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Is swinging hundreds of times to the nondominant side worth the time, effort, and awkwardness for golfers? There are certainly many people in the industry who believe so. Should we take their word for it?

Many say it prevents injury and “balances” the golfer side to side—they’ve “seen it work.” They say the chances of getting hurt swinging in the opposite direction are less than if you don’t do it. How do they know that?

Others say it increases motor unit recruitment and “strengthens” the golfer’s ability to decelerate the golf club. Does it increase their ability to produce force in the true sense of strength? Or is it more of a central nervous system effect?

More say that you can only swing as fast as you can decelerate and that training nondominant-side swings creates faster permanence. Who tested this to figure it out? Where is the data? How do they know that a causational relationship exists between deceleration and top-end swing speed and it is not just a collateral effect? Do they have objective data on it, or is it just a theory that can be made to sound reasonable?

Alternatively, naysayers bring up that you don’t train sprinters to be world champions by having them run backward or counterclockwise on the track to “balance” them out. Some professionals who have worked with the best in the world have even said that asymmetrical muscle imbalances are beneficial to performance—if they were to fix it, the runners would no longer be the fastest in the world.

So why would we want to “fix” asymmetry in golf but not in other sports? Is it really a problem, or is it actually a beneficial performance adaption?

Then there are the baseball and tennis arguments for why we don’t have pitchers throw as hard as they can with their nondominant arm. Do the top tennis players in the world practice serving as hard as they can on their opposite side to prevent injury and maximize their speed? If they do, and their speeds increase, how do they know it was solely because of the opposite side training and not because of other things they did?

The list goes on…

I was part of a very long Twitter thread on this topic recently, and when it came to asking either side of the coin to produce objective information, the proverbial Twitter crickets killed the conversation. Really smart people become entrenched on different sides of debates like this based on theory and opinion…yet few actually have the grit, desire, and/or resources to go research and actually test it themselves to see. Hence, the Twitter crickets and trolls reign supreme.

What was even more apparent, and frustrating, was the clear lack of understanding of the actual point of opposite side training. What physiological systems or benefits are actually being trained? There were more opinions than choices on a Cookout Shake menu.

What’s even more apparent and frustrating is the clear lack of understanding of the actual point of opposite side training. What physiological systems or benefits are actually being trained? Share on X

I’ve decided to see if I can answer these questions instead of getting into endless debates and conversations on theory and case data. Hopefully, this article will help move the conversation forward. Nothing frustrates me more in a conversation than a rebuttal of “We don’t have data, but we don’t make this up. We’ve worked with hundreds/thousands of people, so we know it works, and you should just trust us.”

Let’s stop puffing chests and hiding insecurities. Instead, let’s start filling data sheets with actual objectively collected data. I find that to be so much more productive.

So, enjoy the ride as I work through the exercise of presenting each of the opinions/thought processes one by one and dissecting them to see if we can bring some clarity to the discussion, or at least an intelligent starting point…

Theory 1: Opposite Side Swings Reduce Injuries in Golfers

Let’s start with what we know.

We know that lead side extremity and low back injuries are the most common injuries that we see in golf, which is rampant with overuse injuries. This is very clear in the literature. Further, it has been documented in a number of studies that lead side hip internal rotation deficit is highly correlated to low back injury.

What we further know from all the research we have done at Par4Success (with more than 1,300 golfers in our database longitudinally) is that if the four main rotational centers don’t have enough motion (hip internal rotation, shoulder external rotation, thoracic spine rotation, and neck rotation), there is an increased frequency of injury and a decreased swing speed. When these rotary centers improve, pain decreases and speeds increase.

We also have seen a very alarming trend with injuries when general power percentiles for age/sex compared to swing speed percentiles for age/sex are low. If all the rotational centers are cleared, but there exists a greater than 15 percentile point deficit of general power numbers (shot put, vertical peak power, and seated chest pass) relative to the golfer’s swing speed percentile, they are more likely to be injured.

We are also seeing early trends of elite level golfers being injured or having injury issues if they are in the top 10-15% of swing speed for their age groups but don’t meet certain strength requirements, such as deadlift loads or other strength metrics in squat and bench press.

So, there are definitely clear ways identified in research, objectively, to decrease the likelihood of repetitive overuse injuries by getting golfers stronger, getting them more mobile in the rotary centers (unless already hypermobile, then doubling down on strength), and making sure their technical abilities and equipment don’t outpace their general power numbers for club speed.

Other Studies, and a Resulting Question

There have also been a number of studies done to look at asymmetrical muscle mass, rotational power, and rotational endurance abilities in golfers compared to the normal population (non-golfers). In all of these studies there was a significant increase to the dominant side in mass, power, and endurance (generally speaking) among the golfers compared to the non-golfers, which shouldn’t be surprising. There also was no negative ability to produce power or endurance on the nondominant side (aka the side not used “concentrically” during the swing) during the testing compared to the general population.

Interestingly, in none of these studies did any researcher raise a concern over injury due to the imbalance, but instead stated the imbalances may be an adaptation that is advantageous for performance.

This brings up an interesting question.

If golfers swing to their nondominant side as often as non-golfers (aka never), why would we want to swing to the nondominant side in golfers but not in non-golfers? Clinicians certainly aren’t recommending to non-golfers that they swing a club fast as a way to prevent injury, so why do we do it to golfers?

Clinicians certainly aren’t recommending to non-golfers that they swing a club fast as a way to prevent injury, so why do we do it to golfers? Share on X

Is perhaps the increased muscle mass and ability to generate power unilaterally protective in nature and obviously advantageous for performance? The natural rebuttal is, of course, “Well, non-golfers don’t swing to the dominant side thousands of times, Chris. That’s why they don’t have imbalance issues and therefore don’t need to balance themselves by swinging to the nondominant side.”

You would be right in that non-golfers don’t have an imbalance from swinging in one direction all the time. But so what? How do we know asymmetrical mass and power production to the dominant side is a problem? How do we know that fixing it (if that is even possible) will stop someone from being injured? I have struggled to find anything that suggests the power, force, and muscle differences side to side are injury-causing if all rotary centers are full, and power and strength metrics are where they should be.

A question to think about: What if we tell a non-golfer to go swing the golf club 1,000 times and then tell a golfer who has the asymmetrical adaptions to do the same? Who would you put your money on getting hurt first? I would bet the house on the non-golfer who is “balanced” being injured way sooner.

Assumption Fun

Let’s assume that asymmetrical imbalance is a problem for golfers that increases risk of injury because the golfer will have trouble “decelerating.” Let’s further assume that slowing down or “deceleration” is an active eccentric musculoskeletal event. “Strengthening” concentrically with nondominant swings would be a pretty inefficient way to remedy this assumption for a number of reasons, both physiologically and ideologically, but we’ll address those issues later.

Alternatively, perhaps slowing down the swing to the dominant side is more of a stretch-shortening cycle event without a strong contraction back to the nondominant side, sort of like a rubber band just absorbing the force and decelerating the body. Is this more of a central nervous system and/or tendinous event?

If this is the case, should we look at training for tendon pliability and specific plyometrics to better absorb these forces? Opposite side training certainly wouldn’t accomplish this in its current commonly used form, unfortunately. Currently, golfers swing as hard as they can to one side or the other individually, failing to incorporate a plyometric event at the end of the swing, and instead just stopping after each rep.

To make the movement plyometric, a maximal effort nondominant-side swing would have to take place immediately following a completed maximal dominant-side swing. This would require full absorption of the energy eccentrically in the dominant direction, storage of it isometrically, and transfer into the nondominant side concentrically to maximize usage of the stretch-shortening cycle. Basically, a golf-specific swing plyometric exercise.

Video 1. Golf training use to be lost in sport-specific exercise, but now it’s making sure it’s appropriate for the sport and athlete. Focus on a combination of transfer and complimenting overuse patterns with more general loading.

Further thought might lead to training the tendons and tissue plyometrically in the lower half of the body, as well as via exercises like 180-degree rotational jumps or depth drop jumps into a 90-degree box jump, etc. These would all be much better and more efficient avenues for lower body tissue and nervous system loading.

Additionally, it would allow the golfer to practice the kinetic sequencing that occurs during the golf swing in an overloaded environment. Because the amount of force that needs to be absorbed in all of these examples would be greater than that in a nondominant-side swing, the nondominant-side swing seems to lose its appeal quickly as a way to reduce injury.

Theory 2: Opposite Swings Help to Balance the Golfer on Their Off Side

I don’t think I need to spend much time on this theory after the above section. Mass will be built in response to the repetitive overload that you apply to the tissue. A competitive golfer will swing to their dominant side at least 1,000 swings per week, but more likely close in on that per day.

If we think solely about the time it would take to have a golfer swing that many times to the nondominant side to “balance” them out from a volume perspective, it borders on ludicrous. Would you ever tell a golfer that instead of working on their putting or letting their body recover—or in a junior golfer’s case, to go be a kid—that they should spend hours swinging to the opposite side to achieve true balance via an equal number of reps? Common sense would reign supreme here, I hope.

So, the next thought is how we could achieve this result in a more time-efficient way…assuming it is even an important element.

I think it is safe to say there are much bigger (and researched) fish to fry when it comes to minimizing injury risk in golfers than swinging to the nondominant side. Share on X

At this point in the discussion, we don’t know if opposite side swings are important for performance. We also technically don’t know at this point if doing nondominant swings decreases injury risk. However, with the research and data that we do have, I think it is safe to say there are much bigger (and researched) fish to fry when it comes to minimizing injury risk in golfers than swinging to the nondominant side.

Theory 3: Being Balanced Actually Reduces Injury Risk

Again, this is a tough nut to crack, and there is not a lot of clarity here. There certainly are a lot of studies in baseball, tennis, volleyball, and other overhead sports that have tried to answer these questions. While asymmetrical shoulder blades or muscle imbalances from dominant to nondominant sides have been tough to tie to injury, there is definitely a strong suggestion that if the eccentric abilities of the shoulder rotators are not able to produce equal or more force than their concentric counterparts, injury could be more likely.

If we take this and make a leap (disclaimer, this is a leap, so feel free to tear it apart), then we could theorize that the golfer’s eccentric force creation ability to their lead side should be equal to or greater than their concentric ability to that same side. Again, this is a leap and discusses force creation, aka strength.

If we accept this as true, then opposite side swings do nothing to help the golfer in this instance. They concentrically train the tissues that need to work eccentrically during the dominant side follow-through—not helpful for sport-specific need—and they would eccentrically train the tissues that need to move concentrically during the dominant-side swing. It’s cool, but not physiologically helpful in this context.

Video 2. This is what a dominant-side swing looks like for a right-handed player. Conversely, this would be a nondominant-side swing for a left-handed player.

What would be more helpful in this context is eccentric overload in rotational patterns with tools such as flywheels, which can provide eccentric overload to the tissues in the dominant direction. When training this specifically in a six-week randomized trial at Par4Success, we saw a 150% swing speed gain compared to the normal average for 12 weeks for an adult golfer. While this doesn’t speak to injury prevention, it certainly points to the value of improving eccentric force creation to the dominant side for performance.

The performance gains, when put together with the leap to needing to make sure eccentric strength rotationally to the dominant side is as strong or stronger than the concentric side, would make a case for potential value on the injury prevention side.

Theory 4: Nondominant-Side Swings Improve the Strength of the Opposite Muscles to Decrease Imbalance

Ok, now it’s later in the article, and we’re going to dive into this theory as mentioned in the injury prevention section. The short answer is that physiologically, this is not one of the stronger thoughts.

When swinging a golf club that weighs around 300 grams at most, you obviously won’t overload the tissues to a point where a strength response will happen. To be more specific, you won’t be able to train an individual’s muscles to put out more force via mechanical overload at the tissue level. The club is way too light, and most of the angular velocity will be created in the first 25% of the movement anyway, with the rest being momentum—there’s not much more to say there.

If you look at it more from a central nervous system perspective, however, then we get into the coordination debate and the idea of neurological carryover. I’m sure you’ve heard the explanation that if you can get better on your off side, the brain doesn’t know left from right, and it will carry over to the opposite side. Sounds good, right? But, so did “If you can do it on a Bosu ball, imagine how much better and powerful you will be when you are back playing your sport on the ground.” Oops…

A lot of this comes from rehabilitation work and neuro rehabilitation. In my time in the acute rehab setting, I used this carryover or overflow theory quite often in stroke patients, with great success. If a client was working on left leg knee extension in sitting (a long arc quad), and they couldn’t move the leg, you would have them go ahead and do 20 or so on the right leg, and magically, the left leg would move. (Disclaimer: Watch how you are sitting if testing this with a patient and do not position the affected leg between your legs. I was kicked out of a few chairs when the affected leg suddenly “sprang to life” and actually extended.)

At Par4Success, we have been testing the opposite side shot put for many years on thousands of golfers and operating under the assumption that increasing nondominant power numbers made sense and translated to performance. The raw correlations were above 0.8, so all is good, right?

Well, as we have gotten more data and started to be able to look more into causation, what variables actually need to change to cause performance change (swing speed), and what variables just happen to change, the opposite side rotational power theory appears to be losing steam. We see it not being a factor that directly changes club speed unless another variable improves as well. There are other factors that, if they solely change, club speed does too. Opposite side rotational power appears to be left behind a bit as we gain more understanding and data.

Without giving away the house, there is a definite need for more study here, and we are working on it.

To wrap up this section, one question is does nondominant side training have to be golf-specific? What about general nondominant work like med balls thrown on the opposite side? Would those work?

A thought… We know, from the research, that jumping three times before you swing will increase your club speed by 2-3 mph immediately. Is swinging a club in the nondominant direction just a general nervous system stimulus that produces increased club speed, much like performing some countermovement jumps on the tee before you swing will do?

While the answers to these questions are certainly left open to opinion and need to be looked into more, one thing has become clear through this line of thinking: Nondominant-side swings will not increase a golfer’s strength in any meaningful fashion or bring muscular balance to their bodies.

Theory 5: You Increase Motor Unit Recruitment by Swinging to the Opposite Side and Make It More Permanent

There are three ways to elicit maximal motor unit recruitment:

1. Max Intent Effort – above 60% (relative to your max; the lighter the load, the more you have to make up for it with your speed).
2. E-Stim
3. Fast Movement (plyometrics) – with a focus on decreased amortization phase to maximize power outputs via maximal magnitude, maximal rate, and shortest duration.

When looking at these three, obviously #1 and #2 are out when it comes to nondominant swings. The load is not nearly enough, unless you are my 1-year-old son, and e-stim on your body while swinging is just not practical but would be fun to watch.

That leaves us with #3.

The more specific the movement is to the activity that is going to be completed, the better. Some considerations to think about for specificity are the motion itself, the angular velocities at play, the loads, and the metabolic demands.

When you consider these, the actual max effort swing starts to make some sense, in the dominant direction. But only with an immediate change to the nondominant-side swing as equally explosive to take advantage of the stretch-shortening cycle.

This is an instance where you could also start with a nondominant swing, immediately transitioning into a dominant-side swing, but that is less specific and therefore would fall lower on the priority list. You obviously could argue global training effect here, but again, it is less specific and therefore would be lower on my list if I have to pick for the sake of efficiency and minimal effective dosage.

The other consideration is metabolic. After 15 seconds, your chances of maximal motor unit recruitment are a thing of the past. You will need to let your body recover. Generally speaking, at least a 1:5 work-to-rest ratio…at the VERY least.

Much like with the earlier discussion of trying to balance out a golfer by matching the same number of nondominant swings to dominant ones, we find ourselves at the mercy of time. If you have your athlete do opposite side swings with appropriate rest intervals, how much time are you willing to allocate to this training as opposed to other critically important areas? To do this well, at most, the athlete could get 4-5 swings in a 15-second time period. Assuming you do the minimum 75 seconds of rest, that is 90 seconds per set. Doing 10 sets would take you close to 15 minutes, at a minimum—for optimal exertion, effort, and results, you are more likely closer to double that time…and that is just to one side.

How much will this move the needle compared to other options out there? That is an incredibly important question to answer.

The last part of this theory about permanence has always been interesting to me. So much so that it has been a point of focus to understand as we have trained and collected data on the thousands of golfers here at Par4Success. In terms of what “permanence” means, no one ever really defines it, and honestly, I don’t think any training makes anything permanent. That would imply that if I reach a certain club speed, strength, and power output level, I can stop all I’m doing and maintain that speed, strength, and power.

Honestly, I don’t think any training makes anything permanent. Share on X

That would be nice, wouldn’t it?

The facts, however, are these…

• If a golfer stops working out, their club speed drops.
• If a golfer travels a lot or has lots of stress (typically during their season), their club speed drops.
• If a golfer stops working out but continues just doing nondominant-side swings, their speeds drop.
• If a golfer continues to work out during the season, maintaining their power outputs high with low volume, and has a lot of travel and stress, their club speed will drop…but their strength numbers often will still go up (or at least maintain), leading to a quick recovery of speed once the central nervous system recovers, and there is an actual long-term net gain that occurs year over year.
• If a golfer continues to work out during the season and maintain their power outputs high with low volume, continues with nondominant swings, and has a ton of travel and stress, their club speed will drop…but their strength numbers often will still go up (or at least maintain), leading to a quick recovery of speed once the central nervous system recovers, and there is an actual long-term net gain that occurs.

There has been no difference in speed maintenance or gains with or without nondominant swings that we have seen in this light. The biggest predictor of “permanent” gains or speeds that continually go up year after year is continued improvements in strength and power metrics with maintained rotational mobility, not how many nondominant swings they do.

**Theory 6: You Can Only Swing as Fast as You Can Decelerate, and Nondominant Swings Improve How Well You Can Decelerate

This one has always perplexed me and made me think.

Effectively, what we are saying here is that your body has a protective mechanism on it, “a governor,” that will preemptively restrict you from swinging faster than it feels you can control. I think of Golgi tendon organs and not letting my tendons tear when I hear this. It makes sense, and I’m very thankful to Mother Nature for those. As many of you know, the idea is that with training, you can move the “governor” to kick in at higher speeds and/or loads, pushing your “red line” higher.

My first issue with this theory is that I know my athletes can swing faster than they can control (i.e., they can swing faster than they can under control and lose their balance). They definitely have one peak playing speed that they can control, but they can swing at least 5-10 mph faster if they are not trying to hit a ball and put in play.

So physiologically, my next logical question is what is the best way to train so that I can alter my governor’s “fall-over speed” so it becomes higher, thereby increasing my “playing speed”? How also can I close the gap between my “fall-over speed” and my “playing speed”?

If we think about it from a force production standpoint, we can handle more load and tissue stress eccentrically than we can concentrically. If eccentric strength is what we need to improve to decelerate better, then it would be common sense to train eccentric-specific overload.

I think we should define that, however, as it does not mean the athlete using a cable machine or a strap wrapped around them and repping out rotational training. Overload means you have to eccentrically control more weight than you can move concentrically. One way would be by having a coach help the athlete get to the end of the concentric part of the rep (using a load they could not otherwise move), and then the athlete has to control the eccentric portion of the rotation on their own before the coach helps them again (i.e., on a cable machine).

Another option would be a flywheel and having someone help the athlete pull the wheel faster/harder than the athlete could concentrically themselves. This leaves them to have to decelerate and change the direction of the movement back to the starting position. If you are not using flywheel with this intent, it is not truly eccentric overload training, it is just another form of variable resistance training.

So, I now know how to increase my eccentric force outputs. The next question is, how do I improve my nervous system’s ability to not give out?

This is the other argument we hear, that opposite side swings increase motor unit activation. What is the peak way to get motor unit activation? There are three simple answers: load, intent, and speed.

Simply put, if I want to train to swing faster than my current “playing, not fall-over, speed.” Swinging a driver or a slightly lighter club faster in the dominant direction is all I would need to do, while maintaining maximal effort above and beyond what I can generate when playing and paying attention to appropriate recovery intervals. That will be an “overload” for the CNS to have to control.

Swinging faster to the dominant side and having to change direction quickly would be best, not concentric contraction to the opposite direction (traditional nondominant-side swings). Share on X

If I want to increase my “fall-over speed” ability to generate force, I have to increase my force output via strength training and/or plyometric-type drills to optimize my stretch-shortening cycle efficiencies with specific plyometric activities. Therefore, swinging faster to the dominant side and having to change direction quickly would be best, not concentric contraction to the opposite direction (traditional nondominant-side swings).

Video 3. This is how traditional nondominant swings looks for a right-handed player. Conversely, this is what a dominant-side swing looks like for a left-handed player.

Theory 7: Nondominant Swings Improve Kinematic Sequencing and, Ultimately, Speed

Now this is one that makes the most sense to me thus far.

When we start talking about kinematic efficiency, which definitely has a positive impact on club speed, opposite side swings can help with coordination, deceleration, and sequencing per some companies in the field.

I have yet to see overly convincing data on this, but at the surface, we can rationalize the potential benefit here based on the couple of case studies that have been presented.

