field in order to score a try and inevitably, at some point, make contact. With contact comes the risk of injury, whether that be acute (direct) or chronic (over time).

The majority of field sports, such as soccer and Australian Rules football, have a competitive schedule that lasts anywhere from seven to nine months. Rugby is no different, which limits the window for physical development. Generally—and I’ll place emphasis on generally—rugby is a matter of maintenance and ensuring that players are available for selection. The idea of strict maintenance does, however, lend itself to limiting the intensity and volume of training, thus leaving players underprepared. That is, in itself, a challenge.

The purpose of this article is to offer information regarding the development of athletes, with the focus on rugby players, although there are always going to be crossovers between various sports. Specifically, I consider underlying reasons for injuries occurring and, from there, potential preventative measures. At the core of this topic is Long Term Athlete Development (LTAD), because I look upon it as an excellent way to subdue injuries.

Understanding what causes the particular physiological system to fail in the first place is paramount when planning rehabilitation or, if you’re ahead of the game, suppressing injury. For the sake of simplicity, it is far more beneficial to build efficient rugby players who can tolerate the specific biomechanical stress. I think it’s important to say that I don’t give all of my attention to injury prevention because that is quite a pessimistic way to view performance—almost as though I am wrapping the athletes in bubble wrap and removing them from all combative situations. I obviously want to see players sprint fast, jump high, and evade tacklers but, at the same time, I like the idea of seeing them do that on a regular basis.

Physical Requirements

Rapid acceleration and deceleration, efficient cutting, and jumping and landing are the foundations of rugby. All place significant stress upon the musculoskeletal and neuromuscular systems. Usually, musculoskeletal injuries occur during acceleration and deceleration and, generally, rate of force development (RFD) is greater in eccentric contractions. In contact sports, there will always be acute, external injuries that can be kept at bay, which will be discussed as this article progresses. I hear a lot of rugby fans complain when a player sustains a number of injuries throughout their career, and they question what the sports science staff members are doing with their time. The reality, however, is that rugby is a very physical game and, regardless of our efforts to keep players fit, injury is a factor that can take down even the strongest of professionals.

The important element when looking at a rugby player’s mass is the momentum that they carry when making contact. Momentum is the product of mass (kg) and speed (m/s). To calculate speed, distance is divided by time, as shown below.

Momentum (kg m/s) can be derived from those calculations. In rugby, momentum is particularly high, as a result of the player’s mass. In a study by Dan Baker (1999), running speed and quickness were compared among elite (NRL) and amateur/club (CRL) level rugby league athletes. Granted, rugby league and rugby union are different sports, but they share similar physical qualities. I’ll refer to the average speed over 10 meters, because the large majority of contact is made within that distance. Times for 40 meters are also found in the table below.

As Figure 2 shows, there is no significant difference in average speed between NRL and CRL players. However, when mass (kg) is introduced, that data becomes noteworthy. Average body mass and the resultant momentum (P) are provided from the same study in the next table.

To summarize the data displayed in Figure 3, there is a significant difference in momentum between elite and amateur players. The predominant reason behind this is, quite simply, that NRL players are much heavier. With that in mind, long term athlete development should become more integral, in terms of developing players that will be able to tolerate the physicality across both codes of rugby.

Long Term Athlete Development

We know that momentum carried by rugby league players is extremely high. That indicates the importance of LTAD in the sport. There is a degree of reliance upon the physical qualities, purely because so much is dependent upon the ability to withstand the demands. Also, perhaps from a more cynical perspective, clubs invest heavily in their players financially, which is understandable. But, with effective youth training, we could see a larger number of academy graduates playing on the professional stage.

Before I delve into the LTAD model, I believe it’s vitally important to understand that the number of juniors who will progress towards professionalism is small, in relative terms. While I acknowledge that, as coaches, high-performance sport is usually at the front of our minds, there must be a degree of realism involved. Sport participation rates, or physical activity for that matter, are extremely low. Inactivity becomes a habit and we all know the benefits of exercise, particularly for schoolchildren. Do not ignore the overriding principle in this model because long-term health, fitness, and well-being are, arguably, equally as important as athletic performance (Lloyd et al, 2015).

The Long-Term Athlete Development (LTAD) model is a physiological framework proposed to manage the focus, volume and type of training applied to athletes as they develop through adolescence into adulthood. (Tucker, 2013)

With this definition of LTAD, the focus is on the transition from adolescence to adulthood. In rugby, it is known that the progression from amateur to professional is significant. Fundamental movement skills and fundamental sports skills are the contributors to effective long-term development (Ford et al, 2010).

Fundamental Movement Skills

From a strength and conditioning perspective, fundamental movement skills are hinging, cutting, accelerating, decelerating, jumping, landing, rotating, pulling, and pushing. It sounds like an overfilled plate. If we get those right or progress towards proficiency, we can unlock doors that welcome further progression. Now, there will be variations across different sports, but these movement skills will, largely, remain the same, especially with younger athletes.

Through observation and conversations with coaches of a similar age to myself, I’ve found that there’s a worry that we might apply too much stimulus and “overtrain” young athletes. Essentially, we want to “wrap them in cotton wool” because, at university, we are taught that they are “still in developmental stages,” as if they are a prototype running trainer. I, myself, am guilty of taking the safe option and making sessions far too easy. On that note, don’t be afraid to make those errors, because no mistake is a silly mistake as long as you don’t do it again.

I’ll tell you now, hopping about on one leg is not going to develop a great rugby athlete. What might, however, is sprinting and developing force. We see gimmicky, commercialized training methods an awful lot and they are not overly effective. Bear in mind that we do, unfortunately, work in a field in which gimmicks do sell and, once one established coach takes the bait, a boat load of young coaches could follow.

