Sport-Specific or “Culture-Specific”?

Sport-Specific or “Culture-Specific”?

Recently a friend of mine and a fellow physical preparation coach, who was working with futsal and was preparing Olympic level Judokas, got an offer to take care of a pro basketball team. Since I was the one recommending him to the agent, I was questioned would he be a good fit, taking into account his lack of experience working in basketball. 

This is very common issue for physical preparation coaches because each sport is totally different and represents totally different needs and specifics. Right? Wrong!

Sport coaches believe that their sport is special and have special physical needs not shared with any other sport. That is because they were most likely never involved in working with other sports. Things are not black and white.

I believe that, when it comes to physical preparation, most sports are more similar than different. This might be a blasphemy to sport-specific movement/community out there, but I will take the risks and provide my rationale.

The shared commonalities are dynamic ~ they tend to be bigger or smaller between sports. I am NOT saying that all sports should approach physical preparation the same way, NOR I am saying that they should be approached in completely specific and different way. Physical preparation is multifaceted and involves different component that could be shared between sports in higher or lover degree (e.g. strength vs aerobic capacity). Truth is in the shades of grey.

Those who cannot understand this ‘complementary’ approach are better off reading some other blogs which are more black and white, dogmatic and ruled by beliefs and selling points and tricks. Here we (try to) use our brains.

Going back to aforementioned friend of mine ~ I reassured the agent, and he did the same with the head coach, that my friend is a great pick, but he will need some time to get into the basketball CULTURE along with getting into the specific needs of the basketball players (positions, physical demands & needs, injury tendencies, etc). I was pretty sure he was already versed in making HUMANS stronger, faster, more powerful, mobile, endurant and resilient and it will be matter of short time until he gets the feel of the basketball culture and specific needs. I hope one understands the message here: a lot of shared needs because we are training humans and humans need to run, jump and throw with some specifics of a given sport and culture.

Sometimes sport coaches (head coaches and managers) make the following mistake: since they believe that their sport is the same regardless of the country where it is being played, they fail miserably when they take the vacancy in abroad due completely different CULTURES.  Sport is the same, but the cultures are different. Cultures demand different approaches. One cannot put the square peg in the round hole even if the objects are built of the same color and material (i.e. same sport).

Sometimes I wonder whether the sports differ (in physical preparation aspect) based on the movement patterns involved and specific needs, or based on the CULTURE involved. Soccer coaches keep whining how their sport is being special flower and is demanding special treatment/approach (not far off from athletes involved, with the couple of exceptions of course) called soccer-specific training while keep hammering leg extensions, balance/bosu board, ab curls and partial bench presses. Strength and conditioning coaches coming into sport like soccer, most likely need to get a feel for a soccer culture rather than a soccer-specific demands. This is the thing that differ the most and the thing that one needs adapting to.

I am not saying here that sport physical preparation should resemble preparation of powerlifters, weightlifters, sprinters, marathoners, crossfitters, gymnasts, throwers and others. This is on the completely other extreme of the problem spectrum and it is also worth mentioning for the sake of having a full and clear picture of the issues.

In some sports, like (American) football, the physical preparation went to the completely other extreme ~ disregarding of the sport specifics and it’s needs, and pursuing strength numbers and basically making footballers a powerlifters.

Make sure to remember the goal of physical preparation for sports: TRANSFER. Transfer to the field performance and injury reduction and resilience (anti-fragility). Steve Maxwell wonderfully outlined in the recent article that the goal is not demonstrating strength (exercise as an end unto itself), but building strength (exercise as a mean to an end).

Powerlifters, weightlifters, gymnasts are strength specialists ~ they need feats of strength in specific movements. (Team) Sport athletes are strength generalists ~ they need general strength in movement patterns that build up general organism strength and resilience and provide performance transfer to the field and most notably to improve run, jump and throw (add maybe carry, tackle, throw down, kick, punch) – in other words also general movement patterns, and here comes the drums, which are common to most humans and hence sports. Nothing extremely special in the sprint, jump and throw (and other patterns) between sports that is not already being taken cared of by practicing one’s sport anyway.

Going back to strength specialists vs. generalists. Strength specialists approach strength training as either (1) skill training and skill acquisition, or as (2) ‘biomotor quality’ training or some combo solution between the two. The former train their lifts frequently and approach it as a ‘form’ (skill). The latter approach strength training as a ‘substance’ – these usually train specific lifts less frequently and try to increase strength as a ‘biomotor ability’ rather than as a specific skill. Think of this as Sheiko vs. Westside. This is what I call “The Root Problem: Substance vs. Form” and I actually did the whole presentation on it (click HERE and HERE).

