Blog

Strength and conditioning coaches are under the spotlight more than ever. The field is under more scrutiny than ever—as it should be. The media-driven world we live in gives us the ability to see a snapshot of many different strength training programs around the country. This can be a trap for a lot of coaches out there running programs in many different leagues and levels.

As the old adage says, “Never judge a book by its cover,” right? Well, this is not a reality. We make judgments every single second of our lives. Coaches make judgments the second they see an athlete move. Great coaches have protocols in place once they identify gaps in movement patterns. We must understand that judging a book by its cover is not always a bad thing. It can go one of two ways.

First, a young coach may see a snapshot of a training session and think it’s a missing piece to their program or that it may take their athletes to the next level. This can be dangerous because of the lack of context in which it was prescribed. Second, the same mistake can be made by the experienced coach who sees that same snapshot and proclaims that it’s inappropriate programming or coaching. Unfortunately, this happens every single day on social media.

Because we live in a world of instant information, I want to shed some light on the steps that performance coaches must take before ever writing an exercise, volume, or intensity prescription. I hope this post gives perspective for every young coach out there looking for guidance on programming and why everything in training, and in life, is relative.

We must address five main categories in every program before we write it. We often speak of how powerful the basics of training can be and why being a principle-driven programmer is more effective than an exercise-driven programmer. Before we can even get to training principles, we must first address our uncontrollable circumstances: population, time, resources, manpower, and relational dynamics.

Population

No matter where you coach, always understand that the logo is not what drives the organization—the people do. We must dive deep to understand the people we work for and the people we serve. The strength coach’s responsibility is to progress the physical capabilities of athletes while minimizing injury risk.

Assessing Your Athletes

When coming into a program, the coach must first assess the athletes’ current abilities so they can have an idea of where to start. How do we do this? Some coaches like to begin with a movement assessment, such as the FMS. I find that the FMS is not a great use of time. Instead, when I began at my new position at Madison Academy, we simply began to train. Watching my athletes move was enough for me to gain that context. As long as you base your initial program on basic movement patterns (squat, hinge, lunge, push, pull, brace, jump, land), you’ll see where you need to go.

This may look different from the professional to the college level. It may look different from the college to the high school level. This may even look different from one team to another at the same level. It may look different on the same team from year to year! Shocker, right? Programs should not be written before you consider and analyze the specific needs of your athletes fully.

What does this look like? When I was responsible for the baseball and softball programs at Division 1 McNeese State University, I decided to stay away from the Olympic movements in training. I based this decision on the risks and rewards and the importance of the wrist and hand. I also believe the demands of a predominantly rotational sport will not see as much benefit from a primary movement in the vertical sagittal plane. Some coaches may disagree, but it’s my stance on this specific parameter.

In my current position at the high school level, I’m implementing a primarily developmental model that uses the same basic movements across all students and athletes. Everyone cleans, everyone squats, everyone deadlifts. While I make some individual modifications, this model looks different in my current population than the ones I served before. The outlook for my high school athletes is not the same as the outlook I had for my college athletes playing one sport.

Number of Athletes

Next, consider the number of people you’re serving. Some coaches, especially at the high school level, are serving 300+ athletes every week. Some coaches are managing 60-80 athletes in a weight room in a single session. We must consider these factors before programming begins. If the schedule and circumstances happen to give you no choice but to train a large number of athletes at once, you must keep things as simple as possible. This has more to do with the coach-to-athlete ratio, which I’ll touch on later in this article.

Movement Ability and Training Age

The last consideration is the movement competency and training age of the population you’re training. Before executing the training program to progress the athletes properly, we must perform determining assessments and evaluations that give a clear picture of how to begin. One of the simplest ways to do this is to use a movement-based standard training template that allows for enough volume to assess and light enough intensity to be safe and work from there.

Time

The next factors to consider before programming are time and schedule. In the majority of strength and conditioning settings, we cannot control these. In the high school setting, for example, the schedule is usually set in stone due to the class structure during the day. On the other hand, some high-level college sports, such as men’s basketball, may have their own facility and only 16 guys on the roster. Scheduling training can have more flexibility with a schedule like that. When scheduling is more flexible, programming strategies can be as well.

My current schedule is 85 minutes in a “block” high school schedule. We designate ten minutes before and after class for dressing in and out. We have a total of 65 minutes to complete our training. Because we function on an alternating schedule (set of four classes on one day and a different set of four classes the next), we only get in two days of training per week. This is a major component of my programming template, selections, and protocols. Many high schools get to train every single day, but with less time to train.

The majority of training is scheduled by team based on weight room availability, practice time, time of year, and other variables. In the high school setting, you often see an entire football team training at the same time in a facility that’s not built for it. This can be unsafe and also inconducive to sound programming and coaching. I’ve seen programs train their football team with 80+ guys at once and only 2-3 coaches coaching or “supervising.” It’s economical from a scheduling and time standpoint, but not at all from a quality standpoint. Lots of these variables are out of our control, and we need to analyze them fully before program creation begins.

If you’re pushed into this circumstance, I recommend being a savage at the simple movements, such as a primary squat movement, primary hinge movement, a single-leg movement, an upper-body push, and an upper-body pull. Having a large number of athletes makes it difficult to coach technique at a high level. Sometimes you have to do the best you can with the hand you’re dealt, but make sure your athletes are getting the best out of the situation they’re in.

Resources

Resources may be the biggest variable affecting programming capabilities. Every school and team have different resources available to them to use for training. Some of the best facilities in the country have a large weight room with many racks and lots of space, which often is attached to an indoor turf area where athletes can do a lot more than they could inside a weight room. You also must consider weight room exercise equipment. How many racks are available? Do you have bumper plates? Do you have bands? Do you have dumbbells? What barbell types do you have? We must consider all of these things in our programming. Weight rooms across the country all look different. Here are a few examples from my experience.

As a volunteer intern at Mississippi State, I was fortunate to be a part of the strength staff for Nick Savage and company. Before the summer began, the first thing we did as interns was to rearrange the room for how Coach Savage and his staff wanted it based on their programming that summer. He wanted to work in primary training blocks, then work accessories and auxiliary work off a rotation. After the main training blocks were finished, one coach and his guys would go to a station that would involve anything from neck training, shoulder care, back work, and even some arm farm. This type of training would not have been possible without the number of machine resources and weight room space.