When Par4Success did our studies looking at kinematic sequencing with lighter and heavier sticks than a driver, there were definite increases in hand and upper body speed, as well as altered kinematics with lighter sticks and increased x factor or lower body separation with the heavier sticks. Sometimes for the better, sometimes not.

These changes in kinematic sequencing based on the implement used pique my curiosity on the potential benefits of nondominant-side swing training when it comes to kinematic efficiency.

It will be interesting to see what actual data is produced.

Theory 8: Opposite Side Swings Improve Ground Force Production

This final one is definitely one we will test here at Par4Success when our GASP dual force plates arrive in a few weeks. The theoretical claims made that people can increase their ground force production with different drills and changes of directions definitely make sense.

Focusing on specific force vectors and improving the timing of the production of those forces obviously can be advantageous to increasing swing speed. It will be interesting to see what nondominant-side swings will show on this frontier, however.

My hypothesis is that, due to lower coordination and overall lower ability to produce force in the opposite direction, the results will kinetically be less than exciting, with other strategies proving to be more beneficial and effective. We know that improved ground forces positively impact club speed, and I am hedging my bets that opposite side swings will not be the most effective way to do that.

We know that improved ground forces positively impact club speed, and I am hedging my bets that opposite side swings will not be the most effective way to do that. Share on X

Maybe there will be other benefits to kinetic sequencing and transfer, but we will have to see!

A Repudiation of Benefits

As I have gone through each of the above points, the benefits of nondominant swings from a physiological perspective appear to be minimal and, in some cases, not viable.

The benefits to reduce injury appear to be minimal. Even if there are some benefits, there are far more effective and impactful areas to focus on. Rotary center mobility, power percentile relative to swing speed percentile ratios, and general strength to bodyweight relativity numbers in the squat, deadlift, and bench press are all much higher on the list and proven.

The benefits of “balancing” a golfer out by doing nondominant swings to reduce injury are questionable at best, and ultimately become irrelevant when you consider how much volume they would have to complete to be meaningful.

The plyometric benefits from a stretch-shortening cycle training perspective, if doing immediate maximal opposite direction “rebound” swings, are present with dominant swings specifically, but with nondominant swings only possibly globally.

The benefits of nondominant swings from a coordination standpoint to produce more force and have causational relationships to club speed gains appear to be more limited than initially thought based on early causational change data.

The benefits of nondominant swings to train deceleration to improve eventual top-end speed seem to be overstated, particularly since swinging to the nondominant side would be training the “decelerators” concentrically versus how they are used—eccentrically (which requires more force output than concentrically). Concentric contraction generally leads to a lower motor unit recruitment potential and is a complete training of the wrong specific swing direction.

Simply swinging a driver or a slightly lighter club (6-10%) faster than the golfer can do while hitting the ball would seem to produce enough of the “overload” stimulus needed to train higher level deceleration in the dominant direction, which they will actually use in sport and translates to performance. This would be the most specific form of training with a higher level of demand in deceleration.

The possible benefits of kinematic sequence improvements of a golfer’s swing make sense, and the few cases studies that have been presented look promising. However, they are case studies, so I am waiting for the additional data promised by some of those in the industry before making any calls on this one.

The kinetic benefits of nondominant swings remain to be seen, but I am not optimistic for them as compared to other training implements and strategies that for sure will make big changes in golf performance.

I am struggling to find where nondominant swings make sense from an injury prevention or performance perspective other than potential kinematic changes. Share on X

I guess as I read back through this, I am struggling to find where nondominant swings make sense from an injury prevention or performance perspective other than potential kinematic changes. I am intrigued by the idea of plyometric swing-specific training and the possible benefits to improve stretch-shortening cycle efficiency and potentially translate to performance and injury prevention.

I am sure there will be many who disagree with this article and want to have further discussion, and that is what I hope for! You can reach me @par4success on Twitter, or you can connect with us to further the discussion at www.par4success.com.

Let’s continue to move this conversation and our field forward while starting to cut the menu of theories down and replacing it with a database of objective facts that give golfers and coaches a clear path to longevity, speed, and performance.

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 best products are the ones that you use daily and experience that A-ha! moment with, where you think: “Wow, I can’t believe I didn’t invent this. This is such a great idea.” Inventions provide solutions to common problems or upgrade solutions currently in place. Whether it be in the weight room or in day-to-day life, the products we use the most are the ones that help us more efficiently accomplish the task at hand.

In the weight room, our main products are barbells, dumbbells, weight plates, and benches. With those four things, you can honestly run a high-performance program. Would it be ideal? Probably not. But would it be enough? Definitely.

While there’s nothing wrong with the basic tools, we live in an era of innovation and not considering new solutions would be flat out irresponsible. As a coach, for me to not consider utilizing new, advanced equipment such as specialty bars would be like using Alexander Graham Bell’s original 1876 telephone design instead of at least checking out the new iPhone.

For me, to not consider utilizing new, advanced equipment such as specialty bars would be like using Bell’s original 1876 telephone design instead of at least checking out the new iPhone. Share on X

Specialty bars are exactly what they sound like. Special. They provide a specialty. They aren’t meant to replace all of our basics, but rather to enhance the adaptations we may be looking for when using them.

Whether it’s tall athletes deadlifting with a trap bar for better biomechanics, coaches utilizing a safety squat bar to allow for hand-assisted lifts, or athletes following a return-to-play protocol by lifting with an Earthquake bar, specialty bars can help us fill voids that we may not be able to fill with our standard equipment.

This article will highlight five of my favorite specialty bars, which I can confidently say are well worth the investment for you as a coach and for your athletes.

1. Earthquake Bar

The Earthquake bar by BandBell is a bar that I never knew I needed until I got my hands on one. I dismissed this bar for years, thinking it was a circus trick for Instagram likes and follows. Boy, was I wrong.

Shame on me for not doing my due diligence and research, because I probably could have helped a lot more athletes by implementing this in our programming earlier. BandBell was started by Jim Seitzer (a founding member of Westside Barbell), and his goal was to help find ways to train big movements without pain.

What started as a broomstick with mini bands and kettlebells attached to it has now turned into several different specialty bars, my favorite being the Earthquake bar.

At just about 6.5 pounds in weight and 1.5 inches in diameter, this bar is capable of handling 300 pounds of external load. Unlike a normal bar, the weight is not loaded directly onto the sleeve but rather hung from bands at the ends of the bar. This setup is what creates the unique benefits of O.K.E.

Oscillating Kinetic Energy

O.K.E., or oscillating kinetic energy if you want to sound super smart, is not a new concept but one that has been truly mastered by the use of this specialty bar. Using O.K.E. is great for both rehab and training goals because the stimulus comes from the oscillations, pulses, and perturbations that create varied levels of multiplanar instability. At different loads and kinetic energy levels, we can alter these exercises based on the desired adaptation.

For example, if you want an athlete to really wake up their central nervous system and tap into all those stabilizing muscles, it would be wise to use a setup with tons of kinetic energy. By hanging several lightweight kettlebells from the bar via bands, you can create the instability you’re looking for. I’ve had a lot of success introducing this early into programming when athletes return from an upper body injury or have high pain levels with traditional upper body lifts.

On the other hand, if an athlete is aiming for a good pump, you can hang heavier weight plates from the bar and even decrease the amount of band slack to make it more stable. Now you can move some pretty good weight with low levels of O.K.E. and work more of the prime movers of the lift without as much stress on the joint. This setup is really good for hypertrophy work on seasoned athletes who may want to avoid any undue joint stress or discomfort.

There are so many variables and customizations you can make with this bar. It’s much more than creating the chaos training effect. You can really fit lifts to each athlete’s needs in a truly beneficial and safe way.

How We Use It

While there are several ways to use this bar in a clinical setting, that’s not the field I’m in. If I were a physical therapist, this would be one of my go-to tools for rehabbing shoulders, elbows, hips, knees, and ankles. Instead, on the performance side of the business, I really love using the bar as a dynamic coordination tool. We’ll often operate in that medium kinetic energy range to get a little bit of the benefits from each end of the spectrum.

On the performance side of the business, I really love using the Earthquake bar as a dynamic coordination tool, says @JustinOchoa317. Share on X

The Earthquake bench press is great for athletes looking to find ways to press without pain, due to the lower overall load being used and the bar’s slightly thicker handle, but it’s also really helpful as a recovery and autoregulation tool.

On days when we might have some sort of bench press variation programmed, but the athlete comes in with a really low level of readiness, we can easily swap that out for the Earthquake bar. Maybe they’re sick, maybe they’re tired from practice/games, maybe they’re hurt, maybe their significant other dumped them, maybe they slept poorly. Those things can affect an athlete’s mental state, physical state, and overall ability to perform. Sometimes coaches have to recognize that and make the proper adjustments.

The benefits of this programming menu are twofold. As coaches, we’re able to alter an athlete’s workout to fit their level of readiness, which can help them ultimately reduce the risk of weight room injuries or the waste of having a lousy session that doesn’t benefit them. Secondly, we can possibly boost their morale with the introduction of something a little bit more unique and stimulating.

By giving the athlete something they might find fun and enjoyable, there is potential that their previously poor mental state and readiness can improve a bit mid-session, and they can finish off on a strong note with some normally programmed work.

Another really valuable exercise we’ve implemented into our speed development programming is the Earthquake split squat. We typically will use this on days when athletes are doing resisted sprints as a way to prime the nervous system without taxing it. The lift itself really challenges the lower extremity stability, which also translates over to their sprint work—especially if they’re working against any type of resistance.

When we first started using the 1080 Sprint, we noticed a lot of athletes would try to drive so hard and stay so low that they would sometimes stumble forward in acceleration. Anecdotally, we believe that the use of the Earthquake split squat before resisted sprints has helped athletes lock into their positions because of their increased single leg stability.

Anecdotally, we think using the Earthquake split squat before resisted sprints has helped athletes lock into their positions due to their increased single leg stability, says @JustinOchoa317. Share on X

At around $250, the Earthquake bar is a bargain. As I said, it’s more than just hanging bands from a bar for Instagram likes. There is so much you can accomplish with this bar, whether it’s sports performance, physique competition, or powerlifting, the bar is worth its weight in gold. If you are in a setting where you work with a lot of professional athletes or in small group or personal sessions, this would probably suit you very well.

2. Trap Bar

The trap bar, sometimes referred to as a hex bar, is a very common specialty bar that you may already have a lot of experience with—of the five bars listed in this article, the trap bar is probably the most widely used and well-known. And with prices starting around $150, it’s a low-cost, no-brainer investment.

This is a versatile bar, especially for deadlift, loaded jump, and loaded carry variations. You can get wildly creative with this bar, but that’s not really my thing. I like to keep it simple and stick to what I know helps our athletes.

Neutral Grip

When it comes to the benefits of a trap bar, I believe one of the keys is the use of a neutral grip. I am a huge fan of neutral grip exercises—whether it be upper or lower body, I think a neutral grip can really make a positive impact on our athletes’ results.

Oftentimes, grip can be a limiting factor in a deadlift. I have no issue with athletes working on their grip strength, but depending on the time of year or what their training schedule looks like, it may not be the best use of our time. Introducing a neutral grip can instantly take this issue away. Grip no longer becomes the limiting factor. As long as that athlete is in a field, track, or court sport and not a barbell sport, then it doesn’t negatively impact their results in any way.

Not only that, but switching from a mixed grip or a pronated grip to a neutral grip allows athletes to get a little bit better shoulder joint centration and shoulder blade retraction, two major cues that can also instantly improve their deadlift.

Center of Mass

Another really unique benefit of a trap bar is that the athlete actually stands inside the bar, rather than behind it. This puts the external load in a much different position relative to the athlete’s center of mass.

This can help athletes avoid lower back pain, injury, or discomfort because the load is in a much more advantageous position. Plus, with the benefits of a neutral grip, their lats and upper back are more engaged and less likely to lose positioning during straining points of the lift.

Traditional barbell deadlifts are amazing but might not be the best fit for everyone. Clean variations are great but might not be for everyone. Implementing a trap bar on jumps or deadlifts can give athletes a hybrid approach that allows them to find a better position to work from.

How We Use It

We use the trap bar in two very simple and effective ways: deadlift it and jump with it.

The trap bar deadlift is one of our main movements in terms of hip-dominant strength options. It has completely replaced the barbell deadlift in our programming. I love to program this lift to help athletes build up a heavy deadlift and strong posterior chain.

The trap bar deadlift is our force-driven exercise selection along the force-velocity curve. We sometimes go against bands or chains to increase velocity a little bit but still focus on heavier loads.

On the opposite end of the continuum, our velocity-driven selection is a trap bar jump. You can either choose to go all-out on velocity with much lighter loads and peak velocities in the 3.0 m/s range or focus more on power output with speeds more in the .85–1.25 m/s range. Both options definitely have their place.

Something that I’ve always found interesting is that the trap bar jump (from hang) allows us to put out more power and faster bar speed, at identical loads, compared to a hang power clean. Why?

• Possibly due to better leverages.

 

• Possibly due to a much easier learning curve.

 

• Less technique requirements could also be a factor.

I’m *this close* to calling the trap bar a standard must-have for all strength coaches. It’s just too versatile and valuable to not capitalize on, says @JustinOchoa317. Share on X

In the end, it’s definitely food for thought as to which may be a better choice for programming. At this point, I’m *this close* to calling the trap bar a standard must-have for all strength coaches. It’s just too versatile and valuable to not capitalize on.

3. Safety Squat Bar

The safety squat bar (SSB), sometimes called a yoke bar, is a unique bar with a wide array of benefits. Unlike the trap bar, which powerlifters kind of frowned upon, powerlifters popularized the SSB as a great training tool. And it is…for all types of athletes.

The unique design of the SSB, which rests on the athlete’s back and has a neutral grip handle at chest height and cambered ends, provides lifters with several key benefits that their body structures may not allow them to experience naturally.

Limits Shoulder Demands

One of the most important differences between a barbell and the SSB is the change in hand placement. Take, as an example, the traditional back squat: With a barbell, the athlete must place their hands on the bar to secure it throughout the lift. This is not easy for many athletes because of the demands of shoulder mobility. Similar to throwing a ball, achieving this position takes decent levels of shoulder abduction and external rotation. Not only do athletes need the mobility to reach this position, but also the strength and stability in that position to be able to support the bar.

With the SSB, the athlete can use the handles to secure the bar without any significant limitations at the shoulder. In rare cases, athletes may have a history of joint damage in the shoulder region that could be irritated by how the bar rests on their collarbone area. For the most part, though, using the SSB is like night and day for athletes who normally struggle to back squat.

Squats with the SSB and with a barbell do have slightly different levels of activation when it comes to muscle groups, but not enough to deem one better than the other. The two can work synergistically, or you can choose your favorite and probably not miss out on much from the other.

Hand-Assisted Lifts

Hand placement on the bar is a benefit, but my absolute favorite perk of the SSB is the hand placement off the bar. I am a huge fan of hand-assisted lifts using the SSB, often referred to as Hatfield variations. Implementing Hatfield SSB split squats, rear-foot-elevated split squats, and tempo squats has been one of the most game-changing decisions I’ve made over the last 10 years.

With the SSB, the athlete technically does not even need their hands to be on the bar because of how it is designed to rest right over the collarbones. This frees up the hands to perform hand-assisted lifting. Most of the time, racks will have mounted pegs/handles for these, but you could also rig up this setup by using an extra barbell against the rack.

You can choose to use the hand assistance for supramaximal load or supramaximal speed. Both have amazing neural benefits that can supercharge your athletes’ results.

How We Use It

As I alluded to earlier, Hatfield squat variations are the go-to for us with the SSB. There are so many ways to incorporate it for general strength, special strength, power, and speed.

I’ve been amazed watching athletes crush this lift for 2-3 times their body weight. No, we can’t really measure the hand assistance, but it’s still wildly impressive for athletes to single leg squat this amount of relative load.

You can get a high-quality safety squat bar for under $400. Buying dozens of these in a team setting would not be a bad investment, but I totally understand if the funds aren’t available. In the private sector, having one is plenty to get the job done, as you can get enough bang for your buck out of just having it available.

4. Swiss Bar

The Swiss bar, or football bar, is a multi-grip bar often used for pressing exercises. The bar designs vary, and all of them are extremely useful. Most Swiss bars feature at least three neutral grip options at various widths. More high-end bars may incorporate those neutral grips along with angled grips, also at different widths.

For presses, the Swiss bar is one of the most versatile tools coaches can use to help athletes find their optimal grip and posture, says @JustinOchoa317. Share on X

Athletes can press vertically or horizontally with the Swiss bar, performing the exercise standing, supine, or seated. For presses, this is one of the most versatile tools coaches can use to help athletes find their optimal grip and posture.

Grip Options

I’ve talked about the benefits of a neutral grip with the trap bar deadlift, and neutral grip alignment can also benefit our presses for the same reasons: better shoulder joint centration, better stability through the range of motion, and a more pain-free comfort level.

A neutral grip and/or altered grip width can also change the muscles emphasized throughout different points of a lift. The Swiss bar allows athletes access to multiple grip widths, something I’m a huge fan of when having athletes perform press-oriented lifts.

It’s extremely important for athletes to train in all zones along the force-velocity curve, spending time working on strength, power, and speed, respectively.

In the Westside Barbell speed bench (dynamic effort) method, they are very adamant that athletes train with at least three different grips during their dynamic bench press days. Those following Louie Simmons’ methods typically use a barbell and go narrow, normal, and then wide grip. Taking that concept, you can actually determine if a non-barbell bench press would be a better fit for the athlete and incorporate the same principles with different neutral or angled grips at other angles. Of course, this helps hit the muscle groups targeted at multiple angles and ranges, but also helps the athlete press pain-free and safely.

How We Use It

Staying on the topic of pressing, the Swiss bar is an elite option for doing just that. One of the most underrated aspects of improving sports performance is having an explosive and powerful upper body.

This is where I think a lot of coaches miss out on crucial gains. Many view the bench press only as an upper body strength exercise, and something that doesn’t transfer to certain sports. My outlook is different. I think the bench press is an amazing option to train in the power and speed ranges, and it transfers over to every sport.

Sprinting and jumping are two of the most athletic actions you can do, no matter the sport. Sprinting and jumping are both full body movements, and the upper body plays a crucial role in both. By incorporating speed bench press variations, you can improve your athlete’s upper body explosiveness, which can then transfer to better arm action during their jumps and sprints.

The Swiss bar is not only for presses, you can also use it for the same benefits with row variations such as seal rows or even use it as a varied-grip pull-up bar laid over the top of a power rack. For around $250, I think this can be one of the more valuable bars in any gym. If you work with a lot of overhead athletes, this would probably be a high-priority investment both in the team and private setting.

If you work with a lot of overhead athletes, the Swiss bar would probably be a high-priority investment both in the team and private setting, says @JustinOchoa317. Share on X

5. PVC Pipe

Last, but definitely not least, is PVC pipe. I realize this is a little out of left field but hear me out. PVC pipe may not be a strength training tool, but at a price point of around $2, it delivers a massive bang for your buck.

You can get plastic pipe at any local hardware store in various shapes and sizes. I’ve seen coaches make hurdles out of PVC pipes, make their own vertical jump testing system out of PVC, and even make water-based slosh pipes with it.

PVC pipes are also a great tool for technique enhancement for beginners to prep their movement patterns in a warm-up routine.

How We Use It

All of those innovations mentioned are great uses for PVC, but I’d like to really showcase how this simple tool can help your athlete’s speed development.

Overhead PVC runs, or fixed arm runs, really help the athlete utilize their hips more optimally in sprints and sprinting drills. In addition to faster and more powerful hips, it also forces the athlete to maintain great posture and integrity during drills.

PVC sprint drills can allow us to uncover breakdowns in an athlete’s techniques, especially in the lateral chain. Although perfect symmetry is usually not attainable, it is important to help get athletes as balanced as they can be whether it’s in the weight room or on the field, court, or track.

Evaluating ROI

All of these bars would be great to have, but there’s this little thing called money, and it doesn’t exactly grow on trees. Understanding program budgeting, finances, and ROI is something that most of our formal preparation for the strength and conditioning industry does not prepare us for.

When it comes to investing in a new piece of equipment, whether it’s $20 or $20,000, there are three simple questions that I ask myself to determine if this is a smart investment.

1. Does this product solve a problem? It doesn’t matter if it solves a single person’s problem or 20 problems at once. If it solves a problem, we can ask question number 2. If it doesn’t provide a solution to a clear-cut issue that you are experiencing as a coach, it’s not necessary. It may not be worth it at the moment.

If a product doesn’t provide a solution to a clear-cut issue that you are experiencing as a coach, it’s not necessary. It may not be worth it at the moment, says @JustinOchoa317. Share on X

I have always wanted wearable EMG garments. I’ve tried so hard to come up with a justification to get some. But they simply don’t solve a problem for me. In my setting, it’s not filling a true void.