Fundamental Sport Skills

Conversely, fundamental sport skills, specifically in rugby, are those that devise the game. So, for rugby, they are tackling, passing, catching, scrummaging, throwing, kicking, and jumping. With these skills in mind, what do they all require in order to execute them efficiently and under fatigue? The fundamental movement skills, perhaps to an extreme level. It is in this area that the New Zealand All Blacks are known to invest, both with time and with resources.

Performance is dependent upon the amalgamation of both fundamental movement and fundamental sport skills. As and when we successfully combine the two ingredients, the athlete should obtain the status, as such, of being physically literate. Essentially, this means being in a position where all of the listed movement skills can be performed while executing the sport skills. In my opinion, it is this area that can be particularly detrimental to long-term performance. If movement proficiency is not demonstrated, we leave the door slightly open to allow injuries and limitations to creep in. If, however, we get the fundamentals nailed down early on and firmly shut the door, we, as support staff, give the athlete a great chance of performing at a high level for a prolonged period.

Performance depends on both fundamental movement & fundamental sport skills. Share on X

As I alluded to “closing the door” and developing proficiency as early as possible, there are periods where development can be accelerated. This element of the LTAD Model fits into the supposed “window of opportunity.” It is a highly debated topic, particularly among the academics in our field, due to its unsubstantiated claims and, ultimately, the lack of literature surrounding it. As Ford and colleagues (2010) state, it cannot be claimed that the LTAD Model is 100% factual.

Having said that, however, there is a reasonable amount of sports science and coaching common sense that shapes the idea of developing athletes. None is more simple than, in a nutshell, introducing strength training as a means of making athletes more “robust” and resilient. If a young rugby player wishes to take on a 110kg gorilla, without sufficient strength training, I wish them good luck. So, on that basis, while there is not an awful lot of literature that justifies particular statements, we can always resort back to common sense. A lot of excellent results are often a product of the wonder that is common sense.

Window of Opportunity

Blink, or take a sip of your coffee, and you may well miss the “window of opportunity.”

This term used for the period in which junior athletes are, hypothetically, believed to be more receptive to imposed demands, does not help its cause. It creates an element of panic, whereby coaches are scurrying around, calculating when their athletes are going to approach the window. Have they missed it? Have they jumped through the window too early and blown the opportunity? The simple answer is that not every athlete will jump through the same window. Half of the group might speed towards the developmental stairway in early 2017, while the other might be progressing, incrementally, at the tail end of 2017. One size does not fit all.

I prefer to view the window of opportunity as, simply, childhood. Ultimately, children are extremely trainable because they almost always respond to the stimuli that you offer and they usually recover at enviable rates. A lot is said about when a junior athlete should be in the weight room, squatting, deadlifting, and bench-pressing but, first things first, does the “athlete” move like a child? How does a child athlete move? Hopefully, not like a toddler because, if that is the case, we have bigger fish to fry.

I’m sure most people would associate child’s play with activities such as climbing trees, making use of their levers in push and pull actions, or sprinting away from a neighbor’s property while playing “knock a door and run.” (Please note, I am not endorsing this game, even though it promotes running at the speed of light). As you can imagine, that kind of fun has diminished in recent years, with the rise of child safety and the draw of technology taking control of children’s attention.

Before I begin to sound like an older gentleman sitting in his leather armchair, I am not placing the blame on technology because it has played, and will continue to play, an integral role in athletic development. I also think technology is viewed as a scapegoat and younger coaches, like myself, are hounded for making use of it. However, it is an undeniable statement that a lot of children would rather play “Angry Birds” than play “tag.”

Solidity From Bottom to Top

The goal of LTAD is to lay “solid foundations” on which we can build strong, fast, and agile athletes. I’ve used Jenga as an example because I’m sure we all have experienced our bricks collapsing because somebody (naming no names) has erected a structurally unstable tower. It is a reasonably similar situation to athletic development. If the foundations that we work on with the athlete are shaky, the chances of building towards the necessary physical requirements are significantly reduced. We might get halfway through the build and realize that we forgot to reinforce the concrete.
The goal of LTAD is to lay solid foundations on which we can build strong, fast, agile athletes. Share on X

Strength usually increases, exponentially, up until the age of 14, for both males and females (Ford et al, 2010). Hopefully, it is clear that this statement does not mean that strength cannot be trained after reaching 14 years of age. Fortunately, we now know that the theory surrounding resistance training and the risk of it “damaging growth” lacks empirical data. If the programming and selection of movements are well-thought-out, the benefits of strength training in adolescents outweigh the risks, which, again, if well taught, should not be an issue. Muscular endurance, strength, neuromuscular coordination, body composition, injury management, and self-efficacy are just a few of the components of performance that improve with well-prescribed strength training.

Neuromuscular Coordination

On the list of benefits that strength training carries, neuromuscular coordination is the greatest ability that a young athlete can maintain. Ultimately, everything, from the fundamental movement skills to the fundamental sport skills, is determined by neuromuscular control in some way. In layman’s terms, if muscle mass, as a result of hypertrophy, can increase, motor unit excitation will follow suit. Motor units are essentially a component of the nervous system that “control” muscular contractions, both voluntary and involuntary.

The diagram shows a simplified overview of the process of rate of force development. There is definitely more to the story, but that is the basis of my point concerning neuromuscular coordination. Our goal, as coaches or sports scientists, is to improve the stimulation of the neuromuscular system and increase the conduction of impulses, with the ultimate intention of enhancing force development.