When I moved on from MSU to West Alabama as a graduate assistant, the resources were drastically different. Going from a 12,000 square foot facility to a 2,000 square foot facility can change things quickly. Keep in mind, having fewer resources is not an excuse for bad programming or bad training. At West Alabama, we had racks, bumper plates, barbells, and a few dumbbells. I had the privilege to work for my mentor Joseph Boyd who got better results with those items than most coaches get with much more. The team was two wins away from a national championship appearance.

You may have to simplify your training program due to weight room resources, but that's no excuse to program poorly. Share on X

Resources may not be things you can control initially, but they’re something that every strength coach should strive to build. The best coaches can get results with athletes using less. I hear many young coaches complain most about weight room resources. You may have to simplify things, but that’s no excuse to program poorly.

Many coaches overlook the management, workflow, and logistics of training execution when designing a training program. Share on X

One of the biggest factors that many coaches, especially young coaches, don’t consider is the management, workflow, and logistics of training execution. Lots of coaches put down a training program that will maximize power output but may not be possible to execute due to logistical complications and population size. For example, a coach may have read about Triphasic Training or French Contrast training and want to implement it into their current training program. What if the coach does not have the space to allow for a logistical flow to go from the strength movement to the power movement to the speed/overspeed movement? It’s not good to force a round peg into a square hole. A better strategy is to get very good at a few things than to be mediocre at many things.

Manpower

The athlete-to-coach ratio is important in training sessions. Many places have only one strength coach, and they have to take care of all training duties and coaching by themselves. At the highest level of college football, five full-time coaches are allowed. Most programs add up to 5-10 interns to aid in many things, such as setup and breakdown. At the highest level, the programming capabilities are endless because they have the manpower to execute the plan.

Training and Coaching

First, the manpower allows for more athletes to train and receive proper coaching. When there are too many athletes per coach, the training session becomes more of a managerial role than a coaching role when specific systems and routines are not in place.

In a weight room, most coaches are concerned with safety. This is common sense. The higher the coach-to-athlete ratio, the higher the risk. To keep order and flow intact, the strength coach may use an on-the-whistle pacing strategy. This may be done rep by rep, set by set, or block by block. To do this, you must have someone responsible for keeping up the pace. I don’t recommend pacing rep by rep. It will turn your athletes into robots. It may be a good method to evaluate if your athletes are completing every rep, but at what cost? You may be counting reps, but are the reps quality reps in the first place? These are questions you must ask.

I like to work off a block-to-block or tier-to-tier pacing strategy. After studying movement types, volumes, and intensities over time, I developed a good feel for how long a block should last in my system. In my current system, I have 2-3 athletes working per rack. No more, no less. For our primary movements, it takes anywhere from 10-13 minutes to complete our first block or tier of the day. This allows some freedom to coach up individuals while making sure everyone is training at the correct pace. I use a visual clock that athletes can see. Some coaches use software such as Rack Performance to help pace their training. Whatever you decide to use, it’s best to use a pacing guide that fits your training parameters. Observe how long training tiers take, decide if that’s too fast, too slow, or just right, and then create your pace.

Setup and Breakdown

Second, the manpower allows for quicker setup and breakdown of the room. Staff with more members can be more efficient during training sessions, especially if transitions or rotations are involved. I’ve even seen interns changing weight for athletes so training sessions can go smoother and faster. This is only possible if you have the manpower available to do so. If you don’t, implementing things such as barbell loading references can help speed up transitions. I have charts posted around my weight room that tell what plates belong on each side for barbell loads from 45 lbs to 500 lbs. They’ve been a huge help to our efficiency.

Relational Dynamics

The art of communication and coaching comes into play in this last category of programming precursors. The relationship dynamic between a strength coach and sport coach is a major variable when programming. Many coaches are fortunate to have the full backing of their sport coach to allow them to do what they are professionally trained and educated to do. What most people don’t see is the groundwork of trust that was laid before that happened. Whether the trust is earned from working with that sport coach over time or the strength coach receives a high recommendation from someone the sport coach trusts, full support comes from the strength coach consistently getting results over time.

Lots of strength coaches in the industry complain a lot about the leverage the sport coach has over them. I don’t believe that a sport coach has much business building training sessions that are impractical but, at the end of the day, they are responsible for their team. It’s the strength coach’s job to communicate on a high level to gain the sport coach’s trust to get the job done.

It's the strength coach’s job to communicate to gain the sport coach's trust. And it's up to both to communicate with private coaches. Share on X

The sport-strength coach dynamic will always exist in team sports. Unfortunately, this fails most at the high school level and the communication with private sector coaches. Lots of athletes are looking to “outwork” their opponents and train with private trainers on top of their school training. This can be really beneficial or detrimental. It’s up to the sport and strength coaches to communicate with the athlete and their private trainer to create the most holistic approach possible. This is not the norm. If used properly, private training can help an athlete develop to their highest level much quicker. This is what we want for our athletes, right? It has to be about the athlete, not ourselves.

Want things to get better? Invest in relationships. Reach out to the private sector coach to learn what they’re doing and establish a communication line. Sit down with your sport coaches to explain everything behind your program and why it will make the team better. This doesn’t happen overnight, but if you commit to the pursuit of a healthy relationship with these individuals, your training program will go to a whole new level.

Conclusion

There are other factors we should consider before prescribing an exercise, volume, or intensity. Some of these are the athletes’ sports demands, injury history, and practice plan implementation. We must do a better job as strength coaches to apply stimulus that makes the most sense for the environment our athletes are living in. We often get caught up in our own world of the weight room and do not consider the stressors that are happening outside of it. The next time you write a program, consider the above categories to put together the most appropriate training stimulus for your athletes to continue to develop and remain healthy.

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

Aside from what a sprinter wears as they report to the starting line for a race, there is no piece of equipment they carry out to the track that’s more important than a set of starting blocks. Yet, despite blocks being used in the Olympics for more than 70 years, how best to set these blocks remains a conundrum. Just go to any junior high­ school meet—or even many high school meets—and you are sure to find athletes completely perplexed by how best to set up two angled pedals attached to a single metal rail.