2. Can I afford this product? Aside from starting up a new business where you may take on some debt or loans, this is a great question to ask yourself before any major purchase. If you want a $450 trap bar, but you don’t have $450 cash available at the snap of a finger, it may not be the right time.

That’s not to say definitely don’t pull the trigger, though. There are solutions. Maybe you can find a similar model for a lower cost. Maybe you can find a used bar for much cheaper. Maybe you can use a credit card with 0% interest for 12 months and pay it off monthly, if you’re in a position to do so. Or, as I mentioned earlier, maybe this is rolled into a start-up loan with a new business. Not having cash is not automatically a no, but it can help you dig deeper into the logistics.

When I started training, I was in a commercial setting and did not have any influence on the equipment available. I ran into a situation where I needed a trap bar. I had a client who experienced a lot of lower back pain during hinge-based exercises and I knew from personal experience that a trap bar would probably be a great move for him.

I went out and bought one for $200, kept it in my trunk, and brought it into the gym with me whenever I needed it. Sadly, I did not have $200 to my name at the time. I was living paycheck to paycheck. But I knew that if I got one, that client would provide me with revenue that exceeded $200 every month, so it ended up paying for itself in one month and turned out to be a fantastic investment. This is just an example of how you might still be able to pull it off even if it appears you can’t afford it.

3. Do I know how to use it? Lastly, are you ready to rock when you get this product? Hopefully, after reading this article about these bars, the answer is yes. But going back to the EMG wearables, even if I did get some, I’m not even sure if I’d know how to interpret the data, best practices on usage, etc.

Do your due diligence on the product. Make sure you do research and get the exact brand and model that suits your program the best. Read reviews, good and bad. Bad reviews are telling because you can see if someone else’s displeasure may have to do with the same reason you are thinking about purchasing. A one-star review for poor customer service and slow shipping? Eh. I can deal with that. A one-star review because the quality feels cheap and it rusted out in one year? Okay, that means something.

Seeing how other coaches use the product, and even what athletes think about it, will also be great feedback for any purchase you’re thinking about.

All of the above listed bars bring their own unique value and purpose to a training program. While they certainly aren’t necessary to get great work in, it’s hard for me to imagine our program without them. Equipment doesn’t make us better coaches, but if we leverage it correctly, we can definitely help our athletes find an edge in their training with special equipment.

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

Coaches and trainers often adopt movements that appear to have the greatest “transfer” to an athlete’s sporting discipline when designing a training program. Once they’ve deemed what they believe to be essential, they commonly scrap or disregard any movement outside of that for its relative ineffectiveness or inapplicability. Of course, we only have so much time to train, and we simply cannot do it all, but how do coaches decide what movements an athlete should do or what is most important? Is it as simple as taking what appears to work from a surface level and disregarding the rest?

Performance coaches commonly make decisions based on the assumption that if a sporting action moves through a given plane of motion, exercises replicating (or closely mimicking) the same action automatically correlate, thus reigning as superior to those that do not. Coaches then fight tooth and nail over programming elements—like whether athletes should back squat or not—saying that it doesn’t emulate a skill like sprinting and therefore is useless. In reality, however, when properly programmed and transferred into the skill of sprinting, squat lifts can most certainly enhance performance.

Most of these topics have been beaten to death over the years, and you can simply scroll through social media to find coaches throwing literature in one another’s faces to justify or assert their position. That is not the intention of this article—the goal, rather, is to inform the reader on why it is inadequate to rely on certain theories for programming, mainly the force-vector theory.

Understanding the Literature

The force-vector theory is a recurring concept that some coaches have leaned on, where movements are classified based on the direction in which force is expressed in relation to the global coordinate frame. This means that activities such as sprint acceleration would fall under the horizontal acceleration umbrella, whereas maximum velocity sprinting would reside under the vertical. Subsequently, “horizontal” or “vertical” exercises would be more specific to their respective categories.

While at first glance this may seem like a sound theory, the principle of dynamic correspondence contends otherwise, showing us that there truly is more to human kinetics than meets the eye. Sure, athletes require unique training methods depending on their sporting discipline, but we could argue that a number of universal movements assist athletes no matter what they are doing.

Sure, athletes require unique training methods depending on their sporting discipline, but we could argue that a number of universal movements assist athletes no matter what they are doing. Share on X

It’s easy to understand the assumption that an exercise loaded similarly to that of a particular sporting action is as simple as a 1 + 1 = 2 equation. Take the 2018 study that examined and directly compared the relationship of vertically directed exercises (loaded and unloaded vertical jumps and half squat) and horizontally directed exercises (hip thrust) to sprint performance in top-level track and field athletes.¹ Testing results for speed at the 10-, 20-, 40-, 60-, 100-, and 150-meter marks indicated that horizontally directed movements (hip thrusts) were more strongly associated with the maximum acceleration phase, whereas vertical movements (loaded and unloaded vertical jumps) were more strongly associated with top-end speed phases.

Loturco et al. concluded that “the force-vector theory is thereby an emergent methodological approach, based on a solid and well-established mechanical foundation.”¹ Essentially, this newfound theory would allow coaches to select exercises based on their relative direction and apply them to the specific phase of running or sport skill the individual athlete needs to improve. Boom! That’s it! All we need to do is train athletes with exercises loaded in a similar fashion to that of the plane they travel in their sport, right?

Sounds nice, but think again.

This is most certainly a broad generalization, and according to Fitzpatrick et al.², comes as a “direct opposition to the most commonly accepted criteria of mechanical specificity used in strength and conditioning, that is, the principle of dynamic correspondence.”

While it is true that during high-speed running, ground reaction forces are predominately vertical, whereas during acceleration, there is a greater horizontal force relative the global frame, it cannot be explained by the force-vector theory. Rather, it is simply due to the athlete’s body position.² During acceleration, the athlete must lean forward to project greater horizontal force, meaning that the ground reaction force relative to the global frame of the body is simply projected in a more horizontal fashion.

Kugler and Jahnsen⁴ demonstrated the same when looking at both horizontal and vertical jumping, finding that the direction of ground reaction force is relative to the athlete, and whether they travel forward or not depends on whether they lean forward. Thus, how the body and the ground reaction force are oriented at toe-off dictates where the athlete travels. This is all further proof that perhaps the development of strength, speed, and power in athletes across the board is more similar than some would like to admit.

Dynamic correspondence supports that activities like back squatting are, in fact, mechanically similar to more “horizontal” motions such as acceleration because the direction of the ground reaction force relative to the athlete is similar despite it being different in the global frame. There is a reason fundamental movement patterns (e.g., squat, hinge, lunge, press, pull, push, etc.) have been around so long in the general physical training of athletes and will continue to be—because they work in the development of foundational qualities needed across most sports.

What Matters Most

If we were to adopt the force-vector theory to guide our programming and decision-making, how would we know when a particular movement goes from being horizontal to vertical, and vice versa?

Take our acceleration and sprinting analogy—there is not an immediate change from one to the next, but rather a gradual shift in the ground reaction forces that propel the athlete forward. Even further, how does something like a hip thrust (knees flexed at 90 degrees) directly transfer to the ground reaction forces of an athlete during closed kinetic chain leg extension?² It certainly doesn’t, and neither do any other exercises for that manner, which is why we don’t program based on the idea of “replicating” what we see. Loturco et al.¹ were certainly on to something when they popularized the use of the hip thrust and similar type exercises, as these movements have been shown to have the potential for greater glute and hamstring activation versus the back squat, which may assist in more hip-dominant skills. That would be a more justified reason to select one exercise over another within a program, not that one happens to fall in line with the force-vector theory.

For this reason, we also must do our research and select an array of movements in our programming to determine what is most beneficial for our athletes, ultimately helping contribute to better athletic potential. Nick Winkelman said it best (and I paraphrase): Athletes are a lot like racecar drivers and we as coaches are a lot like mechanics. We don’t tell the athlete how to drive the car, we just help give them a better and higher performing car to drive.

Perhaps the greatest error a coach can make is getting stuck in the dogmatic thought process that lures many into believing that anything in human performance is universal, says @jimmypritchard_. Share on X

Perhaps the greatest error a coach can make is getting stuck in the dogmatic thought process that lures many into believing that anything in human performance is universal. The cliché “It depends” gets tossed around a lot, and rightfully so. Is a hip thrust better than a back squat for acceleration or speed development? It depends. Numerous factors play into the required development for an individual in their given sport and the forces they encounter on their body concerning the global frame.

Having a truly deep understanding of the sport in which the athlete participates, and subsequently the physiological, biomechanical, and competitive skills they must have to be successful, is no doubt the most important factor. This leads us to the realization that there are many ways to skin a cat, and in sport a multitude of ways to get to our destination. We should prioritize helping the athlete develop the ability to produce force and produce it quickly, or display greater feats of strength, power, endurance, and speed in the context of competition.

Application of Dynamic Correspondence in Exercise Selection

The force-vector theory prioritizes the direction of force relative to the global frame, while what is clearly most important is the direction of force relative to the athlete. Adopting this theory and applying it in practice is rather problematic in that it violates the basic tenets of the relationship between the way a body is oriented and the ground reaction forces that occur on it, thus creating a great deal of misunderstanding.

Obviously, we know that the more effective approach is to make decisions based on dynamic correspondence, but how does one actually do this?

The force-vector theory prioritizes the direction of force relative to the global frame, while what is clearly most important is the direction of force relative to the athlete, says @jimmypritchard_. Share on X

First and foremost, identify precisely what metric or performance parameter you wish to improve. Say, for example, that you know an athlete must improve their foot ground contact time while sprinting in order to get faster, and that a specific athlete is currently somewhere in the neighborhood of 85 milliseconds. Ask yourself what exercises or movements would most effectively improve this quality in order to get to a more desirable number, like 80 milliseconds? The right answer is whatever exercises increase the performance—and what certainly does not matter a bit is the direction in which they execute the movement.

By starting with the end in mind, it is easy to work backward from this end performance goal as well as decipher whether an exercise translates to performance or not. In the case of ground contact time, you may choose to incorporate an array of vertical, horizontal, and multidirectional plyometrics to improve performance.

Lastly, we must not forget that any and every action we choose to execute is in fact a supplement aimed at improving performance. It is easy to get lost in the minutiae of all the training details we encounter while working with athletes, but at the end of the day, whatever improves the athlete’s performance most is what really matters.

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. Loturco, I., Contreras, B., Kobal, R., et al. “Vertically and horizontally directed muscle power exercises: Relationships with top-level sprint performance.” PLoS One. 2018;13:e0201475.

2. Fitzpatrick, D.A., Cimadoro, G., and Cleather, D.J. “The Magical Horizontal Force Muscle? A Preliminary Study Examining the ‘Force-Vector’ Theory.” Sports. 2019;7:30.

3. Bryanton, M.A. and Chiu, L.Z. “Hip-versus knee-dominant task categorization oversimplifies multijoint dynamics.” Strength & Conditioning Journal. 2014;36:98-99.

4. Kugler, F. and Janshen, L. “Body position determines propulsive forces in accelerated running.” Journal of Biomechanics. 2010;43:343-348.

Building dynamic qualities and sustaining long-term growth within an athlete is an art. For new athletes beginning their sports performance journey, the simplest answer is often the most effective. Basic progressive overload and a consistent dose of sprinting and leaping goes a long way.

In the beginning, nearly anything reasonable works, but it will not work forever. As the athlete nears exhaustion of their initial adaptative reserves, it becomes critical to have a long-term strategy in place to maintain progress. This plan should include management of energy resources (acute versus chronic loading) as well as an effective means to develop specific muscular actions/contractions (isometrics, eccentrics, concentrics) by employing a variety of “similar, but not congruent” methods to tastefully shake things up at the appropriate time and avoid stagnation.

Speed-oriented exercises that can both dissect and ultimately rebuild the stretch-shortening cycle faster become necessary to maintain the growth of explosive attributes in an athlete. I like to affectionately refer to this process as “teasing out the twitch” because it is so delicate and unique to each individual athlete. With that said, you should view this blog post more as a compass and less as an absolute road map. It provides general insights accompanied with more specific “bang for your buck” exercises and examples to hopefully set you in the right direction and allow for your own critical thought and experimentation at important training crossroads.

Defining “Bounce”

It is easy to see when an athlete is light on their feet. However, expressing this quality in words can be a bit more difficult. Adjectives that describe bounce can be subject to interpretation and take on different meanings for different people. In the world of strength and conditioning this can be fodder for contentious debate.

Without getting too caught up in semantics, I find “bounce” to be synonymous with elasticity, which is defined as the ability of an object to return to its original state or shape after experiencing stress. Visually this aligns nicely with the simple one-dimensional model of the stretch-contraction cycle typically used to explain how muscles absorb and ultimately produce force. The tendons then provide the critical link, allowing transmission of energy from force-producing muscles to the skeletal system permitting movement. Since the entirety of the musculotendon apparatus is critical to movement, it is important to make sure both tendon and muscular function are developed equally. Unfortunately, all too often the tendons are overlooked at the expense of the muscles.

Lack of balance in the development of both tendons and muscles will not only limit performance but also put an athlete at risk for injury, says @houndsspeed. Share on X

It’s easy to become fixated on exclusively chasing muscular development. After all, the muscles are the most conspicuous and quickest to adapt, allowing for faster appreciable change, so they become the ultra-attractive, low-lying fruit. Tendons are stubborn—like ligaments, they have poor blood flow and are significantly slower to develop as a result. Tendons lack the same visibility that muscles do, so out of sight, out of mind can frequently apply. Just keep in mind, lack of balance in the development of both tendons and muscles will not only limit performance but also put an athlete at risk for injury. Too much, too fast can cause unnecessary and easily avoidable setbacks.

Extensive Ground Contacts: Building a Strong Foundation

Slow cooking the intensification process is always best practice as it relates to training in general but maybe even more so as it relates to building better bounce. As previously stated, tendons are slow to budge, so subtlety is most effective. This contrasts with the more overt measures required to develop the explosive, muscular-driven torque created by heavy squats, pulls, and presses, as well as singular throws and jumps. Elasticity is delicate and needs to be coaxed out gently. Extensive ground contacts then fall under the broader umbrella of posture, balance, and rhythm drills that are designed to both condition soft tissues and develop a high degree of familiarity with the ground.

Video 1. Simple rebound jumps for stiffness are the cornerstone for learning to bounce with elasticity. Do them multiple times a week to get better—far more effective than lazy sessions of skipping rope.

I always stress with my athletes in the Riverhounds Development Academy that I want them to be able to feel the ground without having to look at it. One of the most telling things I see with young athletes (and older athletes who lack formal training) is their propensity to want to look where they are going at all times with eyes fixed on the ground. This immediately lets me know they at least subconsciously do not trust their own movements when decisive movement with conviction should always be the aspiration.

In general, basic low-impact, two-footed rhythm hopping in all planes of motion is a great starting point for soft tissue prep as well as posture, balance, and rhythm. These drills can be progressed to one leg to drive proprioceptive abilities that push for higher degrees of self-awareness. These same drills can then be translated into more run-specific motor patterns such as skips, prances, gallops, and dribbling.

Pogo Hops, Progressions

My love for pogo hops has no bounds, pun intended! It is perhaps the single most effective exercise for establishing posture, balance, and rhythm. “Strong as steel head to heel” is a simple way to reinforce just how valuable the entirety of the body is to even the most rudimentary drills. Maintaining a neutral head position with eyes fixed forward and not down is also critical to the final quality regarding execution.

My love for pogo hops has no bounds, pun intended! It is perhaps the single most effective exercise for establishing posture, balance, and rhythm, says @houndsspeed. Share on X

As previously suggested, rhythmic hopping in place with good posture is the goal, but it is not necessarily as easy as it sounds on paper. Common pitfalls include piking at the hips and eyeing down, which typically contributes to the piking as result of inefficient posture. One of the first things they teach young gymnasts is that the body will follow the head, so being extra critical of head positioning becomes important for all extensive plyos. Posture and movement standards begin here, so you must coach them hard. If an athlete cannot maintain position or defaults to poor shapes under limited duress, there is no way they will magically adopt the appropriate position under the more intense conditions experienced in maximal outputs such as sprints, leaps, and heavy lifts.

Video 2. Hops should be done in all directions and at all angles. Side-to-side options are great for cutting and reducing ACL risk.

The best place to start is the athlete beginning with two feet in place and going for as long as they can maintain quality. “Quality” is subjective, so make sure you know exactly what you are looking for. For me, I specifically want to see the extensors of the ankles and knees working in a coordinated manner while maintaining the previously mentioned good posture. As a coach, it should not only look rhythmic but sound rhythmic. You should be able to look away (depending on surface and footwear interaction, of course) and still know the objective is being achieved.

This is a great opportunity for coaches to warm up as well. Acuity in a coach’s senses is rarely if ever talked about, but it needs to be trained just as much as their athletes’ bodies do. Each individual athlete will have their own nuance in movement strategy and unique cadence, so using low-level extensive work to familiarize yourself to the individuality of the athlete is helpful.

After an athlete demonstrates comfort in place, the addition of mobility in all planes of motion—sagittal, frontal, and transverse—under the auspices of maintaining fluid, rhythmic bounce are simple progressions. From this point, removing the arms in a variety of manners is a subtle way to progress and avoid stagnation. Removing the arms immediately forces an athlete to stabilize through the core in a more specific and functional manner. Ground-based anti-rotation and anti-extension work will always have a place, particularly on low-CNS days when it is best just to get an athlete off their feet. But when given the opportunity and choice, opting to incorporate bracing within extensive skill work is an effective time management strategy.

Hands on hips, hug, plane, prisoner position (hands behind head) and arms extended overhead are all great variations, and each brings their own unique problem that the athlete must solve. Typically, the higher you hold your arms and the further you spread your arms out from the center of mass, the harder it becomes to maintain stability. Here there is no right or wrong, as there are unlimited degrees of freedom and myriad progressions, so feel free to experiment. Just make sure you do not lose the plot.

If positioning becomes disruptive to the rhythm and quality of ground contact, regress or change trajectory. Adding subtle constraints would be the next step—small hurdles and low boxes or stairs are great options to challenge the athlete’s spatial awareness. Like anything, constraints have their time and place, so it’s best to fall in like as opposed to love with certain modalities and drills.

As with the arm positioning, feel free to explore and experiment, but just be mindful it does no harm to the skill and coordination of the drill. Since most constraints require hopping onto or over something, too often these exercises become a demonstration of “knee tucking” instead of ground striking, and there is a huge difference between the latter and the former.

Not All Extensive Hopping Is Created Equal – Think LATERAL!

If extensive multiplanar hopping is the gold standard for movement and tissue prep, then more lateral single-leg and rotational single-leg ground contacts are the platinum and double platinum standards, respectively. They are so important and unique that they warrant their own subsection within the intensification process. Great intensification within the individual session is so subtle that it is hard to discern where the warm-up ends, and the work truly begins.

While making sure to be mindful and not rush this process, the quicker you can progress an athlete to one leg and moving laterally and eventually rotating, the better. One-leg hopping is a great way to organically increase an athlete’s self-awareness without overly complicating the process. To fulfill rhythmic bouncing on one leg, an athlete must strike the ground correctly right under their center of mass. What an athlete might be able to get away with on two legs, they cannot hide on one. Single leg hopping then becomes a great litmus test for a lot of important athletic qualities.

What an athlete may be able to get away with on two legs, they can’t hide on one. Single leg hopping then becomes a great litmus test for a lot of important athletic qualities, says @houndsspeed. Share on X

Merging single leg benefits with greater glute medius recruitment by moving laterally amplifies the return on time management investment. Efficiency is accomplishing more by doing less and should always be the goal of the training process. Thus, one-leg lateral movement has extraordinary “bang for your buck.”

While traditional glute/hip band walks have value, they lack the velocities experienced on the field. The increased speed demands crank up stresses ever so slightly and fire up the nervous system in turn. Adding rotations and arm constraints “doubles down” on the neural recruitment, sending proprioceptive feedback through the roof.

Joint Angle-Specific Isometrics

Developing isometric strength by holding task-specific joint angles is a great way to add integrity and back the extensive ground contacts with some serious substance. These positions are highly specific to each individual due to differences in limb lengths and torque-producing tendencies, so it is important to put the athlete in positions that are both advantageous and disadvantageous for performance at times. Isometric holds in unfavorable positions are great ways to address weak points and enhance general preparedness qualities while advantageous positioning fortifies already strong kinematic positions. Both are necessary, but sport specificity is found in the more favorable angles yielding a greater performance effect, so having a strong idea of what you would like to accomplish with isometrics and working backward becomes helpful.