To draw this article to a close, I feel that self-efficacy is a vital “cog” in the high-performance machine and it is vastly underestimated. To rattle away from my first year at university, self-efficacy is how confident we are of achieving our goals. It’s a sub-division within Albert Bandura’s Social Cognitive Construct and, in my eyes, it is extremely beneficial to understand from a coach’s point of view, especially if you are involved in youth development.

Rugby players, both male and female, have a pre-written “rule” whereby they are some of the toughest, most durable, athletes going. After all, if they can take a physical beating for 60 to 80 minutes, they must be confident souls. I think an awful lot of young players, with aspirations to play for their favorite professional team from childhood, are often overcome with doubt. Trials, assessment games, and physical testing are actually quite a daunting experience for some people; perhaps even the vast majority of them. This view does not apply to everyone, because I have come across plenty of confident players who believe in their ability, no matter what. That’s exactly what we want, without arrogance seeping in.

However—and I take this role on with a degree of pride—as the coaches of young prospects, we have an opportunity to influence their behavior, their mindset, and their future as an athlete. Please don’t abuse that opportunity. Time and time again, coaches are becoming part of the downfall of many potentially great athletes because they feel they are in a position to “release the hounds” on young players. Prepare. Empower. Enjoy.

A special thank you to Nick Newman and Glen Thurgood, who both kindly offered advice and input towards my development and, ultimately, the thoughts in this article.

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

• Baker, D. “A comparison of running speed and quickness between elite professional and young rugby league players.” Strength & Conditioning Coach. 7(3):3-7. 1999.
• Ford, P., Croix, M., Lloyd, R., Meyers, R., Moosavi, M., Oliver, J., Till, K., and Williams, C., 2010. “The Long-Term Athlete Development model: Physiological evidence and application.” Journal of Sports Sciences. 29(4): 389-402.
• Hendricks, S., Karpul, D., and Lambert, M., 2014. “Momentum and Kinetic Energy Before the Tackle in Rugby Union.” Journal of Sports Science Medicine. 13(3): 557-563.
• Lloyd, R., Oliver, J., Faigenbaum, A., Howard, R., Croix, M., Williams, C., Best, T., Alvar, B., Micheli, L., Thomas, P., Hatfield, D., Cronin, J., and Myer, G. (2015) “Long-Term Athlete Development-Part 1: A Pathway for All Youth.” Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research. 29(5): 1439-1450.
• Tucker, R. 2013. The Science of Sport. (Online). Available: Long-term athlete development:FOUNDATIONS AND CHALLENGES FOR COACHES, SCIENTISTS & POLICY-MAKERS Accessed: 17th October 2016.

One of the topics I am most interested in relates to plyometric training for endurance runners. An article by Ebben (2001) states that, due to the instability of the surface of cross-country running, an estimated 5-10% of energy in a three- to six-mile race comes from anaerobic sources. With that said, it is important to train for this anaerobic component, even in a primarily aerobic sport. This can be done via the use of explosive plyometric exercises.

Plyometrics and Performance

Ebben (2001) discusses the principle of specificity as it relates to training in a sport-specific manner. Force application to the ground is extremely important in cross-country running, as it directly generates power for covering the greatest horizontal distance possible with optimal efficiency. Plyometric training, especially in the single-leg modality, is highly specific to the single-leg force application that occurs in a runner’s stride. Plyometric exercises with a greater horizontal component are even more specific to running, such as multiple reactive single-leg hops moving forward.

A study by Ramirez-Campillo et al. (2014) examined the use of plyometric training in highly competitive middle- and long-distance runners for the purpose of developing explosive strength in performance. Plyometric training adapts the stretch-shortening cycle (SSC) and increases the rate of activation of a muscle’s motor units. They initiated this study because prior research lacked a sufficient number of participants, failed to evaluate the effects in elite runners, applied a very high volume of plyometric activity per study length, and/or failed to include a time trial to assess distance running performance change.

The experiment included a simultaneous application of plyometric and endurance training to test the effect on both time trial endurance performance and explosive strength adaptations (Ramirez-Campillo et al., 2014). The plyometric exercises included drop (depth) jumps from 20 centimeters and 40 centimeters to test for maximum jump height and minimum ground contact time, a countermovement jump (with arms) for slow SSC action, a 20-meter sprint test to assess horizontal explosive strength with fast SSC action, and a 2.4-kilometer endurance test on an outdoor track. Total plyometric training time was less than 60 minutes per week for the six-week study. The experimental group had an improvement in time trial performance that was three times greater than the control group; in all other explosive metrics, the experimental group improved significantly while the control group showed a reduction in performance.

I thought this study was well-done and covered a lot of the bases that were missing in previous research to-date. It’s important to see these adaptations in the elite population: Since they are already highly efficient individuals, small gains in performance are crucial and highly visible with new training strategies. In the general, untrained, or even moderately trained population, it’s very easy to manipulate variables to create positive results; this is much more difficult to achieve in elite populations.

Speed potential has been found to be 85-90% predetermined by the genetic makeup of an individual (Karalejic, Stojiljkovic, Stojanovic, Andjelkovic & Nikolic, 2014). The ability of an athlete to develop their ultimate speed potential requires the highest functionality and efficiency of the neuromuscular system. This motor development begins at a young age; often in elementary school when a child learns various games and sports that require running and jumping in some form or another. The greatest increase in development occurs in pre-adolescence, from ages 8-12 years old, and developmental ability is drastically lost after this point of growth and adaptation.

Karalejic et al. found that working on dynamic power improves the speed handling of the body. This can be achieved with the incorporation of plyometric training for athletes, since plyometric activity is known to effectively develop the elastic forces of the tendons, which directly return energy from the ground during a horizontal sprint. The general recommendations from this article were that plyometric sessions should not exceed 40 to 60 jumps for beginners, two to three times per week with 24 to 48 hours between sessions, and not in same-day combination with strength activity due to central nervous system fatigue. These exercises are also not recommended until 13 years of age, with depth jumping height between 40 and 120 centimeters and all landing on the forefoot, not allowing the heel to touch the ground.