A lot of sports ‘suffer’ from the similar problem: for example throwers in certain schools (or should I say CULTURES?) did ‘substance’ training to increase strength and only used actual throwing to ‘realize’ that substance into competitive form; others, with the prime example being Anatoly Bondarchuk did throws to improve ‘special strength’ and skills and put ‘substance’ training on hold after certain level is reached. I have also tried to explain my rationale for inclusion of running-based conditioning (‘substance’) alongside with play practices (‘form’) in team sports HERE.

It is important to realize that even strength specialists differ in their approach and philosophy (in how they solved the Root Problem). Anyway, strength generalists should always have transfer and injury resilience as a main objective and not pursuing strength feats number, although they do provide certain guidelines, possible thresholds and motivating goals.

Hence there is no need to split the hair whether front squats are better than back squats or trap bar deadlift/squat as long as we provide progressive overload and variety in double led squat pattern with our athletes without making them injured in the process. Some coaches differ on the dogmatic scale regarding how much they fall in love in certain exercises and how much they defend their “Precious” exercises. Their athletes buy in into those and hence we have a culture developed. And cultures differ, not the reality.

In team sports physical performance’ relationship to either game outcome or physical qualities of the players, is simply more complex, as Martin Buchheit would say. Things are not linear ~ they are complexly moderated and mediated between a lot of factors. Some coaches and researches would love us to believe that things are simple and linear: increase your aerobic power, which will increase your running/physical performance in a game (run more), which will make you dominate over the opponents, which will make you win. Unfortunately reality is far, far more complex than that. 

To summarize this before it becomes too long:

• Sometimes it is the culture that differs between sports the most, not physical needs. Culture specific vs. sport specific needs and differences.

• We are dealing with humans in most of the sports (if you didn’t realized this statement has some joke elements) ~ humans need to run, jump, throw, kick, punch, tackle, carry, throw down. They need to perform these tasks in their respectable sports. Improving these is the goal of physical preparation – there are some sport-specific differences, but things are more similar than they are different.

• The aim of physical preparation is not to make powerlifters of our athletes, nor to cuddle them with ‘sport-specific’ strength training (read: crap training involving some circus tricks while balancing on bosu ball, because, hey! sport  movements are done on a single leg in unstable environment). There is also no point in falling in love with certain exercises. Take care of movement patterns ~ create safe, progressive and variable training environment. Also make sure do to what NEEDS to be done, not only what CAN be done. This is often the problem, so we need to balance the two and find the best solution.

• There are no clear linear causal links between physical attributes, physical game performance and game outcome which make this more complex, but also more interesting. Some elements are more linked, some are not. Some links are moderated and mediated. Don’t be dogmatic – understand and appreciate the complexity

• Physical preparation in my opinion is 50% human specific (we need to improve the general movement patterns: run, jump, throw and others), 30% sport/culture specific (how are these movements performed in a sport and how much; how are they “modulated” taking into account skill related factors; positional demands and injury tendencies; what are cultural differences of the sport; what are sport view how these should be developed and approached) and 20% individual specific (individual player motivation and characteristics, preferences, injury history and tendencies)

Increasing sense of control in team sports

 Increasing sense of control in team sports

Sometime too little control and too much freedom/flexibility can lead to unhappiness, lack of consistency and guidance.  There are many too flexible dieting failing, too flexible training programs failing, and too flexible leadership failing.  What concerns me is that humans think that limiting flexibility and freedom is by nature bad – but the research says otherwise. Please see the video by Dan Gilbert.

On the flip side, lack of flexibility can lead to lack of feeling of being in control and that is a huge stressor and usual factor in overtraining and burnout.

There is a fine line between too much and too little control/flexibility. It is one of the examples of complementary aspect in leadership and management. Control~freedom. Structure~flexibility

“..it's important to remember that structure is what pays the bills, but variety is what keeps you coming back day after day.” --- Charles Staley

I have blogged about this issue before and I really love how Charles Staley solved this paradox in strength training by prescribing compulsory and optional exercises in a workout. This provides enough of wiggle room for the athlete to make his own choices and have a feeling of being in control.  You can read more about it HERE, HERE, HERE and HERE among other Staley’s tips.

Going back to the team sports, last couple of seasons I wanted to use one rule with the players, but unfortunately didn’t go through with the staff. This simple rule can provide a great sense of being in control in a very structured team practices and I believe it can decrease psychological stress on the athletes by giving them a little wiggle room and control over what is happening.