Holding sport-specific positions allows an athlete to feel critical intermuscular and intramuscular links before complicating with movement and velocity. Experience has shown that simultaneously intertwining extensive ground contacts and isometric holds proves to be a formidable stimulus to really “grease the groove” and prepare the athlete for the more intensive efforts to follow. As it relates to positioning, a good hold should begin on the ball of an athlete’s foot and unify the ankle, knee, and hip extensors (soleus, VMO, glute med/max).

Video 3. Simple medial hops were popularized by Ted Banks in the 1970s and can be traced to when Bud Winter was coaching high jump. Remember, speed athletes need to be good at simple plyometrics, not be competitive horizontal jumpers.

Athletes should never be caught flat-footed, and this is a great opportunity to reinforce this sentiment. The more “acute” the joint angles an athlete can adopt, the more aggressive their athletic position. Acute is typically far from comfortable, so isometrics become a great way to condition the athlete to becoming comfortable with being uncomfortable.

For dosing, I have found 10- to 15-second efforts of max intensity appear to be optimal for allowing the individual to maximize tension and maintain high quality. To progress the holds, I prefer to increase intensity as opposed to increasing duration. You can accomplish this by placing the athlete in a more challenging position, adding load, or incorporating contract relax-type principles.

The contract relax method is unique because it requires the athlete to quickly relax and recreate tension with tiny oscillations at the specific joint angle in question. I like this because it captures the best of both worlds with respect to position while encouraging subtle movement, which more closely resembles what is happening real time on the field, as athletes are not statues. Specifically, a simple superset of a loaded isometric immediately followed by an unloaded oscillatory iso is a great way to quickly fire up the nervous system!

Concentrics: Overcoming Inertia

Newton’s first law of motion states that an object at rest will remain at rest or an object in motion will remain in motion unless acted on by an external force. Being able to harness these forces means everything to an athlete. Moving explosively out of static positions, then being able to skillfully maintain and eventually stopping or redirecting is a tremendous undertaking. Therefore, I often like to remind our athletes that inertia is an athlete’s best friend and worst enemy at the same time, the ultimate catch 22!

Specifically as it relates to “bounce,” deliberately disrupting the rhythmic fluidity of extensive ground contacts at certain times is a neat trick to maintain continual progress. Eliminating the stretch phase and forcing an athlete to overcome any variety of static positions with a dynamic movement are the simplest ways to go about developing this unique quality. The classic example of this is the relationship between the squat jump (no stretch) and countermovement jump (stretch).

Eliminating the stretch phase and forcing an athlete to overcome any variety of static positions with a dynamic movement are the simplest ways to go about developing this unique quality. Share on X

The countermovement jump should be about 10-15% better than the squat jump. If the margin of difference is too narrow (< 10%), more “bounce” development is in order; conversely, if the separation is too extreme (> 20%), more strength is likely needed. For strength building and the efforts skewed more toward maximal force and rate of force development on the force-velocity curve, concentric-only deadlifts—trap bar deadlifts with different starting heights with different stances—are great for developing an athlete’s ability to overcome. However, if it is speed you seek, med ball throws are king.

Video 4. Adding an external load and larger knee angle will decrease the elastic energy, but it does teach the body to use momentum properly. Experiment with ways to jump efficiently without tendons and elastic energy.

To stay on topic with the concentric-only theme, I am specifically referencing concentric-only “scoop” throws both vertically forward and overhead backward, or any other throw from a static position. Med balls are great because they are subtle. They are heavy enough to enhance feedback but still light enough to really create some velocity.

When it comes to incorporating speed with concentrics, I gravitate more toward throws, as I see them as an opportunity to very lightly load. Additionally, in my experience, releasing an object naturally teaches extension better than not releasing an object, as athletes capitalize on continuing to accelerate as joint angles become increasingly favorable. When emphasizing development of maximal outputs like speed and power, which tend to skew toward heavy (strength speed, max force) or ultra-fast (bodyweight sprints and jumps), it’s often easy to overlook the value of more subtle means like lightly weighted throws.

Mastery over Stretch Reflex: Hit the Brakes!

The stretch reflex is one of the most powerful tools an athlete possesses, and developing powerful brakes with hard decelerations and landings from various heights and angles is an invaluable way to challenge the eccentric muscular function under more sport-specific velocities. Slow eccentrics will always have their place in training and are of great value to young athletes establishing positions as well as more advanced athletes deliberately seeking increased time under tension during periods of general prep for instance. However, outside of a handful of specific scenarios, fast eccentrics will always have greater carryover to the field.

Athletes endure lots of stress from the high velocities and abrupt braking forces, and they cannot efficiently overcome what they cannot first absorb. To deal with greater forces, bigger brakes must be built with a good strength training regime and more sport-specific decelerations and landings. If an athlete struggles to deal with these stresses, the resulting visual is continually being a step behind and, even worse, potentially one step away from soft tissue injury.

Video 5. Looking at the medial hops again, you can see how the foot contacts are long enough to help roll the body towards the inside.

Gradually preparing the athlete for higher forces in training then becomes important, and building an athlete’s braking apparatus by gradually increasing eccentric velocities becomes the fourth and final piece to accompany the low-intensity ground contacts, sport-specific isometric positioning, and concentric medicine ball throws. The human body is incredibly resilient and will adapt to the demands imposed on it (SAID principle). An athlete can then be gradually conditioned to endure greater and greater magnitudes of stress in training, so when exposed to the same scenarios within the game, they are first and foremost likely to stay healthy and, as a by-product, perform at a higher level.

“Extreme training” in a highly controlled and tastefully progressed manner best prepares an athlete for the field of play. Limiting an athlete to submaximal outputs in training and merely hoping for the best typically never goes as intended on match day.

Decelerations, Altitude Landings

My starting point for high-velocity eccentrics begins with simple two-footed “snap downs.” To execute properly, an athlete starts tall in a fully extended position and then must move with maximal intent into a flexed, athletic position as quickly as possible. In essence, they are violently jumping straight down and abruptly hitting the brakes trying to freeze as if they are a statue in their joint angle-specific athletic set. Again, this will vary from athlete to athlete because of different heights and limb lengths, so it’s not necessary to try to fit square pegs into round holes.

Athletes should move their feet during the landing process, and as they get increasingly better and better at the skill, the landings should get louder and louder. As a coach you should be able to HEAR the force. As they move their feet, it is equally important that an athlete specifically locate the balls of their feet. It does the athlete no good to land flat-footed, as this is the last thing we want happening on the field.

Braking with maximal purpose and abruptly locating balance on the balls of the feet is much trickier than it looks, so it is good to drill it continuously to reinforce development for youth athletes and quickly touch on it frequently as professionals even if during warm-ups. To progress the snap down slowly, adding heights of just a few inches at a time subtly increases the stress upon landing. Again, the strictest landing mechanics must be maintained, as eventually there will be a specific height for each individual at which the quality degrades and intended effect is lost. Quality always supersedes quantity and best to “stop a mile early than one inch late.” Next would be adding lateral falls and falls with twists and eventually restarting the entire process over on one leg in a similar progressive manner.

Drop Jumps, Depth Jumps

After thoroughly dissecting the stretch-shortening cycle, drop jumps and depth jumps tie the entire stretch reflex together again. Upon falling from a height, the athlete now must quickly reverse the landing upon ground contact and leap explosively vertically, horizontally, or eventually off a single leg. Initiating with a fall increases an athlete’s acceleration prior to takeoff and, if executed correctly, should yield higher resultant force. Simply put, athletes should be able to jump higher or bound further after the fall.

Video 6. Box to Bounce to Box is nothing more than depth jumps with the right height. Monitor the Reactive Strength Index (RSI) in order to make changes in box heights.

If an athlete lacks the requisite strength and the fall hinders performance, then you should regress the exercises to a lower height, or they should not do them until they are strong enough. The amount of time spent on the ground is directly proportional to the height of the fall so attention to detail really matters, and it is important to know the desired effect. Drop jumps are more speed-oriented and require quicker ground contacts, so box heights must be lower.

Visually they look like a pogo with limited knee bend and maximal lower limb stiffness upon reversal. However, depth jumps are slightly more force-oriented and require more hip-dominant torque so encourage slightly greater heights, and they closely resemble your typical countermovement jump. Both variations are necessary, particularly when the goal is to tease out highly specific qualities. For instance, if you look at ground contact times of sprinters, the slowest grounds contacts occur during the first propulsive steps of acceleration, and the fastest ground contacts are demonstrated during max velocity.

Despite the subtle variations in speed and execution that exist between the two exercises, they both fall under the same distinction of plyometric exercise designed to enhance the speed of the stretch-shortening cycle and are just slightly varying degrees of FAST! Simple jumping and rate of force development exercises such as weighted jumps and throws often get mischaracterized into this category. For an exercise to be a plyometric it must have a fast ground contact (approximately 0.2 seconds) and specifically address enhancing the speed of stretch, transition, and contraction.

Be mindful that these specific types of plyometrics are force- and energy-intensive, so you need to closely monitor volume and use them only sparingly. I liken drops and depth jumps to a “NOS button” for performance, and I like to use them prior to more significant competitions or showcases for our youth academy or to quickly burst through a training plateau and jump-start further progress.

Keep It Simple!

Maximizing bounce and developing any speed-related quality takes time, as it is the last adaptation to manifest itself, so extreme patience is required. Good development should never be rushed—maintain a process-oriented approach and stay the course with the lower-intensity, skill-building, extensive ground contacts and the obligatory strength work to maintain health and build power, and it will pay off in the long run. This truly should comprise most of an athlete’s training, as it keeps them prepared and healthy. After all, there’s no ability like availability!

Maximizing bounce and developing any speed-related quality takes time, as it is the last adaptation to manifest itself, so extreme patience is required, says @houndsspeed. Share on X

Tastefully injecting more intensive plyometrics in controlled doses at just the right time will raise the ceiling just enough to make sure trends can always remain favorable, but it’s all about picking and choosing your moments. Doing the simple stuff better and being able to get the simple stuff to create the desired effects is truly the name of the game in the end, and it will keep your athlete light and springy along their athletic journey.

 

I want to tell you a story. So often as coaches, we find ourselves poring over research articles, attending conferences, and getting into Twitter arguments with each other, and sometimes we need to step back and read stories. We need stories because they remind us of reality: that coaching is a human endeavor, not just a scientific one. Stories remind us that we can suffer hard times, battle with mental health issues, and overcome.

We need stories because they remind us of reality: that coaching is a human endeavor, not just a scientific one, says @litt_strength. Share on X

Strength and Conditioning and Burnout – My Story

On July 6, 2019, in a cabin in the mountains of North Carolina, I got out of bed with the full intention of taking my own life. I would say I woke up with that intention, but to be honest, I hadn’t slept in 24 hours. I don’t think I had slept well in six months.

Thankfully, by a coincidence I am more inclined to consider an act of God, that intention was thwarted by the fortunate presence of someone at the camp I worked at. In the following weeks, like someone who nearly falls off the edge of a cliff, I tried to catch a mental breath and understand how I wound up there in the first place. I went from coaching full teams, clubs, and groups on a weekly basis to a boy’s camp tucked away in the mountains, lacking the desire to live.

While admittedly, I was likely at higher risk for depression based on family history, this is not a story about depression. And it is not a redemption story either. It is a reminder of the nature of what we do as coaches and some of the issues we face.

By anyone’s thought process, I was “too young” to burn out. I was only 25, and I hadn’t been considered a “coach” for long enough. What happened?

When I finished my bachelor’s degree in 2016, I blindly entered a field in which I thought I knew what I was doing. Right off the bat, I got turned down for job after job, and I realized that I was unprepared for the true nature of strength and conditioning.

I had no experience. I had only done one internship and coached weightlifting at a few CrossFit gyms. The first door that opened was working as a personal trainer at a big box gym chain, so I jumped at the chance. I started putting in 10- to 12-hour days trying to accumulate clients and continued to throw my resume into the wind.

I got out of corporate fitness about as soon as I got into it, moving to a job as a performance coach at a youth training facility in November 2017. What I failed to realize was that I was replacing not one individual at the facility, but three, all of whom had resigned their positions in a span of three months. I quickly dove into 60- to 70-hour weeks at the facility, for much lower pay than I had been earning at the big box gym. I entered the facility at 9:00 in the morning and left some time after 7:30 in the evening.

This is not unusual for strength and conditioning coaches. In fact, it seems to be an odd bragging point, showing that they are “committed to their athletes” or that it’s a sign that they “love what they do” so much. Because of this, I thought I was paying my dues in the profession.

Additionally, it did not help my situation that I was in a long-term relationship with someone who was emotionally dependent upon me. And to add fuel to that fire, it was a long-distance relationship. As I’ve continued to meet more coaches, I’ve come to realize that the best coaches have the best life-partners on the home front. Thankfully, caring people in my life intervened and pointed out the disconnect. I ended the relationship, which led to expanding my work hours even more as a poor coping mechanism.

Continuing Down the Same Path

I then continued adding more poor coping mechanisms to my repertoire, first by picking up my endeavors on the weightlifting platform and then by starting to earn a master’s degree. To put it simply, I fell for the game of tight t-shirts, big lifts, and an endless list of initials after my name. In the space of five months, I ended a serious relationship, began competing in weightlifting meets, and started a master’s degree program. I was also still working at the sport performance facility 50-60 hours per week and training a team at a local school five days per week at 6 a.m. I was doing what I thought every coach was supposed to do in their climb up the ranks.

I was doing what I thought every coach was supposed to do in their climb up the ranks…I constantly fought boiling over like a whistling kettle, says @litt_strength. Share on X

As this was happening, I became the go-to guy in our facility for cleaning up the mess made by the frequently poor decisions of mid-level management. The more time went on, the more often those decisions led to more pointing fingers in my face than I should have accepted on behalf of my director. I constantly fought boiling over like a whistling kettle.

By the time May 2019 hit, my life felt like it was becoming a movie playing on a screen in front of me. In three consecutive weekends, I travelled to a sibling’s graduation, competed in the USA Weightlifting National Championships, and was spontaneously given tickets to three days at SummerStrong at Sorinex headquarters in South Carolina. I remember sitting there, listening to coaches tell stories of passion and hardship, and feeling completely alone in a packed room. It was a good experience, but even in a sea of people, I had never felt more anxious or lethargic as I did then.

A month later, I quit my job and disappeared into the woods to work at a boy’s camp as a cook. That was June 30, 2019.

Now, at this point, you might wonder where this story is going. Perhaps this is where I share the light-at-the-end-of-the-tunnel moment or the moral of the story? Well, I would, but the story doesn’t stop there.

As fate would have it, I found purpose in my pain that summer when the man whose presence prevented my self-harm had his own near-death experience three weeks later. That purpose gave me time to heal, reflect, and formulate a plan for how I could avoid burning out again.

Several weeks after I came back out of the woods, I got a phone call from one of my former coworkers at the training facility, asking if I’d be willing to come meet with them about something. It turned out that the former director’s poor decision-making led to his eventual firing, and in seeking changes to how things had been done, they offered me his position.

Admittedly, I laughed inside when they handed me the job description and the pay associated with it. They were asking me to do almost everything I had previously done for the former director, but at double my pay from before. On October 4, 2019, I started back at coaching in the same facility I had left only three months prior. But I had no idea what was in store…

Job Loss to Life Gain

In the early stages of 2020, the world as most of us knew it turned upside down.

In the U.S., March 13 became the day that I’ve noted as the “Oh crap moment” for what would become a very difficult time for gyms and sport performance facilities. I was in Orlando at a coaches’ summit when the pandemic started to spike, causing the U.S. government to declare a state of emergency. The talk among coaches quickly became the best process for dealing with restrictions on gatherings and how they would adapt their own facility’s policies. The final day of the conference was cancelled, and many coaches headed home to start prepping for the forecasted storm of shutdowns and social distancing.

I prepared for the worst when I got home. However, things didn’t start getting bad until late that week, when I was told that we needed to cut back some of our staff’s hours. The next day, in the meetings with those coaches, I was blindsided when our GM laid them off instead. To date, that was the hardest part of all that has happened this year. Sitting in a meeting and watching two individuals, who are like family, lose their jobs felt like a gut punch. And because the directive to our GM was given by our ownership, I knew there was nothing I could do. I don’t drink often, but admittedly I did that night.

On March 23, the North Carolina governor issued a shelter-in-place order that closed all businesses deemed “non-essential.” This included gyms and fitness centers statewide, though our isolated area in the mountains would not see a single COVID-19 case for another two weeks. The owner of our facility, both the sport performance business and the sports complex in which we were housed, was generous enough to keep us on staff as we navigated online training with our athletes and clients.

As I kept up to date with information from sources that my sister, a lab coordinator with a PhD in infectious diseases, suggested to me, I started to come to terms with the thought that this would be the final nail in my coaching coffin. That what ended my chances of coaching was something so small you’d need a microscope to see it. But the tides would eventually turn in my favor…or so I thought.

We barely pulled through the shutdowns. Despite attempts to provide as much opportunity to continue training as we could, business was slow. When the governor allowed day camps to open in Phase One, we quickly took advantage of the fact we worked with kids and labeled every training group a “day camp.” We went through all of the sanitation steps and even started to grow again. As the program director, I kept an eye on the numbers and knew we still had a long fight ahead.

At the end of August, I got the text that I had been dreading from our GM, asking if I could meet the next morning. In our meeting, I was told that we would be temporarily closing the facility. Due to the economic impacts of the shutdowns and lack of interest in our program, they could no longer afford to pay the staff. We were effectively dead in the water, and in the end, the remaining staff would be without jobs. This leads to today, as I sit at my desk typing away on the first day of not having a job to go to in the morning.

So, where do we go from here? Every story has to have a moral or a lesson to learn, right? Perhaps. I would be remiss if I didn’t say that there is something to be learned here. But what can be taken from a story where there is no hero, or where the traveler winds up in the wrong location? Well, hindsight is 2020.

A Road Map to Hope and Recovery

First, I need to acknowledge that we are not Supermen (or Wonder Women). We have weaknesses, and we can be prone to struggling with our mental health. Coaching is like being an oil wick candle, and if you don’t take the time to put more oil in the base, you eventually burn out. Take time off when you can, spend time with family, invest in hobbies, and be present outside of the weight room. Burnout also does not have to be the death sentence for your coaching career. You can get back in if you want to, or you can choose to move on.

Coaching is like being an oil wick candle, and if you don’t take the time to put more oil in the base, you eventually burn out, says @litt_strength. Share on X

Second, the light at the end of the tunnel is more blinding than you may think. I would have never thought that I would have two “last day of work” moments at the same job, but I did. And yet, within 48 hours of being told I would be laid off, I was asked to interview for a PE teacher’s position at a middle school. A few days after I learned that I wasn’t selected for that position, I got an email from a professor at a local college with an invite to guest lecture in their exercise science department. A week later, a coach I met at SummerStrong called me out of the blue, offering his advice and some opportunities to learn and develop as a coach. This light at the end of my tunnel made me realize that most of us have a light shining brightly for us, but we often shield our eyes from it.

Third, in the past year and a half, one thing has become increasingly clear to me: We should hope for the best while preparing for the worst. Burning out was, and likely will be, the lowest point in my coaching career. But even with the mental stress of the COVID-19 shutdowns and the eventual loss of my job, I am the happiest I have been since I started coaching. I attribute part of this to mentally preparing for the worst: the loss of my job and the closure of the gym. This is not to say that we should dwell on negative thoughts, but rather embrace the multiple outcomes of a situation.

If I leave you with anything, it would be to not give up hope. While we should be prepared for the worst, we should also hope for the best. Have hope that doors will open when others close, have hope that our roles will remain intact, and have hope that there will be a stronger future.

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While not blessed with the genetics to excel at sprinting, I consider track and field to have treated me very well. To offer some perspective, I am a masters athlete, having recently turned 38 years old, and I have never broken 11 seconds for 100 meters or 23 seconds for 200 meters, and at this point I assume I never will. I have spent four years coaching youth athletes in Dubai, and although I’m not currently coaching, it is something I see myself returning to in the future. However, largely due to being in the right place at the right time, I have been extremely fortunate to cross paths with some of the world’s leading sprinters, coaches, and authorities in speed development.

This is not something I have taken lightly, and I am under no illusion that my athletic capabilities warrant the input from some of the great minds that have offered me help and advice over the past 20 years. With this in mind, I have counted my blessings and endeavored to learn something from each encounter and tried to apply any lesson where appropriate as I progressed through my involvement in the sport.

In no particular order, I have decided to offer a lesson learned from some of the athletes and coaches I have interacted with. Some of the knowledge was imparted by extremely prominent names, other wisdom was derived from lesser-known sources, and there are many more names I could add to this list. Some of the lessons I have learned along the way have been fairly specific, but I have tried to reflect upon and share some of the broader concepts I have picked up on. This is due in part to the fact that I think in recent years the speed development community has become prone to consumption by minutiae, and I feel stepping back, considering the big picture, and being more holistic in the development of sprinters could be a positive thing.