I was in accordance with this article until I reached the recommendation section, which gave no reasoning behind the age limit, height limit, or “proper” landing. I definitely do not teach a forefoot landing on a depth jump, due to the high demand it places on the bones of the foot, shins, and knees. I find much better results from a full-footed landing, and an attenuated risk of injury too.

Plyometrics and Bone Health

Due to the high impact nature of these exercises, they inadvertently develop the eccentric strength of the muscles and aid in bone and tendon remodeling and growth, respectively (Ebben, 2001). The high-risk impact associated with plyometric training should be preempted with a strong base in strength training so the body is well-prepared for the landing forces involved. Coaches should limit the volume of these exercises to a minimum to supplement a strength training regimen, remaining mindful of the high-volume nature of a runner’s mileage throughout the season. Early prevention of bone weakening disorders such as osteoporosis has become a focus of research even as early as adolescence. Statistics show that approximately 60% of all cases of osteoporosis in adulthood link to low bone mineral content in childhood, since 50% of total bone mass develops during this time (Vlachopoulos, Barker, Williams, Knapp & Metcalf, 2015).

Vlachopoulos et al. (2015) has such a study in progress, on three groups of athletes (n=105) ages 12-14 years old, participating in the sports of football, cycling, and swimming. Football is an osteogenic (bone-developing) impact sport, whereas cycling and swimming are non-osteogenic, non-impact sports. The purpose of this study is to assess bone metabolism in each group over the course of 12 months, as well as the effect of a nine-month plyometric training program on bone health in these athletes.

The longitudinal study will track the following markers in each subject: body composition via dual energy X-ray absorptiometry (DEXA), nutrition, bone stiffness with bone ultrasonometry, pubertal maturation, physical fitness, bone turnover markers and vitamin D. Following 12 months of sport-specific training, the groups will be split into interventional (plyometric-enhanced) and non-interventional (sport-only) subgroups. In the interventional groups, a progressive plyometric regimen consisting of 10 minutes per day and 3-4 times per week will be implemented for nine months. Unfortunately, this particular study is longitudinal; therefore, the results will not be published for some time. I think the design is extremely well done and I will be looking forward to the results once they are published.

Another study, however, did measure the effects of plyometric activity on markers of bone turnover in boys and young men (Kish, Mezil, Ward, Klentrou, & Falk, 2015). Twelve boys (mean age 10.2) and 14 men (mean age 22) performed 144 jumps, and venous blood sample markers for bone resorption were compared from pre-, 5-min, 1-hr, and 24-hrs post-exercise. Bone alkaline phosphatase (ALP) and osteoprotegerin (OPG) were used to measure bone formation; N-telopeptides of type I collagen (NTx) and receptor activator of nuclear factor KB ligand (RANKL) were used to measure bone resorption.

The results of this study concluded that some age-related differences exist between the markers of bone formation and resorption at rest, but not post-exercise (Kish et al., 2015). Boys carried higher levels of ALP and NTx at rest but both boys and men experienced increases in ALP (peak at 24-hrs post-exercise) and OPG (immediately post-exercise) for bone formation. Boys demonstrated bone ALP and NTx increases greater than 20% post exercise, while men were less than 10%. These numbers were not statistically significant due to the sample size, so future research may explore this difference further.

It appears that even a single session of plyometric activity can accelerate bone formation. Share on X

It appears that even a single session of plyometric activity can accelerate bone formation, possibly more so in developing boys than fully grown men. Many conservative coaches still refuse to add this type of training to a distance runner’s program, without seeing the direct translation to force-velocity development as is obvious in a sprinter or jumper in track and field. Hopefully, this mindset will evolve as these coaches see the benefits that plyometric training can have on the speed, efficiency, and injury-prevention of a cross-country runner on unpredictable terrain.

References

• Ebben, W. P. (October 2001). “Maximum power training and plyometrics for cross-country running.” National Strength and Conditioning Association, 23(5): 47-50.
• Karalejic, S., Stojiljkovic, D., Stojanovic, J., Andjelkovic, I. & Nikolic, D. (2014). “Methodics of developing speed in young athletes.” Activities in Physical Education and Sport, 4(2): 159-161.
• Kish, K., Mezil, Y., Ward, W. E., Klentrou, P. & Falk, B. (2015). “Effects of plyometric exercise session on markers of bone turnover in boys and young men.” European Journal of Applied Physiology, 115, 2115-2124.
• Ramírez-Campillo, R., Alvarez, C., Henríquez-Olguín, C., Baez, E. B., Martínez, C., Andrade, D. C. & Izquierdo, M. (2014). “Effects of plyometric training on endurance and explosive strength performance in competitive middle- and long-distance runners.” Journal of Strength & Conditioning Research, 28(1): 97–104.

There has been a long-standing debate on whether higher volumes of endurance training equate to elite caliber athletic performances. While it is true that many elite athletes train with much higher volume and intensity than recreational athletes, this certainly hasn’t been shown to be a necessary requirement to compete on this level.

With an increasing volume of training comes a heightened risk of injury, a potentially weakened immunity, and a greater chance of overtraining and burnout. Each athlete is individually capable of handling a given workload and, until the body adapts, this volume should only increase slightly, with caution taken so as not to shock the body into a fatigue- or injury-ridden state. Over time, as more training experience is acquired, this volume can gradually drift upward into the 60-, 70-, and 80-mile, and even 100+ mile weeks.