Besides what a sprinter wears to the starting line for a race, there is no piece of equipment they carry out to the track that’s more important than a set of starting blocks, says @Zoom1Ken. Share on X

Many sprinters simply look to the athletes next to them, set their blocks the same way, and hope they don’t stumble on the start. If they do stumble, their coaches get upset, point out that their poor start cost them a good time, and feel obligated to give them some kind of quick lesson—not just how to place their blocks, but how to slide the pedals to their proper locations along the rail.

Then, right when athletes appear to figure it out, they go to meets where the pedals are not locked into the rail and, sure enough, at least one of those pedals falls out of its slot and bounces on the track (or on the sprinter’s foot). Or course, the sprinter can’t remember what slot the pedal came out of. Watching the perplexed sprinters trying to figure it out, you’d think they were being asked to line up colors on a Rubik’s Cube!

History of the Starting Block

But that wasn’t always the case. There were no starting blocks when Harold Abrahams won the 100-meter gold medal in the 1924 Olympics. Back then, the only piece of equipment sprinters carried onto the track was a trowel for digging two holes to place their feet in. Sprinters took meticulous care making those starting holes, concerned about precisely where their first foot out of the holes would place them. In fact, Abrahams once mentioned how he also carried a piece of string cut to the length of his first stride, put the string down on the track, extended it forward, and then made a mark in the track where he focused his eyes when he heard the “set” command.

George Simpson, a 20-year-old star from Ohio State, set the 100-yard world record at 9.4 in 1929, but the IAAF did not recognize that mark because Simpson had used a piece of equipment: starting blocks. Until 1948, the best “carry on” item sprinters brought to the track remained that trowel for digging holes at the spots where they wanted to place their feet. Such holes were not only unstable, but they were also a “groundskeeper’s nightmare” on dirt, grass, or cinder tracks. Track and field historians believe that the trowel was still in use in the 1970s and early ’80s before the newer, rubberized surfaces became more affordable.

Even though starting blocks were used in the ’48 Olympics for the first time, sprinters still struggled with them. In the 1956 Melbourne Olympics, U.S. sprinter Thane Baker put down his starting blocks pointing in the wrong direction. In yet another piece of bizarre starting block trivia, 1980 Olympic gold medalist Alan Wells of Britain didn’t want to use starting blocks, but they were then required by the IAAF for the Olympic Games. Just three months before the Moscow Games, Wells had not even used blocks in competition because he “preferred to start with his feet firmly on the track.”

Finding the Right Positioning

Starting blocks have evolved over the years, but not without controversy. In the 1930s, the generally accepted orthodox position was often called the “Duffy” start because that’s the way Georgetown champion Arthur Duffy set his blocks. His feet were 17 inches apart, and his front foot 8 inches from the starting line. Duffy believed this position resulted in a primary push from both legs and not just the front leg.

Much of the thinking at the time centered on the belief that it was best to place the feet as close to the starting line as possible. For example, Coach Larry Snyder noted that if an athlete’s foot is 8 inches from the starting line, that athlete would be ahead of the sprinter whose front foot was 18 or more inches behind the line. This is one of the reasons why the Australian or “kangaroo” style start was not accepted at first. The front pedal was set 17–19 inches behind the starting line, with the back foot pedal 10–12 inches behind the front one. Coaches believed this position put the feet too far behind the starting line. Again, this notion of sprinters losing too much ground to sprinters who crowded the line was a major concern.

Sprinters like the great Jesse Owens did not do much to change coaches’ minds. Owens moved both feet closer to the line, believing that being nearer to the starting line put him nearer to the finish line. Larry Snyder’s insights clearly had an influence on Owens, but he never crowded the line by the 2 or 3 inches that Snyder believed optimal.

Research in the early ’50s cast some doubt on the benefit of “hugging the line” as much as coaches had advocated. The highly respected Franklin Henry noted that a 16- to 21-inch difference from toe to toe is the best distance, and that the 11-inch bunch start was the poorest. Though the bunch was effective at getting the sprinter off the blocks quickly, slower times were the result because the spacing did not put sprinters in a good running position. With a bunch start, Henry believed that sprinters would not be able to recover from that disadvantage.

Though the bunch start was effective at getting the sprinter off the blocks quickly, slower times were the result because the spacing didn’t put sprinters in a good running position. Share on X

Ken Doherty said it best: “Undoubtedly, in the United States since 1890, there have been more speeches, more arguments, more try-this-try-that, and more research on the placement of starting blocks than on any other track and field problem.”

What about the blocks themselves? Some have pedals fixed in the rails; other designs have easily detachable pedals. Many blocks now allow the sprinters to adjust the angle of each of the pedals. Doherty notes that “there are numerous papers discussing the optimum position for creating maximum drive from power generated, but using blocks is much more about comfort and control than exact science.”

However, thanks to a rather unique Excel file created by Brian Mackenzie, a Level 4 performance coach with British Athletics, coaches and athletes can take five specific measurements and then plug them into his chart to determine the most effective pedal angles and spacing.

With Mackenzie’s easy-to-use (and free) formula, sprinters can set their blocks based on the numbers that are provided after they have inputted their limb segment data. Mackenzie doesn’t try to “sell” the benefits of his formula. In fact, he begins by explaining that block setting is really a simple process. “Place the front block two foot-lengths from the starting line and the rear block another foot length between the front and rear block. From that point, spacing can be adjusted based on performance over the first several strides.” In other words, athletes can try this simple method to see if the setting feels good or, more importantly, results in faster starts.

This is really how most sprinters approach block setting, and that’s probably all they need to do. In terms of ideal angles of the leg in the “set” position, Mackenzie notes that the leading knee angle should be 90–110 degrees, and the rear knee angle 120–135 degrees. Again, nothing controversial here, but for those who follow the old carpenter’s rule of “measure twice, cut once,” there is value in a personal assessment like the one Mackenzie presents.

Each sprinter gets a personalized sheet, which serves as a simple instruction manual. This means they adjust the blocks on their own without a coach hovering over them, says @Zoom1Ken. Share on X

I have had assistant coaches ask if taking these measurements was really necessary, and if the recommendation from the data actually suggested a placement that would be much different from what the athlete would have determined on their own, just based on the above simple guidelines—or “trial and error” based on feel. My response is always the same: Each sprinter gets a personalized sheet, and that sheet serves as a simple instruction manual. This means they adjust the blocks on their own without a coach hovering over them.