This rule is simple: 3 no-questions-asked days off a month per player. This rule can be further constrained to restrict certain days for such a rule (e.g. Game day, couple of day before a game, etc) or that they cannot be used back-to-back (e.g. two days in a row). One can go over this with players and let them figure out the rules of using it.  They can also figure out a way to increase those days (awards for great effort, consistency, team work, etc ~ make sure it is not ‘talent’ or ‘ability’, but effort or chemistry) or decrease (punishment: bad behavior, being late, showing lack of effort, whining, excuses, etc). In my opinion it is important to get the players involved in decision making and policy making for the team. This will increase ‘buy-in’ and everything else in the Patrick Lencioni’s Pyramid.  Buy in is very important, so the players can show commitment, even if they don’t completely agree (but their opinion is being heard through trust and productive conflict) and hold each other accountable. It is also easy to punish without emotional burden when the rules and policies are agreed upon before the fault.

The coaches might feel that rule like this is absurd and retarded, but in the long run it might help decrease the burnout chances and increase honesty, trust and culture in general. Even the effort might improve if the players know they can get a day of with no questions asked if needed. I am not sure this will lead to slacking ~ it is not 10 days anyway :)

I also believe that investing in a good management, policies and structure might lead more benefits than training monitoring. Rules like these might be more effective than some expensive 'readiness' monitoring.

Opinions, critiques are welcome as usual...

Heads Up: The best recent review article on fatigue and my application of it

This is the finest piece of art and science by Tim Noakes, the 'father' of Central Governor Model (CGM) of exercise regulation.

Fatigue is a brain-derived emotion that regulates the exercise behavior to ensure the protection of whole body homeostasis 

 

I want to thank Mike Nelson for posting it on his FB wall. I printed this one out and really enjoyed reading it. Although I follow Noakes' group in the last 5 years or more I guess (and I have been corresponding with the Tim couple of times), this paper really hit the target, at least for me. 

At the moment I am contemplating about physiological~psychological or biological~behavioral differences  between pre-set training (a.k.a. percent based) and auto-regulatory training (for a review make sure to check Matt Perryman's article). 

Hopefully, I will  expand on pros and cons of each in the near future and I must admit that Noakes' article did put some more oil on this fire. The point is that with modifying the way we perceive work along with other factors might influence our behavioral and thus biological/training effect - "Accordingly Tucker (2009) has proposed a model of exercise regulation which “incorporates anticipatory/feedforward as well as feedback components, using an expectation of exercise duration to set an initial work rate and to generate what has been termed a subconscious ‘template’ for the rate of increase in the RPE" (page 6).

In some scenarios (again context dependency) certain percent-based training program will yield better training effects compared to auto-regulatory program, not because of it's 'superior' design, but because it affects irrational~rational behavior of the humans and thus training effects and vice versa. And this irrational~rational behavior is affected by the effort and exhaustion perception (which brings us to Noakes article). The way we give instructions, feedback, influence constraints will affect behavior, effort and thus training effect. There is no 'ultimate strategy', thus coach need to modify it according to the context, goals and population he is dealing with. And this goes beyond gym work.

At the moment my athletes are doing percent based training (I mostly utilize tables from Dan Baker and Joe Kenn) because it affects how they behave in the gym, not because program is superior to some other. Having predetermined weights, reps, sets and rest minimize the wiggle room and decision making by athletes. This is of course double-edged sword IMHO - because biological systems are not linear and we cannot plan in advance the performance for a given day. Yes, we do have certain flexibility, but we mostly stick to the number on the sheet. Periodic evaluation (doing AMRAP tests and calculating new max) helps to be more along the line with the current adaptation. 

I tried this approach myself last month and I did pretty good, because it affected my wiggling and stupid irrational behavior (check How to be your own coach by Lyle McDonald). Usually I push myself too much and I tend to over think everything and that is a burden. With percent based approach I go in, do it, get out and unload when needed. No decision making when under fire (at least try to minimize it - using flexibility in black and white - too hard? don't do more sets). This worked pretty fine until couple of days ago, when I felt like sh*t and I pushed the weights as written on the paper during the squat workout. I felt angry, I checked the percentages and luckily I stopped on the 5th set, or else I would got injured (I did got sore as HELL the next couple of days though). This brings me to Jim Wendler advice of starting with 90% of max and going submaximal, and to idea that flexibility should be taken into account as well even in percent based training. 