By no means should an inexperienced runner jump into a 120-mile week training plan and expect to escape unscathed; in fact, some of the highest caliber elite athletes operate at half that volume, under a specific, periodized program designed to substitute quality miles over a quantity of miles. However, others swear by the increases in volume as the key to taking performance to the next level. Is the reward of this high-mileage training worth the risk?

Assessing the Risk

It is well-established in research that exercise in either a high-intensity or high-volume capacity stresses the immune system, making an individual more susceptible to infection, especially immediately following a training session. Unfortunately, a wide breadth of this research involves recreational athletes and sedentary individuals (Mårtensson, Nordebo & Malm, 2014). When considering this trend in elite athletes, you must consider the impact of lifestyle, training tolerance, recovery ability, and nutritional intake, which can all greatly affect the strength and resistance of an athlete’s immune system.

In Mårtensson’s study, which involved 11 elite endurance athletes, the volume of training over several logged years was compared to the number of self-reported sick days. In one year, on average, these athletes trained 462 hours, were sick for 15 days, and were injured for 21 days. The volume of training was not correlated to the contraction of infection, although less fit individuals (those with less training years of experience) were found to be more susceptible than their more experienced counterparts. The latter information aligns with similar research of its kind.

Some studies have reported that the incidence of acquiring an infection post-marathon (or similar event) greatly increases. However, others have negated this cause-and-effect relationship, finding that pre-effort infection is the probable cause for this incidence rate, rather than post-effort sensitivity (Mårtensson et al., 2014). All in all, the physiological training adaptation that occurs in a musculoskeletal and cardiovascular sense also occurs with the immune system. In other words, as an athlete improves and stress demands increase, the immune response must also strengthen to keep from being overrun, both literally and figuratively.

With the explosion of high-intensity interval training (HIIT), it’s no wonder the benefit of high-volume endurance work is being questioned. Still, the largest majority of elite athletes performs 80% of training volume under the lactate threshold, and utilizes HIIT sparingly (Seiler & Tønnessen, 2009). Studies that incorporate a higher intensity of training into already well-trained athletes’ programming prove to be equivocal at best in regards to increasing performance.

What has been consistent and clearly established in the literature is the fact that an 80:20 ratio of low-to-high intensity training leads to excellent long-term performance results in athletes that train daily (Seiler & Tønnessen, 2009). The ability of an athlete to handle high-volume loads in training should be considered on an individual basis, but what seems to be more important is the ratio of this type of base-endurance training to that of high-intensity interval training. The right combination of the two, over time, is better correlated to success in elite athletes today, rather than loading purely for the sake of loading.

References

• Mårtensson, S., Nordebo, K. & Malm, C. (2014). “High Training Volumes are Associated with a Low Number of Self-Reported Sick Days in Elite Endurance Athletes.” Journal of Sports Science & Medicine, 13(4): 929-933.
• Seiler, S. & Tønnessen, E. (2009). “Intervals, Thresholds, and Long Slow Distance: The Role of Intensity and Duration in Endurance Training.” Sportscience, 131-27.

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

 

Necessity is the mother of invention. Discontent is the necessity of progress. Discontent is too gentle a word for the sickening catastrophe of an elite sprinter pulling a hamstring. I can only compare it to a racehorse breaking his leg.

But what can we do? If I hear one more strength and conditioning coach boast about preventing hamstring injuries by increased weight training, I may leave Twitter.

I’ve had great success with Reflexive Performance Reset™ (RPR), an easy-to-learn manual therapy that improves the durability of athletes, keeping them injury free. Think about that. Think deeply. Think of all the athletes who have been sidelined by mysterious soft-tissue injuries.

Reflexive Performance Reset

Thomas Edison said, “Discontent is the first necessity of progress.” When tired of living in darkness, we invent light bulbs. When sprint coaches are haunted by hamstring injuries, we find ways to prevent them.

When sprint coaches are haunted by hamstring injuries, we find ways to prevent them. Share on X

Reflexive Performance Reset is a simple combination of breathing and acupressure that treats imbalances in the muscular and nervous systems. When muscles work together in sequence while fully activated, the body moves correctly. Athletic movements are sequenced chain-reactions. Weak links in the chain and improper sequencing lead to injuries. When the same compensation patterns are reinforced, injuries linger and recur.

Reflexive Performance Reset training is proactive; it helps evaluate an athlete’s current physical state and then implements breathing and acupressure as a means of running injury prevention.

2012 IHSA State Track Meet: Blown Hamstring

At the final race of the 2012 IHSA State Track Meet, the 3A 4×4, my team, Plainfield North, featured four proud seniors with PRs of 49.5, 48.6, 51.6, and 49.5. Our ace-in-the-hole was our third runner, 6’3” Derrick Suss. A newcomer to the relay, Derrick jogged a 51.6 in the prelims the previous day. After running 22.00 in the 200 at Sectional, Derrick was destined to run sub-49, no question. Yes, four seniors with a chance to win it all.

After two outstanding legs, we found ourselves in second place. Seventy meters into the third leg, Derrick went down, hard. He had blown a hamstring. Quest Young and Marquis Flowers ran across the field to help their fallen teammate. Knowing that assistance from his teammates would disqualify our team, Derrick waived off their help and crawled ten meters to the baton. Somehow he found the courage to pull himself up and limp the remainder of his lap.

Evan Flagg took the baton long after the other eight teams finished the race. Evan ran the most spirited solo anchor lap I’ve ever witnessed. Twenty thousand emotional fans stood in support of Plainfield North, many with tears in their eyes, including me. We courageously finished the race but finished last with the slowest time in the 120-year history of the IHSA State Track Meet. Four seniors from Plainfield North stood on the awards stands and proudly accepted their ninth place medals.