Unconventional Blocks and Starts

So, an interesting question: Why are they even called “blocks”? This may have been related to the 1927 starting block patent that George Bresnahan of Iowa filed as a “foot support,” which he then described as “what might be termed a starting block.” As you can see in this image of the patent, they are basically hinged blocks of wood with butterfly screws to create a solid base of support and angle.

In general, starting blocks have evolved slowly. The rail or platform for the angled pedals has been progressively shortened, but some manufacturers have had to modify their design to accommodate sprinters and hurdlers with longer legs. It makes you wonder if they should have used Mackenzie’s formula with various sprinters before determining that a shorter rail length was better.

Blocks were actually approved by the IAAF in 1937, but because of World War II, they were not used in competition until the ’48 Games.

A final note: What inspired me to take block setting this seriously? It was an image of the starting technique of ’72 Olympic champion Valery Borzov. His start so impressed Ken Doherty that he developed a sketch just to make Borzov’s start a point of special analysis in his Track and Field Omnibook. Borzov’s block spacing appears to be as little as 10 inches apart—what would be considered more like the questionable “bunch” spacing in standard block setting terms. His front block was 25 inches to the starting line. His eyes are straight down, hands spread wide, and arms above 110 degrees. This position placed his center of gravity low and far ahead of his feet.

This position was intended to aid forward drive, but it appeared problematic because of the increased risk of stumbling and causing a much shorter first step. But note how Borzov compensated. His foot is placed low in the front pedal, and the front of his spikes is actually on the track and not against the block itself. This allowed for greater flexion and extension, and that front-of-the-foot contact with the track apparently increased his application of force and basically prevented him from stumbling.

This prompted Doherty to claim that the result, “may well be an improvement over the best possible on-your-marks placement.” Jimson Lee, in an excellent blog post on Borzov’s mechanics, said something similar: “He has one of the greatest sprinting techniques out of the blocks and running at top speed.”

Interesting in that, competing indoors following his gold-medal Olympic performance in Munich, Borzov was seen starting indoor races from a three-point stance. This prompted many coaches to wonder if the Ukrainian Express had developed an even faster technique for block starting. It turned out he had a hand injury painful enough for him to avoid taking a risk with his typical “unconventional” start!

More Than a Thought: The Best Possible Block Setting

Give Brian Mackenzie’s calculator a try. The five measurements he recommends that we take of a sprinter while in the “set” position give us another way to test what we assume may be the best possible block setting for each of our athletes. It gives us something more to think about during our thinking process.

In “Hamlet,” when a probing Rosencrantz disagrees with Hamlet about Denmark being a prison, Hamlet says, “There is nothing either good or bad but thinking makes it so.”

In the debate over what is the best block setting for sprinters, I offer a somewhat different twist on Hamlet’s insight: There is nothing like good data from sound research to cure what might be bad thinking.

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

Doherty, Ken. Track and Field Omnibook; a Complete Guide for Coach and Athlete. Tafmop Publishers, 1976.

Mackenzie, B. (2001) Sprint Starting Block Settings [WWW] Available from: https://www.brianmac.co.uk/sprints/blockset.htm [Accessed 11/9/2019].

Duncanson, N. The Fastest Men on Earth: The Story of the Men’s 100 Metre Champions. Andre Deutsch Publishers, 2011.

Brewer, John. Running Science: Optimizing Training and Performance. University of Chicago Press, 2017.

Everyone has another side in performance that allows them to turn up the aggression, increase their intensity, and lock into the task at hand. Everyone has the ability to flip the switch and become “a beast” when they step into their performance environment. It’s called the alter ego—everyone has one, yet very few people tap into it. It’s a place that allows you to break free of any self-doubt and limitations and completely dominate the task at hand.

It’s simple: As a repercussion of not tapping into this mental skill, you leave results on the table. Think about how many athletes you have on your roster who you know can bring more, but don’t. How many athletes do you know who have this amazing side to themselves that they don’t utilize?

As a repercussion of not tapping into the mental skill known as the alter ego, you leave results on the table, says @mattcaldaroni. Share on X

If you’re a strength coach who’s not helping your athletes tap into this mental skill, then you’re doing them a disservice. In this article, I’m going to teach you about the alter ego and how you can help your athletes truly empty the tank, be fully locked in, and dominate the task at hand.

Kobe Bryant’s Alter Ego

If you’re involved in sports at any level, then you’ve seen the power of the alter ego fully activated and utilized by one of the world’s most iconic athletes: Kobe Bryant, aka, the Black Mamba. While the majority of people thought it was just a good marketing tool, the truth is—as Kobe stated in his documentary “Muse”—he utilized his alter ego as a mental skill in performance.

It gave him the ability to turn off his personal life and the biosocial behaviors that came with it and turn on his true competitive nature in his professional life. It allowed him to be an easygoing guy outside of performance and a dominant force within performance. It allowed him to raise his standards and comply with what he was given while raising the standards of others around him as well. It made him a pleasure to work with in the weight room and turned him into an iconic individual in the sport of basketball.

He was able to take control and not just “think different” or focus on his breathing, like the majority of the “mental gurus” suggest, but instead fully embody a different being on the court. He dropped the personal drama, blocked out the noise, locked into the task at hand, and turned up the aggression and intensity. From 2004 on, Kobe didn’t stop dominating: At home he was Kobe Bryant, the soft, easygoing father, but at basketball he was the aggressive and intense Black Mamba—the leader of L.A.

I know that you’ve had athletes similar to Kobe before; ones who deal with personal issues at home and have to be able to block out the noise. Or ones who are naturally softer as a person and don’t often push their limits. How about the ones on the opposite end of the spectrum—the ones who are too engaged and can’t turn it off, often burning out, or ones who are too aggressive and out of control?

When you utilize the alter ego, you’re able to have your athletes push buttons that they didn’t even realize they had, says @mattcaldaroni. Share on X

The brilliance of this coaching tool is that it allows you to eliminate both of these issues within the athletes you work with; when you utilize the alter ego, you’re able to have your athletes push buttons that they didn’t even realize they had. You’re able to get them to lock into what you’re coaching them on, bring the most effort possible, and retain it when they’re finished by keeping them hungry for the next session. If you’re not utilizing the alter ego in your coaching, then you’re not truly serving the athletes you work with.