1. Craig Pickering – Keep the Big Picture in Mind and Think Critically

When I first joined what was then Milton Keynes Athletics Club, an athlete four years younger than me named Craig Pickering had also recently joined. Many readers will be familiar with his name, as he has written fairly extensively for SimpliFaster and now has a role in high-performance sport with Athletics Australia.

At 14 years old, Craig won the national Under-15 100m title and went on to have a strong senior career, finishing with personal best times of 10.14 over 100 meters and 6.55 over 60 meters. He made the Olympic team in the 100 meters in 2008 and qualified for the 2014 Winter Olympics as part of the British bobsled team, before injury forced him to retire prematurely from international sport. In my opinion, Craig has an excellent understanding of the details related to training and athlete development.

Craig and I still speak regularly, and what continues to impress me is his ability to process new information, take a step back, see where it fits, and apply it, without getting drawn down rabbit holes. Prior to his role in Athletics Australia, Craig worked for a company involved in genetic research and testing, and he introduced me to the ACTN3 gene. The ACTN3 gene is also known as the “sprint gene,” and it relates to the body’s ability to produce type IIx muscle fibers, with an individual’s genotype offering clues as to how they may most appropriately be trained to develop speed and power qualities.

Whereas I went down that proverbial rabbit hole, Craig was able to reflect on this and consider that, while there may be some merit in applying some of this information to training programs, a sprinter still needed to be able to clear the blocks effectively, accelerate efficiently, and reach a high maximum velocity that they could also maintain well. Therefore, regardless of an athlete’s ACTN3 status, these qualities required regular development in training.

When I am now faced with some new information, instead of mindlessly attempting to apply it, I try to consider how Craig Pickering may interpret it. Where does this information fit? Share on X

When I am now faced with some new information, instead of mindlessly attempting to apply it, I try to consider how Craig may interpret it. Where does this information fit? Is my context suitable for the application of this information? Ultimately, this has led to a more holistic thought process with regard to my sprint training.

2. Greg Rutherford – Listen to Your Body, and Rest Is Underrated

At around the same time I met Craig, there was another athlete there who was also four years younger than me named Greg Rutherford. When I introduced this article stating that luck was involved in the paths I crossed, part of that luck was joining a club when it was on the brink of becoming a national hotbed for youth athletics talent. Greg was prodigious and won his first European medal—long jump silver—at 19 years old, before going through a golden spell in his career that saw him become Olympic, World, European, and Commonwealth Champion, as well as British record holder in the event with 8.51 meters. Additionally, he was a useful sprinter with personal best times of 10.26 over 100 meters and 6.68 over 60 meters.

One of the key influences (in my opinion, and likely in Greg’s as well) that led to Greg’s golden spell was a reduction in training volume and frequency. At the time, I recall (arrogantly) thinking Greg was lazy. There were times when we were due to train together, and Greg would cancel because he had taken his dogs for a long walk or had been installing windows in his new house, and I recall thinking “Imagine how good he could be if he devoted himself.” Upon reflection, however, I now think Greg was exceptionally in tune with his body and knew when he needed to back off in order to deliver the required intensity and effort when he did train. The reduction in training frequency and volume saw a reduction in injuries, and the rest, as they say, is history.

As I have gotten (a lot) older, I now try to consider this lesson when faced with a training session. Am I ready to deliver the appropriate intensity? If not, is it a better idea to back off and live to fight another day? My circumstances are fairly busy, and around a full-time teaching job and a 3-year-old daughter, my recovery is often not optimal, so it’s become paramount to think carefully about when I can “go hard” or whether I should “go home.”

3. Dave Lease – Train Speed Year-Round

In 2003, I moved to Cardiff to study sport and exercise science at its university, and one of the reasons I chose the institution was its sports facilities. They had an indoor, banked 200-meter track, which was unheard of in those days in the U.K. Those facilities meant that there were elite athletes who made that venue their training hub, and this enabled me to witness high-level sprinters and sprint coaches operating on a daily basis. Dave Lease was known for coaching Jason Gardener to a world indoor bronze medal over 60 meters in 1999 (behind Maurice Greene and Tim Harden) and for helping him to run 6.46 over 60 meters and 9.98 over 100 meters.

Dave was perhaps the equivalent for me of Charlie Francis for many people. In my first year at university, Dave delivered a lecture for my course, and one point that stood out was that he tried to coach Jason as though they were based in Southern California year-round as opposed to an outdoor track in Bath, England. Dave had staple year-round sessions for Jason, such as 3×30 meter fly runs with six minutes’ recovery between the repetitions, or block sessions consisting of runs over anywhere from 1-6 steps.

These kinds of workouts were almost unheard of to me, and up until that point my training had typically consisted of far higher volume. With maximal sprinting, the overall volumes an athlete can achieve within a session are quite limited, and in order to replicate maximal intensity, the recovery intervals need to be extended. Otherwise, you are no longer sprinting maximally, and the stimulus and therefore the adaptation are impacted. Jason had appeared to thrive with this type of training incorporated into his program, and the times mentioned above remained his personal bests for the rest of his career.

Having seen the way Dave Lease constructed his training programs, I have always incorporated some form of maximal intent sprinting throughout the year, and not just in season. Share on X

It stands to reason that if you want to sprint maximally in competition, at some point in practice you will also need to sprint maximally and probably reasonably regularly. Doing so helps develop the body’s physiological capabilities to reach and operate at higher velocities. Having seen the way Dave constructed his training programs, I have always incorporated some form of maximal intent sprinting throughout the year, and not just in season.

4. Linford Christie & Darren Campbell – Not All Short Sprints Need to Be Carried Out with Maximal Intent

Linford Christie is perhaps Great Britain’s most famous track and field athlete after he won the Olympic 100-meter title in 1992 and the following year posted the still-standing British record of 9.87 to win the World Championships. In the winter of 2005, Darren Campbell allowed me, with an (at that time) 100-meter personal best of 11.8 seconds, to join in with his training group. In 2004, Darren had been a member of the Olympic gold winning 4×100 meter relay team, and in 2000 he had won an Olympic silver medal over 200 meters. I was fairly starstruck and ready to soak up knowledge and apply myself in order to improve as an athlete. While Linford was not based in Cardiff, he came down from London fairly regularly to oversee training sessions and set many of the workouts.

One of the concepts that stood out to me from the training sessions was that a lot of the runs were completed as either “good pace,” which was essentially a submaximal effort that felt pretty comfortable, or build-up runs, in which the repetition distance was split into thirds, and each section got faster. Often these formats of runs were all incorporated into one workout, alongside maximal intent sprints, and the distances of the runs containing submaximal sections were as short as 30 meters.

The purpose of these runs was not initially obvious to me, but they were an integral part of the training that year. I beat my old personal best times by nearly three-tenths in the 60 meters and by four-tenths in both the 100 meters and 200 meters, so it was clear that whatever I was doing in training was having a positive impact on my performance, even if I didn’t understand why. Fairly recently, I have had conversations on social media with PJ Vazel and Jonas Tawiah-Dodoo, and both have suggested that motor learning occurs more optimally at submaximal intensities, thus providing an explanation for a potential mechanism behind this type of work.

Although the fact that something works should be enough of a reason to incorporate it, an understanding behind the methodology helps to increase buy-in of an idea, says @SprintFasterDXB. Share on X

This is a lesson I have not done a great job of applying over the years. I think there are two possible reasons for this. First, I did not understand why something could help me. Although the fact that something works should be enough of a reason to incorporate it, an understanding behind the methodology helps to increase buy-in of an idea. Secondly, I think on a basic level it is quite counterintuitive to think that slower running can help an athlete to ultimately run faster. My target has recently been, and will continue to be, to incorporate more submaximal efforts where the foci are rhythm, timing, and coordination.

5. Simon Duberley – One Technical Fix Can Bring About Other Technical Fixes

Simon Duberley is perhaps a name that will not be familiar to a lot of the readers in the U.S. In his day job, Simon works for a company that manufactures ejector seats for military aircraft, and he coaches athletes in the evenings and on weekends. Simon has produced some very successful athletes, including two under-20 athletes: Rion Pierre, who ran 21.23 indoors over 200 meters, and Deji Tobais, who ran 10.30.

While I had considered the importance of technique throughout my early involvement in sprinting, Simon took that understanding to a new level. Based upon his understanding of physics developed through his job, Simon was able to break down the running stride and consider the importance of various biomechanical indicators. I learned that altering one biomechanical aspect can have a knock-on effect and impact other positions.

For example, a dorsiflexed position allows the gastrocnemius to relax, which subsequently allows it to assist in knee flexion throughout swing leg recovery. This, in combination with the fact that the center of mass of the lower segment of the leg is shifted closer to the knee, allows the knee to angle to close more tightly throughout the leg recovery, due to the fact a short lever is a faster lever. The same concept is then applied around the hip. With tighter knee flexion, the center of mass of the leg shifts closer to the hip, which allows the thigh to swing through more rapidly and therefore get into a good position for ground preparation earlier in the stride, thus setting up a more optimal subsequent ground contact, which sets up the following stride, and the cycle continues.

Whenever I analyze sprint mechanics and notice a technical issue, I now aim to consider what happens prior in the gait, and how that may influence what I am seeing. By the same token, I consider what impact the issue may have upon technical aspects later in the cycle. Ultimately, the body is built up of many interrelated systems and effecting a change on one variable will impact many other variables. It is therefore important to understand what other factors you risk changing by making a technical alteration, and the same can be said with regard to programming.

6. Terrence Burke – Coaching Is Teaching

Terrence Burke may also not be a name familiar to some readers. Terrence coached in the Bay Area for many years at the high school and collegiate levels, across various event groups. It is perhaps due in part to his more general background that one of the cornerstones in his philosophy is teaching. I met Terrence more than 10 years ago on the old Charlie Francis forum, and since then he has always shared his wealth of knowledge on programming and the history of the sport with me.

For years, I tended to lean toward effective programming and exercise prescription being the key elements in producing successful results on the track. Terrence often spoke to me about the importance of teaching, and as I am a classroom practitioner, one of the concepts that received a great deal of focus during my professional development was understanding via which method the student is best able to access learning. Some learn simply by being told, others learn using visual props, and some learn through guided discovery.

I believe that placing athletes in scenarios where they are best able to learn makes improvements more meaningful and more likely to withstand the pressure faced in a competitive environment. Many years ago, Terrence first introduced me to the concepts of Vince Anderson, who many readers will know, and who was perhaps the first coach to regularly use “wickets.” I bring this up because I see this as a great example of placing a constraint upon an athlete that brings about a technical change.

In this case, the athlete will not want to step on the mini hurdle (wicket), so the barrier directs where the foot will contact the ground. Many times, this is used to prevent overstriding, and it encourages the foot to contact the ground closer to a point directly under the athlete’s center of mass. As would happen in a classroom, the process can progress as the learner becomes more comfortable and needs to extend. For example, some of the hurdles could be removed from the lane either at the end or, perhaps for extra challenge, in the middle of the run, and it can be assessed as to whether the athlete is maintaining the desired stride length and location of ground contact relative to their center of mass.

It’s worth noting that perhaps the concept of teaching is more relevant the earlier the athlete is in their development. Once they have reached elite status, there will likely be fewer opportunities for an athlete to take learning points away from workouts.

While coaching in Dubai, I worked with youth athletes. I challenged myself to deliver learning points to the athletes I worked with, so that they left as many sessions as possible with an improved understanding of sprinting, or a related activity, in the hope it would ultimately lead to them becoming a better athlete.

7. Michael Khmel – Volume Can Work

In late 2008, Tim Abeyie, a good friend of mine, made a coaching change to Michael Khmel, introducing me to him and his training group in Loughborough. Michael has a list of very successful athletes on his coaching resume, with Joel Fearon, Matt Shirvington, Harry Aikines-Aryeetey, James Dasaolu, Craig Pickering, and Leon Baptiste as some of the names that readers may recognize. Very kindly, Michael allowed me to join in with some workouts, as well as observe him and the group and offer input on occasion.

The first workout I did with the group was two sets of four repetitions of 200 meters with a couple of minutes of recovery between each run. First, I had to negotiate the warm-up, which felt like an entire workout in itself based upon any training I had done prior to that. I was generally pretty good at tempo-type workouts and could hold my own with athletes who were far faster sprinters (which is a lesson in itself), and by the eighth 200-meter repetition, only Leon Baptiste and I remained in the workout. The target time for the runs was 28 seconds, and I vividly remember giving it everything I had on the last effort and managing 28.5. Meanwhile, I watched Leon stride way off into the distance and clock 24 seconds. For the next two years, Leon completed these kinds of sessions and improved his 100- and 200-meter times, culminating in a victory and gold medal over 200 meters at the 2010 Commonwealth Games.

Around this period, I posted regularly on Charlie Francis’ forum, reading posts and information that training runs in the 75-95% intensity ranges should not be incorporated into a sprinter’s training, and I was very much about the concept of keeping track work as specific as possible. If a run was not near-maximal, then I could not see the benefit. However, here was Leon excelling off a program that had plenty of volume of submaximal efforts in the intensity range that I believed was too slow to be specific, yet fast enough to bring about more prolonged fatigue. To provoke more thought, Harry Aikines-Aryeetey ran his lifetime personal best time of 6.55 over 60 meters in 2010 as well.

I do not believe it is the optimal strategy for everyone…but I have seen many athletes who seem to improve when they have more training volume, says @SprintFasterDXB. Share on X

This was another lesson I did not learn right away, but as I reflected upon my experience with Michael over the following years, it became apparent that some athletes responded well to a more volume-based approach. I do not believe it is the optimal strategy for everyone, and I still could not give you a detailed explanation of the mechanisms involved, but I have seen many athletes who seem to improve when they have more training volume, and regress when approaching training with a higher-intensity, lower-volume style of programming. This example, combined with similar others, makes it impossible for me to disregard a higher volume approach as being “wrong”; I simply think you need to be aware of the type of work the athlete responds best to.

8. Tim Abeyie – Maximum Strength Can Have Diminishing Returns

In 2005, I began training with Tim Abeyie, as he was one of Linford Christie’s athletes at the time. Over the next year, Tim improved his 60-, 100-, and 200-meter times to 6.64, 10.22, and 20.66 respectively, earning himself a spot on the British team for the 200 meters at the European Championships.

Around this period, I was under the impression that the power clean was an essential lift for any sprinter, and common questions amongst the British sprint community were “What can you clean?” and “What’s your body weight?”, therefore enabling a ratio to be calculated. I felt the unspoken belief was that, as that ratio improved, your sprint time would improve.

Over the next four years, Tim continued to get stronger, and he was ultimately able to power clean 155 kilograms, more than 20 kilograms heavier than in 2006, with very little change to his body weight. That year he ran 6.74, 10.43, and 20.75. Ultimately, sprint performance is multifaceted, and many variables were at play that meant Tim did not run as fast as he had four years earlier. However, if maximum strength is such a strong predictor of sprint performance, I would not have expected to see significant strength gains coincide with a decrease in sprint performance.

Strength training is one aspect of sprint performance that I understand less than others. My feelings are that for most people, a “baseline” level of strength development is beneficial, but past a certain point, chasing numbers in the gym can be futile for some. I think that all things being equal, the stronger athlete is perhaps the faster athlete, but as I mentioned earlier, sprinting is multifaceted, and a change in one variable impacts many others. As with the volume and intensity spectrum on the track, I imagine the role weight training plays in an athlete’s training varies between individuals, and the qualities that make an athlete successful perhaps determine how important that role is.

My feelings are that for most people, a ‘baseline’ level of strength development is beneficial, but past a certain point, chasing numbers in the gym can be futile for some, says @SprintFasterDXB. Share on X

As a younger athlete, I relentlessly attempted to pursue new personal best lifts in the weight room, under the pretense it would almost guarantee better performance on the track. I would try and lift heavy if my back or my knees were not feeling great, and occasionally I got injured. More recently, I have taken a step back from the gym and view it simply as a means to an end, while keeping the primary goal, times on the track, at the forefront of my mind.

I had no access to a weight room throughout lockdown, and my body seems to be feeling better with fewer aches and pains. This allows for greater intent in track workouts and potentially a decreased injury risk, thus possibly allowing for more consistency, and therefore a better chance of improved performance.

9. Dan Pfaff – Athletes Are Individuals

Dan Pfaff likely needs no introduction to the readers of SimpliFaster, as the coach of Donovan Bailey and countless other elite sprinters and track and field athletes across various speed and power events. Greg Rutherford introduced me to Dan in late 2009, when he moved to England in the lead-up to the home Olympics.

Greg split his training between Lee Valley’s indoor 200-meter track in North London and a couple of venues around his home, some 40 miles north of London, and he regularly trained on a long hill near his home. In a conversation with Greg early on in his partnership with Dan, he explained that Dan had not seen the hill yet, but he was happy for Greg to complete his Saturday workouts on it. Initially I found this strange, as I was not sure how Dan could make this decision without seeing the surface and the gradient of the hill clearly.

I was perhaps getting lost in the minutiae again, and as I grew to understand Dan and his methods better, it struck me that perhaps he was focused on keeping his athletes happy and feeling good. A confident athlete heading into a competition period is likely going to perform well, and it was obvious that Dan did a great job of managing this with Greg, who did not want to move to London, away from his home. Dan saw how important it was that his athletes were in a positive and happy environment and facilitated that within the parameters of his programming.

Dan Pfaff saw how important it was that his athletes were in a positive and happy environment and facilitated that within the parameters of his programming, says @SprintFasterDXB. Share on X

As the athletes I coached in Dubai matured and I got to know them better, I encouraged them to take more ownership of their training. It was possible to guide this within certain parameters by providing them with options and ranges, something I had also learned from Dan. For example, I may have them set between four and six repetitions over 150 meters, so that if they’re tired, they can stop after four, or if they feel great, they can complete six. I believe this empowered the athletes, kept them happy, and as an added bonus, contributed to their learning.

Find Your Own Path and Reflect Wisely

These are some of the lessons I have learned from some of the people I have met in my track and field journey over the last 20 years or so. Some I learned through my interaction with them, and others I learned after some reflection. The whole experience has taught me that there are very few occasions when it is not possible to gain knowledge that can shape future practice.

The whole experience has taught me that there are very few occasions when it is not possible to gain knowledge that can shape future practice, says @SprintFasterDXB. Share on X

More recently, it has come to me that perhaps we are too quick to point out what we see as the flaws in the practice of others who may not agree with our philosophy, as opposed to considering aspects that may be able to help us develop as a practitioner. Finally, it taught me that context is key, and some lessons were applicable in the setting in which I observed them, but perhaps would not be appropriate in different circumstances. I think that this is the art of coaching—knowing when to apply which scientific principle.

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Since March, like many others, I have had a lot more time on my hands. As exercise shifted from the gym to my stationary bike, and activities on evenings and weekends moved from social events to time spent indoors, the amount of time I had available grew massively. The positive within all of this is that I finally had the time to do things I’d been putting off, including making my way through an ever-growing list of sports documentaries.

I enjoy the insights of these shows, as they often demonstrate how sports stars and teams operate on a daily basis and reveal the underlying foundations of their success. There are many lessons we can take from these documentaries, and in this article, I highlight some key take-homes from my recent binge watching of all things sport.

1. All or Nothing: All Blacks

There’s a great moment in Amazon’s All or Nothing documentary series on the All Blacks (New Zealand’s national rugby team): They’re losing 22-20 in a match against Argentina in the Rugby Championship, the annual Southern Hemisphere tournament that also includes Australia and South Africa. Having just scored a try, New Zealand has a chance to level the game by kicking the conversion. Lima Sopoaga, usually the second-choice fly half, steps up to take the kick. In the documentary, he talks us through that moment. As he is setting up, he catches a glimpse of the scoreboard: two points down, this is a pivotal moment in the game, and the All Blacks need him to make this kick. The pressure from his teammates, and even from his whole nation, is on him.

How we react in situations like this tells us a lot about ourselves and our character. Sopoaga, in the face of all this pressure, realizes “these are the moments you ask for.” Instead of wanting to avoid the pressure, wanting to be anywhere else but there, he actively embraces it, and the chance to perform that comes with it. This, to my mind, is one of the crucial lessons from this documentary series: Elite athletes are not scared of being in situations where failure might happen. Instead, they embrace it.

This is one of the crucial lessons from this documentary series: Elite athletes are not scared of being in situations where failure might happen. Instead, they embrace it, says @craig100m. Share on X

Although I was never of the same level as Sopoaga, I have raced in two World Championships finals, and I remember the feeling of nerves, the pressure of potential success, and thinking to myself there is nowhere else I would rather be. For elite athletes, there is often something inherently enjoyable about embracing uncomfortable situations; the challenge for coaches is to develop these traits in their athletes so they can perform without fear on their biggest stage. Overall, the All or Nothing series is a fantastic watch, giving amazing insights into how the best team in the world operates and how the best players carry themselves and prepare for their biggest moments.