The train wreck of this race may be the best and worst moment of my coaching career. I will be forever proud of my team’s courage and forever saddened by what could have been.

 

2009: Career-Ending Hamstring Pull

Rewind four years. Chris Korfist was coaching speedster John Fox. As a junior, John won silver in the 100 (10.83) and bronze in the 200 (21.93 with a PR of 21.75). He also led York’s 4×1 to a 5th place finish. Chris was looking forward to entering 2009 with the best sprinter in the state and of his coaching career.

 

In 2009, the curse of speed reared its ugly head. John pulled a hamstring. He did not compete in the 100 or 200 at that year’s state meet. Somehow, John fought through his pain and helped York’s 4×1 and 4×2 to silver medals (41.84 and 1:26.06).

John Fox’s injury was one of those events in coaching that haunts or hounds you for your career. John did everything I asked of him. Ultimately, our training had a lot do with his injury. Even worse, there was nothing I could do to help him. John’s injury forced me to look at what we were doing and try to understand why it happened. My search took me beyond token theories about why hamstrings fail.

John’s injury had a huge impact on me personally. I felt responsible for what happened.

I had other athletes injured earlier in my career, as we all have. I’ve had disappointments in big races, but that is part of sport. John’s injury was different. The stakes were higher. His ceiling was higher. John could have been one of the best ever.

Indoors, as a senior, John ran a 55m dash at one of the top times in the country. After the injury (going into the outdoor season), we held him out until the IHSA Sectional, the last possible meet. John never ran the 100m or 200m his senior year. He ran the sprint relays at the sectional, the state meet, and nationals. John’s 4×2 team placed second at nationals. After that, he never raced again. He received a scholarship to the University of Illinois but never raced.— Chris Korfist

What Can we Do?

Maybe the answer is less weight training. Or more sprint volume. Or less sprint volume.

More intensity, less intensity, core, stretching, yoga, prayer?

Let’s return to 2012. Just four weeks before Derrick’s injury, I received an email from Chris: “I wanted to let all of you know that I have invited Douglas Heel, from South Africa, to come to Chicago to teach and certify you in his technique. I have been using his techniques for three months and have had some dramatic results, not only in injury prevention but performance as well. Please contact me with further questions after reading the attached brochure. I wanted to let you know first before I opened it up. We are limiting it to the first 30.”
I opened the brochure, saw the $500 fee, and disregarded the invitation.

If I had paid the $500 and learned the Be Activated method, my 4×4 team may have been state champs. In hindsight, I would pay thousands to see Derrick run 49.0 and proudly hand-off to Evan.

As coaches, we send our athletes to doctors for stiff hamstrings, sore quads, and tight Achilles. Doctors seem to mindlessly prescribe rest, ice, compression, and anti-inflammatories.

This past football season, I had a two-way player who went to the doctor with a sore Achilles. The doctor sent him back with a note saying to “play only one way.” One way? I assumed that meant he could play offense or defense but not both. Are you kidding me? I “reset” the kid, and he played fast and pain-free (but only on defense).

I once observed a paid athletic trainer stretching a severe hamstring injury. I went ballistic. The trainer immediately pointed to the fact that she had credentials and I did not.

Prevention: RPR

The best way to avoid the soft-tissue injury conundrum is, of course, prevention.

Consider the idea that the technique that makes athletes more durable can also improve performance. That this same therapy also transitions athletes from a sympathetic state of fear, stress, fight, flight, or freeze to a parasympathetic state of balance, calm awareness, and mindfulness.

“Stress is not a state of performance, stress is a state of survival,” Douglas explained. Before I met him, I believed adrenaline was a preferred drug of athletes.

When we are in a sympathetic state—fight, flight, or freeze—our body collapses and implodes to protect vital organs. No one can perform well in a state of implosion. If pills could produce calm-focus or relaxed-intensity, we would all be addicts.

In the statements above, I’ve simplified Reflexive Performance Reset to its three main pillars: durability, performance, and mental state.

Although Be Activated was taught to medical professionals as a treatment method, Chris was implementing it in a non-medical performance setting, using activation as a coach, not a physical therapist, chiropractor, or doctor.

Douglas fully supported adapting the methods to performance training and injury prevention, and RPR was unveiled last summer as the next generation of Be Activated. Reflexive Performance Reset is not a treatment for injuries and is not intended to treat, fix, manipulate, or otherwise replace medical advice and treatment.

RPR gets the body breathing and moving correctly to prevent injuries and improve performance. Share on X

Instead, it’s used as running injury prevention, as it is designed simply to get the body breathing and moving correctly.

“I think if I had RPR in 2009, John Fox would not have injured his hamstring,” Chris said.

 

Chris, Cal Dietz, and J.L. Holdsworth are the founding fathers of RPR. Chris is a high school teacher (Hinsdale Central) and coaches at both Hinsdale Central and Montini Catholic. Cal is the Head Strength & Conditioning Coach at the University of Minnesota and author of Triphasic Training. J.L. is the Founder and Head Strength Coach at The Spot Athletics in Columbus, Ohio.

“Here at the University of Minnesota, out of over 4,500 hockey practices, we’ve had only one missed practice due to soft-tissue injury. RPR makes athletes more durable,” Cal explained.

I went to my first Douglas Heel seminar in October 2014. I’ve now attended five seminars, spent more than 100 hours with Douglas, and written seven articles on his technique.

Reflexive Performance Reset Seminars in Cincinnati, Austin, Bakersfield, and Chicago have sold out. The price of attending a seminar and getting certified is $250. For more information, visit Reflexive Performance Reset.