What Is the Alter Ego?

An alter ego is more than just a “change/separation of thinking,” and it’s more than just a self-talk or deep breathing mechanism. Truth be told, these “block out the noise” techniques commonly referred to aren’t extremely effective. Everyone who works with elite-level athletes knows that there’s too much going on for the athlete to be consciously thinking about “blocking things out.” It has to be instinctive; there has to be a tool that allows the athlete to stay locked in on one thing and focus on the task at hand, bringing the most compliance and effort during the session, and allowing them to retain after the session.

An alter ego does just that. It’s about embodying another being that gets turned on during performance, allowing an individual to drop all the noise, self-doubt, and negativity in performance and dominate the task at hand. It allows them to become the person who their team or performance needs them to be and get the results consistently. There’s no need to “cancel out thinking”; when you fully commit to identifying as a different being, you take on the characteristics of that individual. There’s no more thinking. Instead, there’s just taking action, which is ultimately what we want our athletes to do.

An alter ego, in its literal term, is a person’s secondary or alternative personality; it’s who they are in their performance environment. It’s who they choose to be when they’re performing at their sport. It contains mental, physical, and social traits that are ignited internally as a reaction to their environment. It’s turned on during performance but turned off after it. Some athletes choose to be an animal like Kobe did, while others choose to be a superhero or heightened version of themselves like Brian Dawkins, or “the X-Factor.” In short, they identify as something more aggressive that allows them to fully comply with the task at hand, bringing a strong effort to whatever it is that they have to do.

An alter ego is when an athlete identifies as something more aggressive that allows them to fully comply with a task, bringing a strong effort to whatever it is that they have to do. Share on X

Now here’s the most important part: your job as a strength coach is not to help your players find their alter ego—that’s my job as a resilience coach. Instead, your job is to pull this alter ego out of them; to help your athlete find that extra gear by creating an environment that fosters the alter ego to come out and communicating in ways that allows the individual to internally trigger themselves. If you want to get the most out of your athletes, if you truly want to serve them and take them to the next level, then you must add the alter ego into your coaching toolbox.

Why Every Athlete Needs an Alter Ego

Plain and simple: If you’re a strength and conditioning coach who’s not helping your athlete build their alter ego, then you’re leaving a lot on the table and forgetting about some of your responsibilities. The motivational aspect of strength coaching is a true art that I’m frequently asked to consult on. It’s a sticky topic with a lot of grey areas, and I always suggest utilizing the alter ego for this exact reason.

When you have a framework with proven results that allows you to play to the needs of both the individual and the group, then you’re taking care of all of your responsibilities. If you’re not using the alter ego, then you’re not giving your athletes the best chance to succeed. And more importantly, you’re not seeing their true competitive nature.

To keep things simple, and to provide the framework, I will talk about two case studies where I actively worked with strength and skills coaches to bring out the alter ego in their athletes. I will cover specific aspects in the comply, effort, and retain model and provide solutions for how to activate each portion in many different ways. The main methodologies for carrying out the alter ego for a strength coach are focusing on the communication and words utilized and tampering with the performance environment.

Case 1: Turn It Up

This past year, I’ve been working with an elite-level hockey skills coach. The two of us were given the task of working together to help an upcoming prospect break through to his fullest potential. The athlete lacked compliance to what was being asked of him, and in turn he lacked both effort and retention of the team’s requests. Outside of performance this athlete is a “nice guy”—he’s extremely intellectual, lets very few people in, doesn’t say too much, and is very methodical in his thinking.

This type of athlete is common. We deal with them on a regular basis: loaded with lots of talent and potential but doesn’t turn it up enough to be their best. As a result, he’d overanalyze a lot of situations, question methodologies, rein in effort, and have extremely slow starts. He left a lot on the table; he wasn’t at his absolute best in the weight room or on the ice. As a result, his job was in jeopardy, and he had to be dealt with immediately.

I carried out my work of finding out what made the athlete tick and worked with him to build an alter ego. It was now up to the skills coach to foster the right kind of communication and environment to pull the most out of the athlete and activate his alter ego. Within three weeks, cooperatively, we helped this athlete not only become a menace on the ice, but also a menace in the weight room. He was more social, intense, and compliant. The coach created an extremely strong environment to bring out the athlete’s alter ego, while I worked independently with the athlete to strengthen this mental skill behind the scenes. As a result, he brought a stronger effort into his on- and off-ice sessions. His compliance, effort, and retention all increased—here’s how.

Once I was able to understand the athlete and what made him tick (aka triggers), I relayed the information to the skills coach. He created an environment to turn these triggers on, or Step 1 to the alter ego, which I call “Turn On.” Before the session started, if time permitted, he focused on having an intense one-on-one conversation with the athlete about why he was here.

He focused on the pain (dark triggers) that the athlete would experience, like a missed opportunity to further his career, if he didn’t take action and be his best. He also focused on the pleasure (light triggers) that the athlete would experience if he did take action and comply fully; he spoke to him about how he’d take a step closer to helping his family financially. He’d also speak about the importance of making sure others were up to par; he’d mention to the athlete the importance of others in his environment being at their best as well, and why it was so important for the athlete to raise the level of others through his own personal work.

There were also days where the skills coach couldn’t catch the player before the training session started, so he’d just use the verbiage with the entire group during their warm-ups. He spoke aloud about connecting their current session to the rest of their careers; while the athletes warmed up, he spoke about them imagining how much pain would occur if they didn’t fully comply and take action during the session. He spoke about the importance of each rep and connected it to the rest of their lives.

The skills coach made it a point to force them to turn off the drama from their personal lives and turn on the intensity of their professional lives by speaking about it. He got them selfish and focused on themselves—he mentally warmed them up to be in a state of pain, or pleasure, lighting up their light or dark triggers and preparing the athletes, whether they consciously had one or not, to turn on their alter ego.

This is the mental warm-up you must put your athletes through, and it’s exactly what it sounds like: warming up the athlete mentally to turn on the alter ego. It works because it puts the athlete in a selfish state of mind; one of the best ways to get someone to comply is by helping them see how the current task helps them personally. Think: You’re dealing with the egos of elite individuals—they didn’t get to where they are by thinking only of others; they focused on themselves.