Key Takeaway: Truly elite athletes embrace the pressure of performance and want to put themselves into situations where they will be tested. To support our athletes, we need to develop this attitude.

2. The Last Dance

In comparison to the All Blacks, there are many athletes and teams where the culture is less than positive, often with an under-explored or rarely discussed dark side. Within this theme, there is no better place to start than the Michael Jordan documentary The Last Dance.  

Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the last six months, it’s highly likely that you’ve at least seen clips shared on social media, but the whole series is highly enjoyable. Ostensibly about the 1997-1998 Chicago Bulls team, the docuseries covers MJ’s whole career, as well as key moments from the Chicago Bulls dynasty during their period of sustained success.

A crucial lesson for me came from the clips of the U.S. basketball team at the 1992 Olympics, commonly called the “Dream Team.” The videos show how fiercely competitive their practices were, which many players stated were the hardest games they ever played in. If coaches and players can develop training situations in which they have to work harder than in competition, they will no doubt develop the confidence and skills required for success.

A second lesson comes from how Phil Jackson, coach of the Bulls during this period, deals with Dennis Rodman—who we might charitably describe as a free spirit. In the series, Rodman is shown going on a week-long party tour to Vegas, missing some important training sessions. Rather than punish Rodman once he returns, Jackson instead just carries on like nothing has happened. Jackson—whose book Eleven Rings is also hugely enjoyable—appears to be of the opinion that Rodman needs to party and needs to rebel, and that trying to constrain him to “normal” professional behavior would be counterproductive.

In my own experiences, I know of one multiple Olympic medal-winning coach who, dealing with an athlete of a similar disposition, developed one key session for the week. His goal was to get the athlete to do that session—anything else was a bonus. That athlete now has their own Olympic gold medal, demonstrating that sometimes it is better to work with your athletes (and their perceived weaknesses) than fight with them for perfection.

Sometimes it is better to work with your athletes (and their perceived weaknesses) than fight with them for perfection, says @craig100m. Share on X

There is, however, a dark side to The Last Dance. Jordan is clearly obsessed with winning and exhibits some highly toxic behaviors. The question—which is unanswered in the documentary—is how much coaches and athletes should tolerate this as the price of success. On more than one occasion MJ demonstrates bullying behaviors—including actual physical assault—and this appears to be somewhat accepted by his team as the cost of success. Certainly, MJ thinks so, reflecting as such during one tearful soliloquy. Given the recent sporting abuse scandals that have been widely reported, this should be uncomfortable watching for everyone, and it should drive more conversations around what is the acceptable price of success and what behaviors we will and won’t tolerate on this journey.

Key Takeaways:

1. There is an important need to practice like you compete. As a result, coaches should seek to develop realistic training sessions to better support their athletes in being able to perform when it matters.
2. Success often comes at a price. As a society, we need to have better conversations about what that price is and whether it is acceptable to us. Building on this, we need to be clear on what behaviors we will and will not tolerate in the pursuit of winning, and continually reinforce the desired behaviors.

The Edge

The British documentary The Edge details England cricket’s transformational journey from no-hopers in 2009 to the number one ranked side in the world in 2013. Although not necessarily its main theme, the film explores the darker (or at least more private) side of sport. We see Jonathan Trott openly discussing his mental health and anxiety battles, which demonstrates how athletes are people too and subject to the same battles that we all go through. Other players detail the highs and lows of their sporting journey, which further adds to our understanding that all is not always rosy in elite sport.

Like The Last Dance, The Edge asks the question of what is the acceptable price of success—which is demonstrated by Coach Andy Flowers’ relentless drive for it and his own reflection that he has often got the balance wrong. Finally, we see how, once the team reaches its goal of being number one in the world, it is somewhat of an anti-climax. This topic is similar to that of the HBO Sports documentary The Weight of Gold, which covers the mental health of athletes who have reached the top and find it to be much less fulfilling—and substantially more empty—than they thought it would be.

All involved in sport should, as highlighted in this documentary, be increasingly aware of the mental health challenges posed by elite sport, says @craig100m. Share on X

I went through similar, but far less extreme, experiences during my career. After winning a bronze medal at the World Under-18 Championships in 2003, I remember struggling for motivation at competitions I viewed as not at the same level, and I perhaps didn’t celebrate my selection for the 2008 Olympics—the pinnacle of my career—as much as I should have at the time. I think it’s an important reminder for us all that the journey is often more enjoyable than the destination. If we build up the goal result and put it on a pedestal, thinking that everything will be amazing afterward, we will inevitably be disappointed.

Key Takeaway: We often expect that success leads to happiness, but in many cases the journey is more fulfilling than the destination. All involved in sport should, as highlighted in this documentary, be increasingly aware of the mental health challenges posed by elite sport—and winners are far from immune from this.

4. Building Jerusalem

Switching sports, but staying with England, I finally got around to watching Building Jerusalem, which, like The Edge, is a story of how an England team rose from underperformers to world champions. In this case, it is the England rugby team; knocked out of their home World Cup in 1999 at the quarter-final stage, they turned themselves around to become World Cup winners in 2003. The documentary has multiple key themes—one of the main ones is how Clive Woodward, the England coach, led this revolution through innovative thinking and approaches. Matt Dawson, the England scrum half, even comments that if you were a half-decent salesperson with a sports science product, Woodward would likely have bought your services—he genuinely wanted to leave no stone unturned.

One of Woodward’s innovations was hiring a vision coach, Dr. Sherylle Calder, who is still involved with the team today. Calder worked on improving the peripheral vision and spatial awareness of the players, but also had a secondary, unplanned, important role—she taught the England forwards Afrikaans, allowing them to understand the lineout calls of South Africa, England’s opponents in a crucial group game, and subsequently nullify their threat. Woodward is perhaps one of the key drivers of what eventually became known as marginal gains, a now somewhat maligned approach to leaving no stone unturned in the pursuit of success.

Building Jerusalem also has important lessons for game day performance. Although strong favorites to win the World Cup, in a group game following their win against South Africa, England was struggling against relative minnow Samoa: At half time, Samoa led 16-13. A key part of this story was England’s ability to grind out results. They might not be playing well, but eventually they proved too much for Samoa, running out 35-22 victors. They then struggled against Wales in the quarter-final—again trailing at half time before turning it around.

While we might expect and desire to win in dominant fashion, sometimes it’s important to ‘win ugly’ and just drag yourselves over the line, says @craig100m. Share on X

This is an important lesson to us all: While we might expect and desire to win in dominant fashion, sometimes it’s important to “win ugly” and just drag yourselves over the line. This belief in the process was illustrated in the final, which went to extra time. The message to the England team at this point was just to do what they usually do—nothing special—and, if they did that, they would be successful. This success came with 26 seconds left, as Jonny Wilkinson kicked the winning drop goal.

Jonny Wilkinson brings us back to the key themes discussed in other documentaries. At this stage of his career, Wilkinson was an obsessive: He couldn’t leave training without kicking six consecutive penalties successfully and would typically take 500-600 practice kicks per week. This obsession propelled Wilkinson and England to World Cup glory, but it came at a price. There’s an amazing moment in Building Jerusalem where Wilkinson describes his emotions in the seconds before the end of the game. He knows that England has possession, and that they’re going to just kick it out to secure victory, but he doesn’t want the game to stop. In those few seconds, Wilkinson knows that they will win the World Cup, but that they’re still on the journey—the process by which he is obsessed—and have yet to arrive at that destination. He knows the referee’s whistle will bring an end to this journey, but he doesn’t want it to end.

The next 18 months were an injury hell for Wilkinson, as his obsession drove overtraining: He played just 940 minutes of rugby during this period. Wilkinson eventually found happiness, embracing Buddhist principles and ending his career with a hugely successful five-year period playing for Toulon in France. In the last match of his career, in typical Wilkinson fashion, he scored 84% of his team’s points, leading them to victory in the Top 14 Final. Nevertheless, this happy ending should not obscure the dangers of obsession with sport, as Wilkinson’s career is a powerful reminder that we should develop the whole person, not just the athlete.

Key Takeaways:

1. Once the basics are taken care of, an innovative approach to athlete development and elite sport can support success. Even if it has no direct effect, if the athletes believe that they are the best prepared, that can give them masses of confidence.
2. Elite athletes are at risk of developing perfectionist behaviors; while this certainly helps them achieve success, it tends to come at a cost. A common symptom of this is excessive training, which may be an important warning sign to look out for.

5. From The Inside Out

Despite having lived in Australia for five years, I’ve yet to truly get into Australian Rules Football. However, in my constant search for interesting sports documentaries, I came across From The Inside Out, an hour-long film that covers Collingwood, an AFL team based in Melbourne, and their 2018 season.

The documentary details a club in transition; in the 2017 season, Collingwood—or the Pies, as they are commonly known—finished 13th in the table, well outside of the playoffs. There were calls for their charismatic young coach Nathan Buckley to be fired. Instead, the club offered him a two-year contract, and in the 2018 season detailed in this documentary, they came in third in the league and made the Grand Final, losing by five points. The documentary, as with others discussed here, has a mental health angle; in this instance, Adam Trealor, a key Pies player, discusses his battles with anxiety. What is really pleasing to see is that Collingwood rallies round him; their Chief of Culture and sports psychologists support Trealor in overcoming his issues, and he plays in their Grand Final loss.

From The Inside Out also deals with a culture change—Buckley is aware that the club has a long reputation for being aggressive, causing them to be disliked. He tries to instill a more welcoming culture, using strong links to the local community and fans to develop the player’s collective story. There are many examples of this in the documentary, including bringing fans with illnesses to speak to the players about what the club means to them. You can see the effect this has on the players—some of them are moved to tears—and it results in an overall change in culture, with the well-being and development of players as good people being paramount. At the end of the documentary, Buckley reads a letter from a lifelong Collingwood hater, congratulating him on the great work he has been doing—an example to Buckley that his process is having a positive effect.

Key Takeaway: Culture change can be difficult and “fluffy”; an important step appears to be defining and then operationalizing the desired behaviors (i.e., what does “respect” look like?), and then promoting these behaviors through a variety of means—in the case of Collingwood, often though storytelling.

Hungry for More?

Similar to From The Inside Out, and sticking with the theme of culture change, Amazon’s The Test tells the story of the Australian cricket team, and their rehabilitation from the 2018 ball-tampering scandal. New coach Justin Langer, a former international cricketer for Australia, is keen to change the perception of the squad, and it’s an interesting watch as to how he goes about doing this—but there is a small hint of propaganda throughout!

Andy Murray: Resurfacing is a very enjoyable documentary that details the rehabilitation process for athletes, warts and all. In this case, it covers Murray’s battles with hip pain, his attempts to overcome and deal with it, failed treatments, and potentially a comeback. It illustrates the psychological toll injuries have on athletes; many times, we see Murray getting frustrated or emotional.

This documentary is a great example of the retirement process for many athletes, and the doubt it causes—making it an important watch for those involved in sport, says @craig100m. Share on X

Throughout, there is a storyline that this might be the end of his career; at one point, we see Murray in his hotel room, considering whether this will be his last competition. He can’t decide: He clearly loves the sport, but his body has had enough, and it’s sapping his enjoyment. Murray calls his wife, who says “If you’re looking for someone to give you permission to retire, this is it.” Murray makes up his mind, but then changes it, before changing it back. It’s a great example of the retirement process for many athletes, and the doubt it causes—making it an important watch for those involved in sport.

Finally, The Australian Dream is an eye-opening account of AFL player Adam Goodes and his battles against racism in sport. It’s really uncomfortable to watch, acting as a strong reminder how sport often acts to intensify social issues, and how, while we think we as a society are doing well, we can always do better.

Let me ask you a question: Have you ever observed or coached alongside someone who just seemed to have a presence? This coach controls the flow of the session in a deliberate way and always seems to have a captive audience. They consistently achieve their desired outcomes, whether that is promoting a high degree of learning, producing incredibly detailed and individualized programming, or delivering a massive amount of energy and “buzz,” no matter the situation.

This experience can be quite hard to describe, but you definitely know when you see it and can almost feel it in the room. Watching good coaches operate—basically the complete opposite of what you see on Last Chance U—you get this feeling of unspoken energy in the room I like to call “session climate.” I use that phrase to describe the intangible factors that go into a good session delivered well.

Watching good coaches operate, you get a feeling of unspoken energy in the room that I like to call ‘session climate’—the intangible factors that go into a good session delivered well. Share on X

There is an old adage that a bad program delivered well will work better than a good program delivered poorly. Now, ideally you shouldn’t ever need to make that choice, but it shows that sometimes what we deliver isn’t as important as how we deliver it and why. Having good coaching processes allows you to achieve a positive session climate consistently.

Bringing the Art of Coaching to Life

This is an area that you don’t really get taught much about at university: You learn the underpinning physiology behind programming decision-making and perhaps why you might use certain training prescriptions. But the major roadblock for many young coaches is finding a way to make the program come to life off of Excel.

Why is this?

Well, unfortunately, there isn’t really any replacement for time spent in the trenches coaching! This is why it is so key for young S&C coaches to spend time coaching, whether that’s with a pro sports team, in a college setup, or just training the general population. You have to go out and coach someone…anyone! This is also why there’s a great benefit to exposing young coaches to multiple environments and contexts—for example, if I spend all my time working with a small group of introverted golfers, I’m going to need to adapt my coaching very quickly if I’m then thrown to the wolves with a group of 30 extroverted rugby players!

To develop this “coaching art,” there aren’t many alternatives outside of spending large amounts of time coaching, often developing your craft through trial and error. This is where working outside of pro sport can be so valuable. It might not be as glamorous, but it is a fantastic opportunity to improve your coaching skills. I worked for a few years at a university and coached so much with such varying groups that I couldn’t help but improve my coaching craft!

One helpful resource is a growing body of literature looking at the “science of the art,” with outstanding work from the likes of Nick Winkelman with his book The Language of Coaching and from Brett Bartholomew and his concept of “conscious coaching.” But as coaches, our default setting when furthering our own learning tends to be to look deeper at set and rep schemes, or to look at why we should or shouldn’t do certain exercises. We often know the what very well, but we tend to let the how develop by accident.

Proper Planning: Checklists & Notes

A way of combatting this problem is to take a personal look at our own coaching processes. It sounds simple, but actually sitting down and working out your own process for coaching is worth investing time in. If we have a good coaching process, we can foster a session climate that is appropriate for the session and the athletes we work with, which will lead to us being much more successful. From there we can develop a coaching checklist that ensures we get the most out of every session, every time.

It sounds a bit silly and certainly isn’t the most interesting of topics, but as some of the great work from Atul Gawande shows, implementing checklists can have dramatic effects^1. (See this short clip from his TED Talk—a coaching checklist may not save lives like in this example, but it will certainly save you from delivering a poor session!)

Not only can writing checklists help better prepare you for the session, but it provides a framework for you to more effectively self-evaluate post-session as well, reinforcing the loop of constant refinement of your own coaching process. These might include things you do naturally, such as where you stand in the gym to control the group, or in warm-ups whether athletes go in single file, in small groups, or all at once. Putting some thought into these things helps to sharpen the sword of your own coaching and also allows you to do the “pre-mortem,” as Daniel Kahnman explains in his book Thinking Fast & Slow.

Checklists help better prepare you for the session and provide a framework for you to more effectively self-evaluate post-session, reinforcing the constant refinement of your own coaching process. Share on X

Forecasting to spot the car crash before it happens allows you to be aware of any potential threats to your session climate and put a plan in place to combat them. For example:

• If I’m coaching one player who really struggles with a lift in a large group of 40 athletes, how much one-to-one attention should I give him if it steals from the rest of the group? Do I have a plan for how I deal with this athlete?
• If I have all my athletes do an exercise, but there are only two pieces of equipment for them to do it on, how do I combat the choke point to the session this might cause?
• If I coach a client one-on-one among a large group of the general population, how do I ensure I still achieve the best session flow?

From making mistakes, you can’t help but find better answers to these questions, which allows you to achieve better session climate, because you are better prepared.

One of the things that I have found helps me personally with my own coaching is to have something to refer to while I am on the gym floor or on the field. I would say the most important tool I have in my coaching toolbox is the Post-it Note…yes, the Post-it Note! I now use small Post-it Notes in pretty much every single session that I deliver.

I am not claiming this will work for everyone, but for me at least, the notes help bring clarity in my own mind of what I’m going to do, what I’m going to say, and key themes (or issues I need to look out for). Just the simple process of writing things down—even if you don’t refer to the notes in session—is said to better commit things to memory², so at the very least it can help you be more prepared. Sometimes it may be a plan with themes and cues I want to get across; other times I might write an outline of the gym program so I know what the session flow will look like. (An unintended consequence is that I now have the ability to write so small that if I ever went to prison, I’d certainly be the guy tasked with smuggling notes between inmates!)

A formalized coaching checklist doesn’t necessarily have to be written down, but it is good to think about chronologically, so you can visualize the flow of the session. Prior to the session, consider:

• Is the gym well laid out?
• Do my drills on the field flow from one to the next without choke points?
• Do I need a session briefing at the start?
• What themes should I bring up?
• Will I be doing any education?
• How am I progressing the session from the one before?
• Will the athletes know whether they have been successful in the session? How?
• How am I “packaging” the session?

All of these things help the athletes buy in more to what you’re delivering and grow the session climate.

A Bit of Branding

Packaging sessions can be a great way to liven up a generic session, helping to drive training intent. For example, a standard hypertrophy session could be named “Flex Friday,” or you could have certain athletes enroll in “Speed School.” These packaged sessions add an extra bit of window dressing, tend to be more fun, and give the players much greater ownership of the session.

At times, the athletes will see themselves as custodians of that particular group. For example, to join Speed School, the athletes might first need to earn the right to be there (as judged by the players already “enrolled”), performing a particular rite of passage before being permitted to join the group. One example of this from my coaching was a hypertrophy group that required a Great British Bake Off in order to join, where an athlete had to bake a protein-based snack for the rest of the group (with the players of course judging whether the baked goods were good enough to merit entry!). Another example was a speed session with Premier League-style relegation and promotion to the top group, complete with Champions League music playing before the final sled race!

Competition = Intent

One of the easiest ways to affect session climate is by including elements of competition in a smart and simple session design. This is a surefire way to ensure a positive session climate and drive training intent. Adding external rewards such as prizes can work well—for instance, in a rugby environment, I’ve found the players are more motivated to stitch their teammates up than they are to win prizes! So physical punishments or embarrassment for not winning often helps drive banter in the group, as the players are motivated to see their mate have to do something embarrassing or face some hardship.

Structuring sessions to include game elements or challenges is also a great way to put a bit of special sauce on a session that can otherwise be quite generic, says @peteburridge. Share on X

Structuring sessions to include game elements or challenges is also a great way to put a bit of special sauce on a session that can otherwise be quite generic. For example, when upper body sessions get stale and 5 x 5 becomes too monotonous, a challenge between players to do as many reps as possible in an allotted period of time can be a great change-up.

“Energy” is a term that gets thrown around a lot by coaches, but it is a real thing and the “vibe” of a session can either help give energy to a group or take it away. Energy is a hard thing to put a finger on at times, but it can be controlled by the coach. Depending on your own coaching style, you may be the lead energy guy/gal (think of your college football strength coach in a SMedium polo!), or alternately, you may help certain individual athletes express their own personality to give energy to a group.

This is where allowing your extroverted players to express their personalities can be really useful to provide energy to their teammates. At times, this can be even more powerful than a coach having to always be the driver of energy in the session. The coach can then settle into the role of a conductor, letting the orchestra make the music while you subtly influence the behaviors you want from them in the background.

Being solely reliant on yourself or a few athletes to bring the energy every day is a big ask, so you can make your job easier by letting the environment or task help drive the session climate if the energy is wanting. In a warm-up to get athletes going, playing a couple of fun games that still lead to physical outcomes can be a very effective tool to drive energy and foster a positive session climate.

Videos 1 & 2. Who says warm-ups have to be boring?! You can still achieve maximal accelerations or prepare the players to handle deceleration…it just so happens they are playing naughts & crosses (tic-tac-toe) or running after a rubber chicken! Again, your imagination is the only limiter here.

Gamification of sessions can be a good way of taking the session climate to even better levels. For example, turning a Wattbike session into “Le Tour de Leicester” or having WWE-like Tag-Team Elimination Chamber style max rep challenges with the right group, at the right time, can have a great impact.

This isn’t limited to the gym either; in fact, this strategy works more fluidly on the field in agility and speed games with rules and constraints such as “game-breaker moments” and “power-ups.” This gamification may start out quite abstract in basic tag-based evasion games, but you can actually use it in quite sport-specific drills in a more game speed setting.

Video 3. Gamification works best on-field when tied to the sport. In this game the physical outcome was a max effort acceleration over a large distance, whereas the rugby outcome was kick chase intent and high ball catch skills. In an attempt to tie the two together, the players are in teams that have to score points by cleanly catching the ball in the zone. The further the zone (and so harder the kick and bigger the distance to accelerate over), the more points for your team.