 

 

Post-activation potentiation (PAP) has potential to improve sprint performance and is commonly used in practice and research. It’s especially helpful for athletes who require a little variation in session structure or those who need further transfer from the gym to the track or pitch. This article summarizes what we know about PAP and sprinting, how we can improve PAP’s effectiveness our own sessions, and how we can use PAP for more than a physical response.

The Basics

PAP is a phenomenon where a maximal, or near-maximal, activity increases the performance of a subsequent activity. We expect the performance of the subsequent activity to be greater than if it were performed without the PAP stimulus.

For example, an athlete performs a vertical jump, reaching a height of 50 cm. Next, the athlete performs a 2×2 back squat @ 87% 1RM followed by a 10-minute rest. Then the athlete repeats the vertical jump and hits 51.5 cm (3% improvement).

When using PAP, fatigue and potentiation coexist; typically these are opposing factors to athletic performance.¹ Seitz, Haff² have detailed the balance between potentiation and fatigue, explaining that muscle performance may improve if potentiation dominates and fatigue is reduced. Muscle performance will remain unchanged or even decrease, however, if fatigue is equal to, or greater than, respectively, the potentiating effect.²

How to Apply PAP Stimulus to Your Training Group

A myriad of studies have investigated the PAP response and are superbly summarized and critiqued in various reviews.^1-4 Example exercise pairings include:

1. Very heavy 1-3RM back squat followed by a body weight vertical jump
2. Very heavy 1-3RM bench press followed by a lighter medicine ball throw
3. Bounding-type plyometric activity followed by a sprint
4. Resisted sprint activity followed by a sprint

In this article, I will focus on the fourth pair—resisted sprints and unresisted sprints.

 

Because of the precarious balance between potentiation and fatigue, PAP stimulus is confounded by many variables and depends on the athlete and the specific exercise pairing. Athletes respond differently to varying potentiating exercises, intensities, and rest periods. I advise you to not apply the same PAP stimulus and rest interval to all athletes within a training group.

Do not apply the same PAP stimulus and rest interval to all athletes within a training group. Share on X

A more effective, albeit time-consuming, option is to perform a mini-research study with your athletes. The chart below displays a simple protocol. Your investigation will allow you to individualize PAP stimuli and rest periods for each athlete. This process takes up session time, but I like to think of this as training, not just testing.

 

Resisted Sprinting: The PAP Effect for Sprinting

Five peer-reviewed studies have looked at the potentiating effect of resisted sprinting on subsequent unresisted sprint performance.^5-9 The results are mixed. Three studies found a potentiating effect^6-8 while two did not.^{5, 9} However, we can’t compare the studies due to the variety of methods and populations used.

A common problem with resisted sprint PAP literature is the method of load prescription. I covered this subject previously in this article on resisted sprint training. The five RSS studies used an absolute load or a load related to body mass. As we know, neither method accounts for individual variation in physical qualities such as maximum strength, peak power, rate of force development, or sprint speed.

Non-individual load prescription may be the reason why we’re not close to understanding whether an effective PAP stimulus is present from resisted sprints.

If we prescribe a potentiating load of 30% body mass, athlete A (a weaker athlete) may experience a force-dominant stimulus, while athlete B (a stronger athlete) may experience a velocity-dominant stimulus. How can we expect consistent results when our methods are inconsistent?

How to Individualize Load Prescription

Thankfully, Jack Walsh sought to learn from what was done before and improve upon the practice. In the process, he found some interesting results. Jack conducted a PAP study with a group of male, professional field sport players at resisted sprint loads of 0% (unresisted), 30%, and 60% velocity decrement (V_dec) from their fastest unresisted 10m sprint time.

To find their best sprint time (baseline measure), each player performed 3x10m sprints at 0%, 30%, or 60% V_dec following 3x10m unresisted sprints. After performing the resisted sprints, they ran unresisted sprints at 2, 4, 6, 8, and 10 minutes.

The results are graphed in the chart below. We can see that both the 30% and 60% conditions provided a moderate to large PAP response 10 minutes after the resisted sprints. As individuals, however, the players’ 10m sprint performance peaked at times ranging from 6 to 10 minutes. Jack now knows how long after three resisted sprint efforts each of his players should perform their unresisted sprints.

 

By constantly potentiating his players to achieve supramaximal sprint speeds above their daily baseline, he found this could induce greater adaptations to acceleration performance than without the potentiating stimulus. Is this worth the small hassle of two hours’ testing? I think so.

All may not be so simple, however. A key reviewer of Walsh’s study, Dr. Eamonn Flanagan, made important points. Given the individual nature of training response and the variability of testing results from a single testing session, how variable is the response time to a given PAP stimulus? Optimal PAP response time is affected by a variety of factors including an athlete’s conditioning on the day of testing, psychological approach, activity within the rest period, and given effort.

With these limitations in mind, coaches must don their critical-thinking hat and decide on the frequency of their PAP testing sessions and the control and motivation they provide within each session. What works for you? How confident are you in your testing control?
I also recommend looking at the resisted sprint PAP work by Maria Monahan of University College Dublin.

The 1080 Motion: An Excellent Opportunity for PAP

The 1080 Sprint can play a significant role for resisted sprint PAP sessions. The device measures an athlete’s baseline sprint time with a minimal load of 1 kg. Upon completion of a sprint maximum, average speed, force, power, and time are quantified at 5-metre intervals of a sprint, both graphically and numerically.

Since the 1080 Sprint can increase load at 1 kg intervals, it’s ideal for providing resistance for the % V_dec resisted sprints. Following the sprints, the 1080 Motion provides measurements for the subsequent potentiated unresisted sprints, again giving measurements of sprint, force, speed, and power performance.

 

Can Resisted Sprinting Provide a Learning Effect Beyond a Physiological Potentiation?