Mentally warm up an athlete to put them in a selfish state of mind. One of the best ways to get someone to comply is by helping them see how the current task helps them personally. Share on X

When you’re warming up an athlete mentally to turn on their alter ego and get them to comply, then you have to get the athlete selfish. It’s your job as a strength coach to light up the triggers of the individual and get them focused on seeing the connection of how the current task impacts their personal future. Like my friend from St. Louis, a strength and conditioning coach for elite level football, soccer, and hockey players, always says: “The guys who I’ve worked with who are the most locked in are the ones who are selfish.”

The importance of this is that there’s no “step back and breathe” portion to it. I often hear mental professionals speak about “taking the time to reflect before a performance with the group.” Let’s get real for a second: At the elite level, that should be something athletes do beforehand because they work with a professional like myself to build it into their day-to-day routine. When they get to their performance environment, it’s all business.

As a strength coach in elite environments, you often try to find ways to make the short amounts of time you’re given work. This is all about adapting on the fly to the fast-paced world of elite sports. Being able to pull someone aside for 60 seconds to mentally warm them up and turn on their alter ego is a rare bonus that this skills coach didn’t often come by. That’s why he had to learn the skill of being able to turn on the group versus just turn on the individual.

For the majority of this practice, you will have to be able to light up the triggers of the entire group you’re coaching to create a more competitive environment where every athlete will want to lock in and bring it. When you’re able to home in on the mental warm-up, you take that first step to alter ego: “turn on.” The amazing thing about this was that he not only got positive results out of the individual athlete he was trying to work with, he was able to get more results out of the group as a whole. Eventually, I worked with him to better understand each player that he was dealing with and consulted with him on how to pull the alter ego out of each and every one so that he could get the most out of them, creating a better compliance, effort, and retention rate out of all of them.

During the training session, the coach focused on Step 2: Maintain and Heighten. He actively shouted out directions and instructions to keep the performance environment in what I call “hunting mode.” He tailored his verbiage to become more about the team and less about the individual, and he got them to connect every single repetition to beating the upcoming opponent. This is where everything starts to change; Instead of making it “just another training session” for the team, he made it another day closer to winning against the opponent. Now he not only turned on the alter ego of the majority of his athletes, he was keeping it on.

He praised the positive repetitions of the athletes and spoke about how it was a “winning rep.” He talked about how the team was now “hunting together” instead of just going through the motions. He pulled out collaborative efforts and motivated the team in ways that they hadn’t been motivated before. More importantly, he pulled out the true competitive nature in each athlete without having to waste any time. He kept them locked in and focused, raising the standards of the environment and getting the majority to stay on the same page.

After the training session was done, the coach focused on Step 3: Turn Off. Whether during a cooldown or when he prepared them to go into the weight room after their on-ice session, the coach would speak with the team about how well they “hunted” during the session, and whether it truly resembled the results that the group was after collectively. He also asked the group to reflect on whether they sincerely gave an effort that was worthy of serving their dark and light triggers well. He used that time to speak to how good the group felt now that they’d taken care of business and what they had to do outside of the session. He got them to retain what they just did and focus on what they had to do next.

This is when that individual turned off their alter ego and prepared for what was next. This was a player who previously had been questioned whether he could perform at an elite level consistently, and now they’re speaking about him as the future of an organization. Imagine if this was untouched; imagine if this was left alone. The coach would’ve done a disservice to this high-potential talent, and there would’ve been a career left on the table.

Case 2: Get Relevant

In the second case study, I saw the same results with an elite-level strength coach who had to get more effort and retention out of an athlete who he and I had worked with. The organization had tried to get the most out of the elite-level goaltender for four years. They tried everything from turning it up, to backing off, to outright trying to scare the athlete into working harder and complying. We followed the exact same process with the athlete to help the strength coach pull the alter ego out of the individual.

I figured out the individual’s triggers and created an alter ego for him, and then the strength coach followed the same protocol. He took a bit of a different approach before each training session, however. He made it a point to show up early and speak with the athlete to get him selfish (Turn On and comply). During the training sessions, he made it a point to connect the repetitions and effort rate to the desired team results that the athlete was after (Maintain and Heighten and effort). After the training session, he helped the athlete understand if the effort matched his personal, and the team’s, desired results and helped him focus on what he had to do next (Turn Off and retain).

I was able to consult with the coach on the athlete because I was working with him individually to continue to find the triggers and make sure that he would turn off once the sessions were complete. We started working together on this athlete in September 2018, when the organization viewed him almost as a liability. To date, we have helped this athlete not only break performance barriers in the gym, but also on the ice—making the athlete one of the organization’s most valuable assets to date.

The Danger of Winging It and Doing It Alone

Here’s the thing: Being the “Samurai” in performance is cool, until you don’t know how to turn that Samurai off, and then it starts to disrupt your performance and personal and social lives. How many stories have we heard about athletes who go home and have abusive relationships because they can’t “turn it off”? Or the athletes who become extremely anxious or burnt out because they aren’t able to shut it down?

In both cases that I shared, the coaches had success because I was able to consult with them and teach them about when to shut it down and when to turn it up. Without proper guidance of this coaching tool, you’re playing with fire. I say this because I’m the individual who the athletes call to deal with the issues they face when they can’t turn it off.

It’s important to turn things up, but even more important to shut it down. If you don’t treat this tool (the alter ego) with seriousness and care, then you run the risk of burnout. Share on X

It’s important to turn things up, but it’s even more important to shut it down. What good does it do your athlete if they can only bring it for a day, but are then completely burnt out of the rest of the week? Forget about comply, effort, and retain—if you don’t treat this tool with seriousness and care, then you run the risk of burnout. The reason the first case I mentioned was successful was because the elite-level skills coach was able to receive intel from me on how the athlete was doing outside of performance. The reason that the second case I mentioned with the elite-level strength coach was successful was because he was able to understand how the athlete was feeling before he came into performance.

Both coaches were able to tame the beast that came out in performance, as well as pull it out of the individuals they worked with. In no way did they try to create the alter ego of the individual on their own. This is something that has to be handled with extreme caution and care, as you’re dealing with the identity of an individual both in and out of performance. As much as this can be one of your greatest coaching tools with guidance, it also can be one of your worst enemies without the proper understanding and guidance. Please don’t take chances with this tool.