Using exercises that are measurable and then displaying that feedback through leaderboards is a great way to generate competition. This is where exercise selection can be dictated by the ability to drive energy and competition within a group. For example, broad jumps feature significantly in my programs because we have measurement lines heat transferred into our floor—it’s quick and easy to use competition to see who has jumped the furthest because it’s there for all to see.

Another easy way to get athletes to compete is through the use of VBT: Having an iPad feeding back scores is an effective method of creating competition. To optimally improve power, we know that maximal intent is needed no matter the load on the bar³, so finding ways to dictate the environment to get that behavior is key.

A Dose of Our Own Medicine

Once you’ve implemented your ideas and understood your own process, the next thing you want to do is work on refining that process and look for ways to improve it further. At times, this can be tough to do if it’s just you in the gym with your athletes, because you don’t really have anyone but yourself to evaluate how the session went. This can then quite easily lead to you falling into the trap of doing what you’ve always done. But putting some thought post-session to how it went can be key to making improvements.

Sometimes coaching with a GoPro on or at the very least setting up a camera in the corner of a gym can help you understand elements of your own coaching process, says @peteburridge. Share on X

An even better method is to actually record your sessions: We often challenge our players to analyze their performances and watch film of their training and games, but when was the last time you sat down and analyzed your own coaching sessions? It can be quite an awkward proposition to do self-analysis, but sometimes coaching with a GoPro on or at the very least setting up a camera in the corner of a gym can help you understand elements of your own coaching process:

• Have you stood in the most effective position to coach?
• Do you control the group?
• What is your body language toward the players?
• Are there blind spots with athletes’ technique that you miss or don’t see?
• Have you verbalized your coaching in a way that’s easy to understand?
• Do you say enough to impact a player’s movement quality?
• Are you saying too much? (This is where having access to a mic or the Voice Memos app on an iPhone can be very enlightening.)

I’ve found, especially with my on-field coaching, that hearing what I’ve said allows me to be more concise and have clarity with my words the next time I use them. This ultimately improves my ability to coach and allows me to get better at my craft in the same way that I challenge my players to do.

Don’t get me wrong, at times you can get some funny looks if you do coach with a GoPro on or with glasses with a camera attached. But when you get over the awkwardness, the footage you get is fantastic for analyzing your own coaching. Matching this with more formal self-evaluation can be a powerful method to judge your own coaching or model another coach’s style.

I have adapted the SPICE system used in teaching and public speaking⁴ to help me better evaluate my own coaching, and from time to time to improve my own coaching process.

Being equipped with higher levels of self-awareness around your own coaching process will allow you to more consistently achieve a positive session climate. This helps what you deliver become a more emotive experience for your athletes and provides the backdrop for so many more positive outcomes. With higher levels of engagement, our athletes buy in and are better primed for more education on what to do and how to do it. This allows us to further influence our athletes’ behaviors (whether in the gym or on/off the field). It is also likely that our athletes will develop greater autonomy over their own development and the training process.

Being equipped with higher levels of self-awareness around your own coaching process will allow you to more consistently achieve a positive session climate, says @peteburridge. Share on X

The methods we use to achieve this, whether through competition, fun, greater challenge, or more stimulation doesn’t really matter, as long as it ultimately leads to us being able to better connect to our athletes. If better session climates allow us to do all of that, then we set ourselves up with the best possible platform for our players to succeed…no matter what we decide to program!

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. Haynes, A. B., Weiser, T. G., Lipsitz, S. R., et al. “A surgical safety checklist to reduce morbidity and mortality in a global population.” The New England Journal of Medicine. 2009;360:491-499.

2. Mueller, P. A. and Oppenheimer, D. M. “The pen is mightier than the keyboard: Advantages of longhand over laptop note taking.” Psychological Science. 2014;25(6):1159-1168.

3. Tillin, N. and Folland, J. “Maximal and explosive strength training elicit distinct neuromuscular adaptations, specific to the training stimulus.” European Journal of Applied Physiology. 2014;114(2):365-374. doi:10.1007/s00421-013-2781-x.

4. Jahangiri, L. and Mucciolo, T. A Guide to Better Teaching: Skills, Advice, and Evaluation for College and University Professors. Rowman & Littlefield Publishers. 2017.

Mehh! Mehh! Mehh!

The alarm creates a cascade of cortisol, jolting me awake from a much-needed rest.

I check my phone—there’s no way it can be 4:30 already—but sure enough, it is.

To add insult to injury, it is pitch black outside. Not to mention, cold enough to turn my spit to string cheese as I hock when clearing my throat.

A warm shower would be nice. But it would soothe me, not “start” me. I pass on the hot water and instead, take a 10-minute walk in sub-zero temperatures to wake the hell up. Why? Because I’m a strength coach and gym owner. People like us do things like this, or so I’ve been brainwashed to believe.

Lucky me. It’s also the first of the month, meaning the gym gets paid today. Everyone’s credit cards and ACH get run. As I hear the crunching sound my shoes make on the snowy path, it reminds me of the sieve I’ve created for my bank account. The gym gets paid. The rent gets paid. The staff gets paid. And only then do I get paid, if you want to call it that. What’s left for me after taxes is pennies compared to the amount of work I put in.

“What the hell am I doing?” I mutter to myself. “I work so hard. Everyone is prospering except me. And I’m the damn owner!”

Sound familiar? This is the life of today’s strength coach and gym owner. Change is needed. And soon. Sooner than the day before yesterday.

While coaching athletes and seeing growth in your business is invigorating, it may come at a cost. Yes, you get fulfillment out of building relationships with each youngster who walks through your door. Yes, it is a damn good feeling to see your membership and monthly ACH increase each month. But while coaching and building a business, you are burning the candle at both ends, whether you know it or not.

If the grind this industry wears as a badge of honor is starting to wear on you, this article is for you. And if the work feels unrelenting, ruining any semblance of balance in your life, this article is for you. But if nothing changes, then nothing changes. More of the same leads to more of the same. And as a result, you may stay on the proverbial hamster wheel, or worse—want to leave the industry altogether. Call me crazy, but I believe you deserve to make not just a decent living, but a great one. This is exactly why I felt compelled to write this piece, so you can give up the grind.

Unfortunately, those who have paved the way for you now are blocking it. I may take some flak for this, but I know it is for your good and the betterment of the industry. The “old guard” preaches a do the work attitude day and night, saying things like:

• “If you’re waking up at 6:30 a.m., then you’re already too late.”
• “You need to decide if you’re going to be a business owner.” (Which means, “Your hobbies, workouts, and other things that fill you up need to be set aside.”)
• “If you’re going to try and be an expert then at least be in the game for five years first.”

If you would rather keep staring at your laptop screen until three or four in the morning because that’s what you were told to do in order to be successful, don’t let me stop you. However, if you would rather get in the driver’s seat of your life instead of daydreaming in the passenger seat, then follow and trust.

Imagine achieving financial freedom instead of living paycheck to paycheck. Imagine actually enjoying your mornings again rather than getting in the car half-asleep as you drive to the gym.

Now, don’t get me wrong. I’m all for hard work—trust me. But I’m also a huge advocate for doing nothing, and a lot of it. The irony in the latter is that when I find myself doing nothing—sprinting, reading, meditating, etc.—these are the times when some of my best ideas spawn. Then I can implement those new revelations into my deep work sessions, getting way more done in far less time.

Now, don’t get me wrong. I’m all for hard work—trust me. But I’m also a huge advocate for doing nothing, and a lot of it, says @huntercharneski. Share on X

Having owned a small private training facility for several years in West Michigan (excuse me, having a small private training facility owning me for several years), I’ve been where you’re at. But I also got out. My life is simpler now. I work way less and make more money than ever. Even when our small space served more than 100 athletes. But more importantly, I am helping others get off the hamster wheel and have some freedom, for Pete’s sake.

I live a bicoastal life now between Arizona and Michigan. I write every day. Some of that writing helps coaches and gym owners clarify their message, because most get embarrassed seeing their gym half-empty. Which results in working more hours and getting paid in frustration. And yes, I still coach. But I have built coaching around my life. Far too many do just the opposite. I can say, for the first time in my life, I am actually happy. And it didn’t take as long as you might think. Let’s break down how you give up the grind. 

The “Go-To” Coach

Becoming a “go-to” coach for something is relatively easy.

I used to think becoming a “go-to” coach—much less, being seen as one—would take more than half my life to achieve. Not to mention, the knowledge one must have would be astronomical. But here’s something you won’t find in any university, textbook, or business class: in order to be seen as the authority on a subject matter, all you need to be is one chapter ahead of those you’re educating.

Toward the end of 2017, the subject matter I wanted to plant my flag on was speed. Sprinting and all things helping athletes “get there first” was a hot topic at the time. Having owned a facility in which we prided ourselves on the one biomotor ability everyone wanted more of, I had credibility at the micro-level. But I knew my “reach,” so to speak, would have to be at the macro. 

Near the end of October, and with the new year fast approaching, I decided to host the first-ever #SPRINTORDIE Six-Week Speed Masterclass. (Some of you reading may have been part of it.) I would administer it in a private Facebook group. In the weeks leading up to the class, I posted an “Ask Me Anything!” story on Instagram. This was important for two reasons: anyone who asked a question was granted free access to the class, and the most frequently asked questions gave me insight into what people were struggling with. And thus, those questions became the modules for each of the six weeks (week one: drills; week two: footwear considerations; week three: hamstring rehabilitation; etc.)

The class exploded. Having more than 50 coaches and practitioners in the group eager to learn from me was a huge boost in confidence—something that is incredibly important if you plan to be an expert. To buy myself more time for engagement with the class’s attendees, I pre-recorded all the modules via Microsoft PowerPoint with a Camtasia add-in. This feature allowed me to present each slide and lesson without losing the human aspect, as Camtasia provides a small space for the consumer to see your face on their screen.

In order to increase engagement in the class, I assigned homework at the end of each module. These assignments included their biggest takeaway, which was important. When you ask someone what their biggest takeaway was, or what was most helpful to them, they’re going to provide positive feedback. It’s an honest admission that you provided value to them. They, and you, start to slowly see you as an expert. I also asked people to share videos of their drills, runs, and sprints. They wouldn’t be vulnerable and post a video of themselves if they didn’t trust you, right?

Gather Social Proof

Serve first, sell later.

If you’ve read Influence by Robert Cialdini, then you know how strong the human condition for reciprocity is. Remember, I did not charge any of the attendees one red cent for the class. I was simply building trust, relationships, and most importantly, competence. At the end of the six-week class, all I asked the attendees was:

• “If you think what you got out of this class is worth more than $500, will you please provide a brief video testimonial of your experience?”
• “How could I make it better?”

Since these coaches had free admission, of course they were going to provide testimonials and suggestions for future classes. And they did.

Start a Side Hustle

Repackage your free offering and sell it.

Repackage your free offering and sell it, says @huntercharneski. Share on X

With the first class ending mid-February, I decided I would host another just weeks later in early March. I re-recorded the modules based on the suggestions the attendees made in order to deliver a better experience. And then with the dozen or so video testimonials I had gathered, and not an ounce of marketing experience, I started posting them.

Cialdini also touches on the power of social proof. When your prospective clients see others having success with your product or service (add a smiling face too for extra credit), they will be more likely to buy. And that’s all I did. I posted a video testimonial on Instagram and Facebook every Monday, with a direct call-to-action, and when next Monday came around, I would post a different video testimonial.

Wash. Rinse. Repeat.

As people started signing up, I added them to the Facebook group one by one. Once added, in order to instill more excitement, I asked them to tell the group what they were most excited about heading into this class. My goal for the first paid master class was 10 individuals. Nine signed up. The price tag? $597 each. More than $5,300 for six weeks. Not bad. I’d say the first class (which was free, remember) was well worth it. I would go on to host several more master classes before moving to the next chapter of my life. But let’s discuss what you’ll do next.

Create a Product

You’re feeling good about the money you’re earning from this new side hustle of yours. But in order to truly give up the grind, you have to put your “income on autopilot,” a la Tim Ferriss. The process is simple, but that doesn’t mean it’s easy.

The good news is you’ve got all the lecture material from PowerPoint and Camtasia. In other words, you’ve got the “why” on your subject matter. The bad news is you’re missing the “how” with your product. People will buy the “why,” but they’ll form a line around the block for the “how.”

Either with your phone and a tripod, you will need to film the “how.” In other words, you need to have video evidence capturing that you not only know what to say, but how to coach your skillset as well. Don’t hold back on this part. Coaches love adding exercises to their database and will search high and low for cues they’ve never heard before. This will be the backbone of your product. Make sure it’s got plenty of meat on it.

They know the why. You’ve taught them the how. Now your buyers need a filter. Basically what this means is they want you to show them how to take what you’ve given them and apply it to their specific situation. They want to create their system, not duplicate yours. They want autonomy. Provide them with anecdotal evidence you’ve found in certain situations, examples including (but not limited to):

• How to apply this with youth athletes
• How to apply this with time constraints
• How to apply this with a small gym space
• How to apply this with bad weather
• Team setting considerations
• Private sector considerations

After you’ve created the product, the process goes quickly. Find someone who’s good with ClickFunnels or Infusionsoft to “house” your product, and then craft a lead-generating PDF to grow your email list. (I’m a fan of ConvertKit, personally.) This will allow you access to your potential customer’s inbox, so you can build that relationship and move them closer to the point of purchase when you’re ready to launch your new product.

Now, before my inbox overflows with contrarians, let’s discuss this strategy.

1. This strategy is meant to expedite, not overnight, your grind.

The problem with only being one chapter ahead of those you’re educating is you could be reading the wrong book. In other words, there are a lot of “experts” on social media who are anything but. They’ve been reading the wrong books for way too long. Hell, they’ve been in a different library altogether. Don’t be those folks.

You actually need to have some depth and experience with the subject matter. I hired Derek Hansen as my coach so I could literally immerse myself in sprinting. Yes, it gave me knowledge. Yes, I practiced what I preached. But what it did for me above all else is grant me empathy. “Knowing what it feels like…” is a secret weapon if you’re to be seen as an expert.

Remember: expedite, not overnight. I don’t know about you, but I’d take 18 months to grind if it meant my freedom got expedited by several years.

I don’t know about you, but I’d take 18 months to grind if it meant my freedom got expedited by several years, says @huntercharneski. Share on X

2. “This ain’t a diss song.”

It isn’t my intention to bash the industry’s greats who have been here long before most of us. It is only my intention to show that your path isn’t binary. The message preached about grinding for passion and pennies doesn’t sit well with me. Nor does the assumption, “If you aren’t willing to do so, then you’re in the wrong industry.” There is another way. This is another way.

Ironically, it was a member of the “old guard” who pushed me to become an expert on speed and take the leap into my new life: Jorge Carvajal. Jorge, I apologize for calling you old, my friend, but you’re a guy who’s been around for 30 years who too few know about!

3. Money isn’t everything.

At this point you might be thinking, “Dude’s a sellout,” and while you’re entitled to your opinion, I strongly disagree. If you think this article is purely about making more money, then you’ve missed the point. This is not an article about accumulation, but rather a shift in paradigm. In a word, freedom.

Was money important for me to extricate myself from Michigan and move to Arizona? Absolutely. Did it take a lot less money than you might think? You bet. Money can be a vehicle to drive you toward your dreams, no doubt. But it isn’t everything. John D. Rockefeller, who had more money than any of us ever will, once said, “A man’s wealth must be determined by relation of his desires and expenditures to his income. If he feels rich on $10 and has everything he desires, he really is rich.” Having a “rich” life is easier to obtain than you think.

What If I Still Want to Coach?

I think it is safe to assume the majority of us got into this industry because we love coaching. If you’re like me, your affinity for kids is what lights a fire inside your coaching heart. This is why I am not advocating you give up coaching all together. I am hoping you will give up the grind of it, though. Allow me to explain.

When I still owned and operated my facility in Michigan, there was one class per day I lived for: the 5 p.m. middle school group. It was at the perfect time of day, for starters. I’m a lark, and so my cognitive functioning peak is in the morning. This allowed me to work on the business between 7 and 9 a.m. Then came self-care (something else the industry seems to frown upon, but that’s for another article), which for me was sprinting. After I ate lunch, it was about 1 or 2 in the afternoon. I would take a nap, so I was charged and refreshed for the 20 or more rugrats who’d come barreling into the gym.

Anytime this didn’t happen was no one’s fault but my own. I would try to cram more work into the afternoon and/or early evening. Or worse, I would push aside the vital few tasks in favor of the trivial many. This might upset some, but those less important tasks usually were coaching all the classes. As the business owner, I was under the delusion that wearing every hat was possible, and even worse, worth it. In either case, this affected my love for both the business and coaching, which resulted in the middle schoolers not getting the best of me, but the rest of me when 5 p.m. rolled around.

So I was stuck. I loved coaching. But I also knew as the business owner (and now writer and marketing consultant) coaching every group was not a good use of my time. In fact, it cost me money. Before leaving for Arizona, I put systems in place so I could grow the business as well as coach the kiddos in the evening more often than not. Fast forward to life in Phoenix—my daily schedule looks almost identical. If I have clients in the evening, I train them. Or if it’s track season, off to Pinnacle High School I go.

My point is this: A coach’s life can be stressful., but it doesn’t have to be. You shouldn’t have to choose between coaching and owning a business. It’s just plain wrong to expect yourself to do everything if you’re in the private sector or in small team settings. You ought to have the freedom to pursue opportunities while still being a coach. You can have it all.

Getting Started

How will you be seen as a “go-to” coach as 2021 looms closer by the day? Kettlebell maestro? The plyo guy? Deadlift Debra? The possibilities are endless. My advice? It is easier to fill a need than create one.

• Ask yourself what subject matter you understand—and can teach—better than most.
• Once determined, announce your free master class, take questions, and convert FAQs into modules for your course.
• Anyone who asks a question gets admitted. Create a private Facebook group, and you’re ready to go come 2021.
• Change your FREE class into a paid one.
• Repackage your class into a product and put income on autopilot.

I look forward to watching you give up the grind and take the leap into the next chapter of your life. Or perhaps you’re more comfortable in the passenger’s seat, staring out the window as life passes you by? It’s your choice.

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

For numerous decades, the Olympic lifts (the clean and jerk and the snatch) and their various exercise derivatives have been a mainstay in many strength and conditioning (S&C) programs. Recently, there has been some controversy with regard to the validity of the benefits and the advocacy of including the “catch” during the execution of these exercises. While a formal instruction in the technical performance of the Olympic lifts is not the intended content of this commentary, provided are considerations for the inclusion of the catch during the performance of the Olympic lifts and their derivatives (i.e., power clean, power snatch).

I would like to thank Hall of Fame S&C coaches Al Vermeil, Johnny Parker, Al Miller, and Don Chu, and Coach Mike Gattone, Senior Director of Sports Performance and Coaching Education for USA Weightlifting, for their years of friendship and for all they have taught me about the technical aspects and benefits of Olympic weightlifting, as well as the overall training and coaching of athletes. I have included some of this information in this article.

The value of the Olympic lifts to enhance the physical qualities of both strength and power (rate of force development, acceleration impulse) is well supported in the scientific literature as well as numerous other educational materials. Publications by prominent researchers have compared the Olympic lifts that include the constituent of the catch to the pulling derivatives of these traditional exercises that exclude the catching of the barbell. Some of this research has found little difference between the two techniques, while others report greater performance potential utilizing the weightlifting pulling derivatives.

I am not aware of any recommendations in the research to omit the catching of the barbell during the execution of the Olympic lifts. Share on X

Regardless of these reported outcomes, I am not aware of any recommendations in the content to omit the catching of the barbell during the execution of the Olympic lifts. In fact, many researchers have recommended a combined inclusion of the Olympic lifts, comprising the catch, along with the pulling derivatives during the athlete’s training. I should also note that there are outstanding S&C professionals who have been successful utilizing the pulling derivatives without the catching of the barbell in the training of their athletes. Thus, the question arises, “Is the catching of the barbell during the performance of the Olympic lifts really advantageous?”

Prior to discussing the advantages of catching the barbell, it is important to recognize that no single exercise or exercise derivative is a safe “cut and paste” application for each individual athlete. If the athlete presents or historically reports a medical contraindication and/or orthopedic pathology that prohibits their participation in the performance of the Olympic lifts, the catching of the barbell, or any derivative of these activities, or any other exercise(s), they should not be a consideration for the athlete’s program design.

When presented with a contraindication for specific exercise(s) performance, there are likely alternative corresponding exercises that may be safely appropriate for inclusion for the enhancement of the same desired physical quality. However, in the absence of any exercise contraindication, why wouldn’t those athletes who are inexperienced in performing the Olympic lifts, including the catching of the barbell, participate in these activities as long as a viable process for a safe exercise teaching progression via an experienced and reputable coach is available? As with any other unfamiliar or poorly executed exercise or drill, the Olympic lifts may be taught, improved, and perfected over (training) time.