The underpinning physical mechanisms behind PAP are well reviewed¹ and do not require discussion here. The potentiation effect of resisted to unresisted sprints, however, may involve not only an internal physiological effect but also an additional acute learning potentiation, or acute learning effect.

PAP may provide acute learning effects in addition to the known physiological effects. Share on X

With his world class sprint group, Sprint coach Jonas Dodoo of Speedworks uses Exer-genie resisted sprints as part of a warm-up to block starts and acceleration work.

“Prior to the main drills, resisted sprints let the athletes not only create force, but project force so they push forwards. Heavy resisted sprints allow my athletes to practise the first 4 metres of a free acceleration, whilst medium and light loads teach the respective positions required for 2nd level acceleration and transition strength. During each resisted sprint, the athletes get to understand how it feels to create and project high amounts of horizontal force whilst having to switch limbs, something of which we want to coach during our acceleration work. Resisted sprints take away that fear of falling forwards which can cause lateral and vertical force leakage. Following the resistance runs, I encourage my athletes to trust the new ‘forwards’ they have unlocked. It may feel scary and require better switching, but the power will be through the roof so all they have to do is catch the new angles.” — Coach Jonas Dodoo

Coach Dodoo’s reasons for pre-sprint resisted sprint work are compelling. I’d like to see more written about acute learning effects and the different exercise pairings used by sprint, throws, and strength and conditioning coaches.

Example Session for a Resisted Sprint PAP Effect

I’ve used the following session plan with field hockey and rugby players. The guideline will not suit everyone’s needs or session plans, so please take from it what you will.

 

A typical problem with classic PAP protocols is filling the time between the heavy and light loads. Trying to inspire fifteen athletes to sit nice and still for 12 minutes halfway through a gym session is not attractive to the athletes or the coaches.

Instead, fill this time with light technique drills to assist focus on acceleration. In my experience, light drills add to PAP’s learning effect while the sub-maximal nature does not seem to affect the physical potentiation. Finally, the light drills maintain key muscle temperature, which will aid session sprint performance.

Fill the time between heavy & light loads with light acceleration drills, upper body strength work. Share on X

Alternatively, I’ve used the time for upper body strength work with those athletes who need it. I’m confident the upper body work has no negative outcomes on the resisted sprint potentiation and it’s likely to maintain core temperature. Conversely, will heavy upper body strength work decrease neural drive for the free sprints?

Unfortunately, there is little knowledge as to the longitudinal effects of PAP training. Yes, acute improvements in sprint performance have been noted, but do these improvements provide a long-term training effect? Are the longitudinal benefits greater than those when structuring your resisted sprint program in a more traditional manner?

Finally, the PAP effect generally requires quite a heavy load before the lighter load. Are our athletes robust enough to experience this heavy load for, say, 2x sessions per week for eight weeks? Does this type of loading match the periodized plan? Once again, there are no answers here, just questions for the critically-thinking coach.

Summary

Resisted sprinting at heavier loads can improve acute unresisted sprint performance. However, load and rest interval must be individual to the athlete. The coach must understand the limitations of resisted sprint PAP, including the practicality of running a resisted sprint PAP testing session before a block of work and the variability of individual PAP testing results.

Please feel free to contact me with any queries or criticisms. I’m always looking to connect and learn from scientists and coaches around the world.

Many thanks to Jonas Dodoo for providing excellent commentary on his use of resisted sprint PAP work. Also, a big thank you to Dr. Eamonn Flanagan for his critique and advice.

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. Hodgson M, Docherty D, Robbins D. Post-Activation Potentiation: Underlying Physiology and Implications for MotorPerformance. Sports Medicine. 2005; 35(7): 585-595.
2. Seitz LB, Haff GG. Factors Modulating Post-Activation Potentiation of Jump, Sprint, Throw, and Upper-Body Ballistic Performances: A Systematic Review with Meta-Analysis. Sports Medince. 2016; 46(2): 231-40. doi:10.1007/s40279-015-0415-7.
3. Wilson JM, Duncan NM, Marin PJ, et al. Meta-Analysis of Postactivation Potentiation and Power: Effects of Conditioning Activity, Volume, Gender, Rest Periods, and Training Status. Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research. 2013; 27(3): 854-859. doi:10.1519/JSC.0b013e31825c2bdb.
4. Suchomel TJ, Lamont HS, Moir GL. Understanding Vertical Jump Potentiation: A Deterministic Model. Sports Medicine. 2016; 46(6): 809-28. doi:10.1007/s40279-015-0466-9.
5. Whelan N, O’Regan C, Harrison AJ. Resisted Sprints Do Not Acutely Enhance Sprinting Performance. Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research. 2014; 28(7): 1858-1866. doi:10.1519/JSC.0000000000000357.
6. Smith CE, Hannon JC, McGladrey B, et al. The Effects of a Postactivation Potentiation Warm-up on Subsequent Sprint Performance. Human Movement. 2014; 15(1): 36-44. doi:10.2478/humo-2013-0050.
7. Matthews MJ, Comfort P, Crebin R. Complex Training in Ice Hockey: The Effects of a Heavy Resisted Sprint on Subsequent Ice-Hockey Sprint Performance. Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research. 2010; 24(11): 2883-2887. doi:10.1519/JSC.0b013e3181e7253c.
8. Winwood PW, Posthumus LR, Cronin JB, et al. The Acute Potentiating Effects of Heavy Sled Pulls on Sprint Performance. Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research. 2016; 30(5): 1248-1254. doi:10.1519/JSC.0000000000001227.
9. Crouse CS. The acute effects of multiple resisted sled-pull loads on subsequent sprint-running performances (2015). Electronic Theses and Dissertations. 207.