Ensure Its Effective Use

Everyone has an alter ego. In order to effectively do your job as a strength coach and pull the most out of your athletes, you need to activate this alter ego. It’s your responsibility to motivate the athlete effectively, but most importantly, to do so in a way that doesn’t harm the well-being of the athlete.

The alter ego is an extremely strong coaching tool that’s replicable and viable across many different environments, but to properly utilize this tool you must have the right guidance and care to do so effectively. Again, you are doing your athletes a disservice if you know this coaching tool is here, but don’t take advantage of it. Don’t just wing it—empty the tank.

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

Allen, M.S., Jones, M., McCarthy, P.J., Sheehan-Mansfield, S., and Sheffield, D. “Emotions correlate with perceived mental effort and concentration disruption in adult sport performers.” European Journal of Sport Science. 2013;13(6):697-706.

Bray, C.D. and Whaley, D.E. “Team Cohesion, Effort, and Objective Individual Performance of High School Basketball Players.” The Sport Psychologist. 2001;15(3): 260-275.

Cusella, L. P. Feedback, motivation, and performance, Handbook of organizational communication: An interdisciplinary perspective. (p. 624-678). 1987: Sage Publications, Inc.

Fehr, E. and Fischbacher, U. “Why Social Preferences Matter – the Impact of non‐Selfish Motives on Competition, Cooperation and Incentives.” The Economic Journal. 2002;112(478):C1-C33.

Gillet, N., Valleranda, R.J., Amoura, S., and Baldes, B. “Influence of coaches’ autonomy support on athletes’ motivation and sport performance: A test of the hierarchical model of intrinsic and extrinsic motivation.” Psychology of Sport and Exercise. 2010; 11(2):155-161.

Harwood, C., Hardy, L., and Swain A. “Achievement Goals in Sport: A Critique of Conceptual and Measurement Issues.” Journal of Sport and Exercise Psychology. 2003;22(3):235-255.

Terry, D.J., Hogg, M.A., and White, K.M. “The theory of planned behaviour: Self‐identity, social identity and group norms.” British Journal of Social Psychology. 2010;38(3):511.

van der Werff, E., Steg, L., and Keizer, K. “The value of environmental self-identity: The relationship between biospheric values, environmental self-identity and environmental preferences, intentions and behaviour.”Journal of Environmental Psychology. 2013;34:55-63.

Van Knippenberg, D. “Work Motivation and Performance: A Social Identity Perspective.” Applied Psychology. 2001;49(3):401.

Yves, C., Guay, F., Tzvetanka, D.-M., and Vallerand, R.J. “Motivation and elite performance: an exploratory investigation with Bulgarian athletes.” International Journal of Sport Psychology. 1996;27(2):173-182.

Hopefully, the title of this article has already pissed off and confused many of you. Now that I have your attention, let me justify my thoughts and beliefs about the necessity of including running drills in your program.

As context matters, this is my world: coaching predominantly invasive team sport athletes (Aussie Rules Football, softball, rugby, and handball). I’ve more often than not experienced that neither the ability to execute any running drills (wall drills, A/B/C-marches/skips/bounds, dribbles, scissor runs) nor the qualitative improvement of those drills shares any relationship with sprint performance. So, I started to question how executing one skill has the potential to improve another skill.

I’ve more often than not experienced that neither the ability to execute any running drills, nor the qualitative improvement of those drills, shares any relationship with sprint performance. Share on X

We all agree that speed, or the ability to cover a given distance in as little time as possible, is an utmost crucial feature in many sports. Hence, many methods, traditions, and ideas prevail around this topic. With the increasing amount of information we share nowadays via a multitude of channels, it seems like we get to see a new running drill that “magically” unlocks the secrets of speed on a daily basis. This not only “muddies the water to make it seem deep” (Friedrich Nietzsche), it concomitantly increases our inability to see the forest for the trees when it comes to speed development. We urgently need a call for simplicity.

I think it is presumptuous to argue we need to break down a sprinting motion into its parts, learn or relearn the isolated patterns through part-practice, and put it back again into the whole motion. Despite the recent and increasing deterioration of humankind’s physical integrity, bipedal locomotion at a high velocity—aka sprinting—is the most fundamental movement pattern developed through a million years of evolutionary history, which not that long ago was essential to survive. So how can anyone not be able to sprint correctly?

The Emergence of Running Drills

The Polish sprint coach Gerard Mach initially designed running drills (A/B/C-marches/skips/bounds) to increase the work capacity of key sprint-specific muscle groups as regular speed work wasn’t possible due to adverse weather conditions in the winter and a lack of other resources. So, because actual sprinting wasn’t possible, athletes needed other methods to ensure (what we now call) adequate chronic workloads of sprint-specific capacities up until weather conditions allowed outside work again at meaningful volumes.

After several extrapolations and misinterpretation of this original idea, we now face a multitude of fancy-looking drills that some training professionals believe will manifest a certain sprinting technique and lead to better sprint performance in the team sport athlete. However, we subconsciously substitute the kinematic sequencing of the sprinting motion with actual sprinting performance. But what is good for track athletes must be good for any other athletes in an endeavor to improve their speed characteristics, so the drills are being blindly applied in team sports in the hope of a similar effect.

We all agree that the particular gains one individual gets from a distinct gym program won’t necessarily work for another person to the same degree. Yet we assume that a small—likely negligible—part of a holistic track program shares a causal relationship with the manifestation of track athletes’ superior sprint performance and therefore must be equally effective for an entirely different context and cohort of athletes, while ignoring all confounding variables.

Further, we must be aware and acknowledge the representative heuristic when evaluating the sprinting performance of our athletes. With that said, we tend to subconsciously compare our athlete against an archetype biomechanical model of sprinting (usually a sagittal plane view) and regard distinct kinematic features of high importance (think high knee position), which we then try to impose on our athletes. However, all we do is just drill them into a robotic and uniform sprint pattern derived from the same set of drills. It doesn’t seem like a step towards antifragility to me. Also, why do we feel obliged to enforce a change to what has been developed over long periods of time?

Your Current Technique Is Your Best Technique…So Far

In simple terms, we know that movement is a function of the organism, the task, and the environment, as defined by Newell decades ago with his simplistic conceptual framework of human movement. There are other important constraints influencing the appearance and time course of the movement forms that occur at the psychosocial level, but our industry doesn’t highlight them. Action selection can be conceived as a result of the interaction of task, organismic, and environmental constraints in relation to the psychosocial attributes (figure 1).