Exercise intensity is an additional consideration in regard to the application of unaccustomed stress, a requirement for physical adaptation to take place. High-intensity programming of any exercise also has the potential for vulnerability to the athlete. “High intensity” does not necessarily assume substantially heavy loads or maximal velocities but denotes an appropriate programmed level of intensity to which the athlete is unaccustomed. The exposure of an athlete’s vulnerability relates to all exercises executed with a programmed application of unaccustomed levels of stress (intensity).

During the sports rehabilitation and training of an athlete—especially during the training of the post-rehabilitated athlete—whether teaching a complex exercise, activity, or drill, including the programming of high exercise intensities, empirically the concern for athlete vulnerability is reduced if the sports rehabilitation and S&C professionals:

• Are aware of the athlete’s medical history, psychological state (i.e., the presence of kinesiophobia), and important environmental circumstances.
• Have an organized system of exercise advancement to safely and appropriately address and coach (teach) this undertaking.

Triple Flexion During the Olympic Weightlifting Performance

The discussion for the inclusion of the Olympic lifts during the course of the athlete’s training frequently includes the concept of triple extension. Triple joint extension occurs at the hips, knees, and ankles for the appropriate application of a directed force in such athletic activities as starting from the blocks, the initiation of a jump, etc. The same triple extension transpires for an effective application of an acceleration impulse during the performance of the Olympic lifts (figure 1). This acceleration impulse is produced with the intention of creating a high-velocity vertical displacement of the weighted barbell to overcome its inertia.

During these same conversations, the advantages of triple flexion are not often considered. Deceleration is a fundamental constituent of multidirectional speed to allow athletes to effectively change their state of momentum. High-velocity eccentric muscle contractions, along with the associated eccentric rate of force development (ERFD), are required for optimal high-velocity deceleration efficiency and effectiveness during such activities as landing from a jump, change of direction (COD), arm deceleration during throwing, stride leg braking forces at the time of the penultimate foot contact, and the transition of the lower extremity from the swing phase to ground contact in sprinting, to name a few.

The reversal of high-velocity movements requires the production of great eccentric muscle tension for efficient and effective deceleration, including at times the complete halting of the body and/or extremity(ies). The highest level of eccentric muscle tension correlates to movements that occur at high velocity as exhibited in the force-velocity curve (figure 2).

Many athletic injuries happen during the deceleration component of a high-velocity task including, but not limited to, landing from a jump, COD from a high linear velocity, and rapid deceleration braking-type tasks. The catching of the barbell transpires through a coordinated effort between the lower and upper extremities during a deceleration (triple flexion) of the athlete that occurs following an initiated high-velocity task (triple extension). Upon completion of the applied acceleration impulse, the athlete attempts to appropriately position themselves under the barbell by reversing their direction via a high-velocity descent and rapid change in posture (figures 3a and 3b) in preparation for receiving the barbell.

The greater the barbell’s ascending velocity, the faster the corresponding eccentric velocity of the athlete’s descent to assume a correct body posture for a successful catch of the barbell. Barbell velocities can be significant, and those for elite weightlifters that occur during the second pull of the snatch can be found in figure 4.

The initial high-velocity descent of the athlete that occurs prior to the catch carries on as the athlete continues to decelerate the “system” of the barbell weight in addition to their body weight to eventually assume a deep knee bend position. During the descent there is also a synchronous stabilization of the torso and upper extremities to catch and suitably maintain the proper position of the weighted barbell. The athlete then ascends to conclude the exercise in the erect standing position. The ability to decelerate at high velocity with accompanying strength and stability is essential to ensure a safe and optimal athletic performance when confronted with the required deceleration that transpires during various athletic endeavors.

Enhancing the athlete’s ability to produce high-velocity concentric (acceleration impulse, RFD) and eccentric (ERFD) qualities will also help to instill confidence in the application of force, as well as the acceptance of ground reactive forces. This is especially significant for the post-rehabilitated athlete who may present with kinesiophobia during training. Participation in competitive athletics requires the athlete to accept and redirect high levels of force.

Weaker athletes tend to rely more on ligaments for joint stability in high-intensity situations when compared to stronger athletes. Stronger athletes avoid a condition known as “ligament dominance,” a term coined by researcher and anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) expert Dr. Tim Hewett. Ligament dominance takes place when the knee joint (or any joint) is more dependent upon the structure of ligaments for stability than the supporting joint musculature while resisting high levels of applied stress. Placing an emphasis on the ligaments instead of strong supporting musculature for joint stability may often result in undesirable orthopedic consequences.

Deep Knee Bend Exercises’ Relationship to Strength Development

Conversations with S&C professionals include declarations that the same eccentric contraction progression (descent) of the catch, and subsequent deep knee bend, that occurs during the Olympic lifts also transpires during the execution of other exercises such as the squat. Squatting-type exercises provide similar triple flexion eccentrics that are essential for the athlete’s strength enhancement; however, these eccentric exercise movements do not require or produce the same high-velocity descent, resulting in the eccentric muscle tension and associated ERFD that is produced during the Olympic lifts.

While squatting-type exercises provide similar essential triple flexion eccentrics as Olympic lifts, they do not require or produce the same high-velocity descent. Share on X

As an analogy, athletes traveling at maximum linear velocities would have to produce a greater ERFD and associated eccentric muscle tension with a very short deceleration runway requiring an abrupt deceleration and/or stopping of the body when compared to the presence of a very long runway allowing for a gradual deceleration. The catch component of the Olympic lifts has a very “short runway” to rapidly reverse (decelerate) the athlete’s body position as compared to the extended “long runway” of the squat exercise, which is performed at a lower velocity of descent. The squat-type category of exercises, although important for an athlete’s training, does not provide the additional benefits of the anticipation of the catch or preparatory exercise movement to enhance barbell velocity prior to the athlete’s deceleration.

The Triple Extension Relationship to Triple Flexion

The execution of the Olympic lifts requires an appropriately applied and directed accelerated impulse to propel the weighted barbell in the proper vertical direction (figure 1). The triple extension that results from the applied impulse may be considered the front-side mechanics of the Olympic lifts, resulting in a suitable backside mechanics where a rapid descent and appropriate posture transpire to safely catch and secure the barbell during the clean and snatch exercises. An optimally executed triple flexion is directly correlated to the athlete’s optimally executed triple extension as is synonymous to the sprinting cycle where optimal backside mechanics is contingent upon optimal front side mechanics.

Ideal triple extension is not just about applying a concentric acceleration impulse to the ground surface area, but also ensuring a precise high-velocity reversal of the athlete’s posture for an appropriate and safe barbell catch, support of the barbell, and deep knee bend triple flexion exercise conclusion.

Exercise Preparatory Movement and Exercise Depth

The preparatory exercise movement is an important component of the Olympic lifts. Bearing in mind that the resulting eccentric muscle tension (backside mechanics) directly corresponds to the concentric barbell velocity (front-side mechanics), a preparatory movement prior to the acceleration impulse will result in a greater overall barbell velocity when compared to exercises initiated from a stationary (dead stop) position.

Dr. Loren Chiu, an outstanding researcher, former competitive weightlifter, and friend, provided me with an analogy of this preparatory movement component of the Olympic lifts years ago. In the sport of drag racing, the drag racer accelerates from a dead stop starting position, as a race starts from a velocity of zero. In comparison, NASCAR racers exhibit a preparatory movement via their established pace velocity while circling the racetrack. Prior to their attempt to pass the race car directly in front of them, NASCAR race drivers will initiate their acceleration velocity from a higher preparatory movement (pace) velocity. Thus, the race car velocity at the precise moment of acceleration is higher in the NASCAR vehicle when compared to the zero velocity of the drag racer.

During the performance of the Olympic lifts, the first pull is the preparatory movement that occurs prior to the greater acceleration of the barbell that ensues at the initiation of the second pull. The preparatory movement of the first pull allows for a greater barbell acceleration velocity at the time the ascending barbell reaches the same height as a barbell exercise initiated from a stationary position upon blocks.

In both exercise conditions the weighted barbell will eventually decelerate to a velocity of zero at the moment of peak barbell height. However, a higher-velocity barbell will achieve a higher peak height, and the anticipation of catching a higher-velocity barbell affords a higher-velocity triple flexion of the athlete to position themselves under the barbell. The preparatory movement of the first pull results in a higher-velocity barbell when compared to non-preparatory pull velocities, resulting in a higher-velocity triple flexion descent. This high-velocity triple flexion descent will only occur with the inclusion of the catch.

The exercise depth distance that transpires during the post-catch descent has a significant influence upon muscle activity. Relative muscular effort (RME) is the term for the absolute muscle effort as related to the maximum strength of a muscle.^7,8 As an example, the RME of the deltoid and rotator cuff muscle groups of the shoulder complex would be lower during the task of placing a book on a high bookshelf when compared to pressing 200 pounds overhead. The gluteal as well as the quadriceps muscle groups are significant contributors to the athlete’s ability to optimally and effectively decelerate and redirect (COD) from high-velocity eccentric forces to high-velocity concentric movements. Greater exercise depth (distance), along with the associated applied barbell weight (intensity), has been demonstrated to best influence gluteal and quadriceps muscle activity.⁸

Exercise depth also improves and maintains joint mobility, joint stability, and the soft tissue compliance (flexibility) of the body. When performing the clean and the snatch exercises, the athlete assumes a deep knee bend position while supporting a weighted barbell. In the snatch, this deep knee bend position occurs with the arms positioned (extended) directly overhead. The overhead squat is a commonly utilized test to determine an athlete’s joint mobility and soft tissue compliance. The snatch mimics an overhead squat performance, thus maintaining both mobility and soft tissue compliance qualities. The athlete’s support of the overhead weighted barbell in this deep knee bend position also requires joint stability. Joint mobility, stability, and soft tissue compliance are significant attributes of the Olympic lifts that occur only with the inclusion of the catch.

Joint mobility, stability, and soft tissue compliance are significant attributes of the Olympic lifts that occur only with the inclusion of the catch. Share on X

Most athletic endeavors require the athlete to be able to frequently decelerate and change direction during competition. The athlete will only travel at velocities that directly correspond to their “braking” abilities. This is observed frequently in the sports rehabilitation setting, where the presence of kinesiophobia is prohibitive in the application and receiving of ground reaction forces. This is especially true in the case of the postoperative anterior cruciate ligament reconstructed (ACLR) knee athlete.

The inability to tolerate ground reaction forces has negative consequences for the ACLR athlete’s ability to produce high-velocity movements and redirect. It is very unlikely that anyone would drive a car over 100 mph if the car’s brakes couldn’t effectively stop it from these velocities. The clean and the snatch provide the qualities of strength and exercise velocity both concentrically (RFD, impulse) and eccentrically (ERFD), as well as the benefits of a deep knee bend exercise depth, all within the performance of a single exercise. However, for all of these physical quality benefits to materialize during this single exercise performance, it is necessary to catch the barbell.

Arm Length Discrepancy and the Snatch Grip

It is fairly common to work with athletes who present with leg length discrepancies, especially in the rehabilitation setting. However, there are also occasions, although less common, when athletes may present with upper extremity (arm) length discrepancies. When an athlete presents with an upper extremity limb length discrepancy, the snatch grip is a consideration for exercise performance.

The modified hand placement adjustment of the wider snatch grip allows the athlete to execute any exercise performance, including overhead tasks, while maintaining a parallel position of the barbell as related to the ground surface area. This is especially important when making the catch during the execution of the snatch exercise.

The Double Peak in Muscle Activation

It is acknowledged that intended exercise muscle activation produces both force and stiffness. Pinto² and McGill^2,3 have demonstrated that muscle activation and relaxation must be coordinated and precise to regulate movement while enhancing performance that requires both strength and velocity. As the muscle force generated creates a higher-velocity joint movement, the associated muscle stiffness slows joint velocity. Therefore, to increase levels of joint (limb) velocity, and in the case of a “striking” impact force (e.g., a hand, fist, foot, or body delivering a blow), the activation of muscles occurs in pulses.

These pulses are initiated by means of muscle activation, followed by a brief period of muscle relaxation, and conclude, once again, with muscle activation. This double pulse specific sequenced pattern phenomenon is introduced as muscle activity (force) initiates limb motion; however, as corresponding muscle stiffness attempts to reduce limb velocity, an immediate rapid relaxation transpires to enhance limb velocity. A concluding additional muscle activation then reestablishes muscle stiffness, resulting in an effective mass at the moment of high-impact strike force.³

Superior athletic performance has been linked to the rate of muscle relaxation in world champion golfers and Olympic sprinters⁵ and, yes, Olympic weightlifters as well⁶. Therefore, how is it possible for this double pulse muscle activation process of initial contraction (first pull), relaxation (at the conclusion of the acceleration impulse of the second pull), and second contraction (catching of the barbell) to occur during the execution of the Olympic lifts without the inclusion of the catch of the barbell?

The anticipated “impact” of the weighted barbell prior to the catch requires a second muscle activation and resulting stiffness that some coaches describe as bracing and stabilizing. The stiffness that occurs during the second pulse of muscle activity, resulting in a more effective mass, may be beneficial to enhance the ability of those athletes who commonly deliver a strike force (e.g., an MMA fighter, a football linebacker making a tackle) or better protect the athlete at the moment of receiving a strike force (e.g., an MMA fighter, a football running back being tackled).

Optimal limb and joint velocity is not only dependent upon the athlete’s ability to initiate high-velocity force (strength, impulse), “but by the rate of muscle activation and relaxation.”⁴ Coach Vermeil reminded me of the words of Coach Charlie Francis, who stated that great athletes not only activate their muscles rapidly but have the ability to relax them rapidly as well.

A simple analogy for this concept would be the cracking of a bullwhip (figure 5). The applied “double peak” wave observed with the bullwhip transpires with an initial muscle (activation) force peak (A) applied to the bullwhip, followed by relaxation (B), and concluding with a second force activation (C) to result in the high-impact force (crack) of the whip. The double peak force applied through a bullwhip is substantial, as a cracking sound is heard as the tip of the bullwhip moves faster than the speed of sound, creating a “mini” sonic boom.

The Body Position When Receiving the Barbell (the Catch)

As the athlete anticipates the “catching” of the weighted barbell by bracing and stabilizing their body, the lower extremity joint angles assumed (especially during the power clean) are very similar to the lower extremity joint angles that occur during the following activities:

• The initiation and application of a forceful impact to an opponent (e.g., boxer throwing a punch, football blocking).
• Accepting an externally applied forceful impact from an opponent (e.g., boxer receiving a punch, football linemen striking each other).
• Jump landings, as the catch may be considered and employed as a lead-up to plyometric activities.

The Split Jerk

Conversations about the catching of the barbell are usually linked to the clean and the snatch exercises and their exercise derivatives (i.e., power clean, power snatch). Fewer discussions include the catch of the barbell during performance of the split jerk.

The split jerk is an exercise that accompanies the clean (clean and jerk), or it may be performed as its own exercise entity. The split jerk, like the clean and snatch, is primarily a lower extremity exercise that starts via an acceleration impulse initiated by the lower extremities. As occurs with both the clean and the snatch, the execution of the split jerk also includes an exercise preparatory movement.

After completing a successful catch of the barbell, the jerk is initiated from the front racked position. At this point, the athlete dips a few inches by bending the knees, keeps the body erect (figure 6a), and reverses direction by applying an acceleration impulse into the ground by rapidly extending their knees to propel the barbell upward from its racked position on the shoulders (6b). The “dip” performed by the athlete prior to the execution of the jerk is an exercise preparatory movement resulting in high levels of peak power (6923 W) as well as mean power (4321 W)^9,10 of generated forces by the lower extremities. What is just as significant as the power produced is the rate of the work done during the execution of the jerk.¹⁰ These forces are then transferred through the kinetic chain of the body to the upper extremities as the barbell travels overhead.

As transpires with the clean and snatch exercises, the athlete reverses their direction after the upward takeoff of a high-velocity barbell by rapidly dropping and decelerating the body under the barbell (figure 6c) to assume a position of an anterior stride leg, a posterior extended opposite lower extremity, and extended arms directly overhead (figure 6d). They should align the extended arms with the ears (olecranon of the elbow) as they stabilize the torso with the weighted barbell positioned overhead. The athlete then concludes the split jerk exercise to assume a bilateral erect standing position with both arms maintaining their overhead extended position (6e).

The split jerk helps the overhead athlete (i.e., pitchers, javelin throwers, volleyball players, etc.) enhance arm velocity. High-velocity deceleration (braking) transpires from the anterior extending lower extremity to conclude in a stable stationary position. Pitchers with higher baseball (arm) velocities were those who demonstrated the following:

• Greater stride leg extension.
• Higher braking ground reaction forces from the extended stride leg.
• Posterior directed landing (braking) forces of the stride leg landing foot, reflecting a balance of inertial forces of the body moving forward to create baseball velocity.
• The landing (stride) leg serving as an anchor, transforming forward and vertical momentum into rotational components.
• The ability to “drive” the body over a stabilized stride leg.
• Increased forward motion of the trunk via stride knee extension during the acceleration phase of pitching.

The split jerk provides the following benefits for the overhead athlete during exercise execution:

• Enhanced stride leg extension.
• Enhanced stride leg landing (braking) ground reaction forces.
• Enhanced stride leg landing stability as well as overall body stability.
• Enhanced eccentric rate of force development to decelerate and “brake” the stride of the lower extremity from an initial high velocity.
• Maintaining a fully extended (shoulder flexion) overhead arm range of motion since deficits in throwing arm flexion of 5 degrees or more have resulted in an almost 3x increase in elbow injuries in throwers.¹¹

The split jerk can also play a significant role in the preparation of the athlete for optimal COD capabilities. The ability to change direction effectively includes the significant role of the penultimate foot contact. The penultimate foot contact is the second to last foot contact with the ground surface area prior to moving in the new intended direction.¹² The penultimate foot contact serves two main purposes:¹²

• Facilitate the ideal body position for an effective push-off during the final COD foot contact.
• Serve as a braking step to reduce the body’s momentum prior to the final foot contact push-off for COD. This is especially important in COD angles greater than 60 degrees.

The split jerk, which is advantageous for the development of arm velocity and safe and ideal COD capabilities, can only be performed with the inclusion of the catching of the barbell. Share on X

The enhancement of the athlete’s breaking force capability during the penultimate foot contact also ensures the athlete maintains a higher entry velocity, resulting in a faster COD speed with a corresponding reduction in in the ground reaction force on the turning plant step limb¹³. A reduction in ground reaction force has significant implications, as non-contact ACL injuries often occur on the planted lower extremity turning limb during sudden deceleration prior to the athlete’s attempted COD. The stride leg extension and associated braking force components of the split jerk are advantageous for both arm velocity and the safe and ideal COD capabilities of the athlete. The split jerk can only be performed with the inclusion of the catching of the barbell.

The Many Advantages of the Catch

Sports rehabilitation and S&C professionals have successfully utilized various exercises and training program designs to enhance an athlete’s physical qualities during their rehabilitation, as well as their athletic performance training. There certainly isn’t any single exercise that is “one size fits all” in the continuum of exercises available for both sports rehabilitation and training. Athletes are individuals who differ from each other with regard to their various medical, physical, psychological, and environmental circumstances, and training experiences. If there was one absolute best exercise and training program design, all sports rehabilitation and S&C professionals would utilize it.

Often, there appears to be a perceived exercise taboo, or assumption that certain exercises are dangerous for inclusion in an athlete’s training. It should be acknowledged that all unaccustomed training exercises and all unaccustomed applied exercise intensities present vulnerability to the athlete. We have rehabilitated many athletes in our physical therapy clinics who have been injured performing many various types of training exercises including single leg exercises, double leg exercises, and even the Olympic pulling derivatives without the inclusion of the catch.

A professional’s poor judgement and inappropriate selection/programming of an exercise for a particular athlete sets the stage for vulnerability, not the exercise itself. Share on X

If an exercise was truly “safe,” as would occur in the routine application of accustomed exercises and exercise intensities, how could physical adaptation possibly take place? What is truly unwarranted is a professional’s poor judgment and inappropriate selection and programming of an exercise for a particular athlete’s sports rehabilitation and/or performance training. These are the conditions that set the stage for vulnerability, not the exercise itself.

The intent of this article was to present the benefits of the catch component of the Olympic lifts for consideration and inclusion during the training of athletes. The Olympic lifts, as well as the catching of the barbell, provide many advantages for an athlete, as shown in figure 7. In order for the athlete to take advantage of all the benefits provided by the Olympic lifts that transpire during a single executed exercise performance, they much include the catch of the barbell.

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. Sandau I and Granacher U. “Effects of the Barbell Load on the Acceleration Phase during the Snatch in Elite Olympic Weightlifting.” Sports. 2020;8(5):1-10.

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