Further, the “constraint optimization” concept states that the behavior of a biological system at any time will always be optimal for the specific confluence of constraints acting on the individual system, as evidence from theoretical and evolutionary biology suggests. So, we must assume that the current movement solution (sprint technique) is the individual’s ideal; however, this is not necessarily related to an optimal performance outcome (better sprint times). But as athletes mature and go through sophisticated training programs, we’ve all seen improvements in sprint performances that come in the presence or absence of kinematic changes. Just because the current movement solution is allegedly the individual’s optimum, doesn’t mean that it cannot be improved.

Just because the current movement solution is allegedly the individual’s optimum doesn’t mean that it cannot be improved, says @DanielKadlec. Share on X

Therefore, our job as coaches is to increase an underlying and possibly insufficient capacity and/or give them opportunities to practice not-yet-experienced motor patterns and thus unlock new possibilities in relation to time. Or, in other words, facilitate the magnitude and timing of each muscle’s force production. As learning often involves breaking out of initial stable states, we cannot expect this to be a linear process. Now, you could argue for the need to shift potentially suboptimal attractors in order to engrain new ones.

Further, we need to agree that any physical improvement can only manifest itself within the limits of the individual’s adaptative capacity. While everybody can get faster, not everybody will be fast due to the limits of their organismic constraints as we need to acknowledge the inherent variability in anthropometrics and arthrokinematics between individuals. As highlighted previously, not everyone can attain the performance or motor pattern that their subconscious mind tells them to aspire to, independent of how much time and energy they invest to do so. Just because some athletes do attain those shapes, it doesn’t mean everyone has the same potential to get there. Hence, let’s all stop trying to force individual athletes into the same robotic patterns.

For argument’s sake, let’s assume there is indeed a technical flaw and we have correctly identified it. We then need to ask ourselves: What potential do we have to change or hopefully improve the athlete’s movement pattern while optimizing performance? What amount of resources (time and energy) will it take to optimize it? What methods are the most efficient to do so? Despite the complexity and uncertainty of this question…the answer most likely can’t be running drills, as they simply cannot provide a meaningful overload, as we’ll see next.

Running Drills and the Principle of Overload

We all know one key element to elicit any desired adaptation is the principle of overload. Therefore, we must impose demands that are greater than in the skill that we want to improve. Overload can take the form of any characteristic of force production, such as the peak moment applied around the joint, peak external force applied, size of the external resistance moved, rate of force development, power output, or movement velocity achieved.

Before digging into some detailed biomechanical evidence, let me raise this question: How can an activity done at 2–3 ms^-1 (in some drills, maybe up to 5 ms^-1) come anywhere near the mechanical demands of another activity done at around 10 ms^-1? This inherent difference in resultant ground force production entirely refutes the notion that we can improve any physical capacities. Any claims that running drills have the potential to overload any physical capacities mainly responsible for lower limb stiffness and/or ground contact times are, thus, laughable.

Any claims that running drills have the potential to overload any physical capacities mainly responsible for lower limb stiffness and/or ground contact times are laughable. Share on X

Another argument for the implementation of running drills is their claimed potential to facilitate improvements in rhythm, fluidity, relaxation, smoothness, and/or co-contraction (have any of them been somehow quantified yet?); hence, provide a coordinative overload or an idea how the movement should look. Without going down the rabbit hole of motor learning and skill acquisition, there is more than enough evidence questioning the presence of not just general coordinative abilities but also a transferability between—what I’d like to emphasize—inherent different skills. While sprinting is dominantly a reflexive, innate, violent, and subconscious activity at 100% effort, the aim of all those running drills is to consciously hit and experience several artificial kinematic patterns at 20–50% of maximal velocity.

When we look at tables 1–3 (derived from @DebsSides’ PhD thesis—I recommend it highly!), which describe the kinematic characteristics between a sprint and three different running drills, we see there are more significant differences than similarities. Therefore, we must really question whether running drills have the potential to provide any overload. Finally, we also know how important fun and enjoyment are for skill acquisition and motor learning—never, ever, have I witnessed any athlete enjoying or at least not hating doing any of those drills…

Simplicity Is the Key to Brilliance

Ultimately, only sprinting itself has the greatest potential to improve sprint technique. When you are not moving at around maximal velocities, you are working on an entirely different skill set while inherently undershooting mechanical demands. So, if you want to get better at the skill of sprinting, you have to practice that particular skill. Specific adaptations to imposed demands 101.

The major part of my speed training approach is to rely on mainly maximal sprints to promote the desired adaptations in the skill and capacity needed to hit faster and faster velocities. Share on X

Hence, the major part of my speed training approach is to rely on predominantly maximal sprints to promote the desired adaptations in the skill and capacity needed to hit faster and faster velocities. In general, the sprint is the first exercise that goes into the training plan and the very last one that gets cut. As the rate of adaptations slows down over time for each method, and the law of diminishing returns manifests itself, athletes need exposure to other specific yet variable enough methods.

We know from motor learning and skill acquisition research that task variability (differential learning and constraints-led approach) and implicit communication strategies (instructions and feedback) are beneficial in order to maximize learning and retention. Therefore, we need to deliberately add different methods alongside appropriate cues to challenge the current abilities and ensure a continuous progression in sprinting performance (table 4).

Because “tolerance is a proof of distrust in one’s own ideals” (Friedrich Nietzsche), I have successfully cut every single running drill from my program independent of what sport I’ve worked with. After the most general warm-up to increase HR and muscle temperature in the key muscle groups, I usually jump straight into (max) speed work. My athletes haven’t yet experienced any adverse effects.

I have successfully cut every single running drill from my program independent of the sport I’ve worked with. My athletes haven’t yet experienced any adverse effects, says @DanielKadlec. Share on X

Most likely, there will never be an RCT to test my hypothesis, so we need to rely on evidence from other sources and common sense—both areas just don’t have any meaningful and logical arguments for the implementation of running drills in team sports. In addition to reason and evidence, “Perfection is achieved, not when there is nothing more to add, but when there is nothing left to take away.” (Antoine de Saint-Exupery).

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