We need black-and-white flexibility strategies in both percent-based and auto-regulatory training to avoid the showing of the irrational Chimp (I am reading really good book by Dr. Steve Peters - The Chimp Paradox). These black-and-white strategies come for The Switch book which I find very influential on me. 

Some folks utilize these black-and-white strategies in dieting as well (think intermittent fasting, either you eat or you don't). In strength training for example, the black-and-white strategy in percent-based training would be "if it feels to havy, do only one set", while in auto-regulatory training with drop-off sets time limits serve the purpose or limiting how much damage you do. The problem with auto-regulatory training is that we put the trust in athlete's decision making  (and thus the Chimp's ugly head can come up more easily) and that might be really good in some cases and/or REALLY bad on another (i.e. 20 soccer players in the gym vs. advanced olympic lifter).  One approach I just came across is to implement both variations of percent-based and autoregulatory approach with Autoregulatory Cluster Training. Seems like an interesting idea.


To avoid giving decision making to the Chimp, especially when the shit hits the fan and you get irrational in the gym, tools like Gym Aware comes to my mind - you stop when you hit certain decrement in power/depth whatever instead of relying on your self-perception of technique and any feel or subjective indicator in general. And that's why it is important to have training partners as well. 

How many times you felt like sh*t, you did a warm-up and you hit a PR? And how many times you felt great, and the effort to put that 20kg plate on the bar seamed higher than usual along with moving the warm-up sets. Our perceptions are tricky. It doesn't mean they are lying all the time, but it means we need to take them with grain of salt.

The key is to have rationally defined strategies (in black and white) BEFORE you become irrational. Think of moving your alarm clock to another room, so when it rings you have to move out of bed instead of hitting snooze button. Please note that this happens even if you decided that you will go on that 5am run last night.

The recent research in behavioral sciences (behavioral economics) show us that we are not rational beings at all and certain context and affections can influence how me make a decisions. I got injured numerous times because I was pursuing some goal (and yes, I believe that this new-age goal setting movements is sometimes out of the freakin' line) instead enjoying the trip and being mindful at the moment. And now I want to try to identify those certain patterns that might help with behavioral aspects of exercise programming.

And coming back to Noakes, the way we design the workouts might influence the amount of exertion and effort we might sense and thus it might influence behavior and training effects. For example, if I need to eat a bunch of frogs the best possible solution would be to eat the biggest one first - thus, the hardest set could be your first one. I know I need to hit one set hard and then just do couple of them with dropped off weight (please check Martin Berkhan's Reverse Pyramid). Compare this to couple of sets across - it feels more demanding (perception) than the former, even you might end up doing LESS work. 

When doing intervals and training session in general, I've also noticed that when the athletes know the end points (what are they doing in the practice, and how long does it going to take) they tend to chose higher pace (power output) compare when they don't know what are they doing and for how long. Sometimes, you don't want to athletes to know how long certain effort will last because this happens in competition, but sometimes you want them to know so they can pace and give you higher effort.

We have also been experimenting with decreasing intervals - for example 30/30 @ 100% MAS for 3x6min compared to 7,6,5min. Even if the total volume is the same (18mins), the latter might seem easier to athletes (eat the biggest frog first), where 5,6,7 might seem really heavy. Depending on what are your goals you might choose different option. 

Also, a little trick - for example you decide to do 4 sets of intervals, and you tell athletes that they are going to do 5, but you allow athletes to bitch and on their demand you decide to do reduce to 4. Wow, they feel they have a right to decide and they feel more in control of the workload which might make them to actually give you more effort on those 4. 

The problem is that you cannot trick yourself when you have yourself as the athlete.... or you can? In the mean time check this study - Effects of deception on exercise performance: implications for determinants of fatigue in humans.

TED videos

I’ve been enjoying TED videos recently and I just wanted to share some of them I consider worth watching.

They go pretty well with The Switch and The Happiness Hypothesis book. I’ve found these two books very interesting and one of the best non-training (at least on the first glance) books I have read in a while.

The positive psychology approach (concentrating on your strengths) is very interesting to me and it goes pretty well with ’Finding the bright spots’ for the Rider (if you don’t know what the hell am I talking get your hand on The Switch book).

I suppose this can be used in sport coaching as well. For example, in a group of athletes, coaches are often focused on bad performers and provide critique to them („Lift those damn knees when doing skips John!“). Instead I think one should concentrate more on good performers and provide positive reinforcements and specific feedback for them ("Great knee height John. Great arm action"). This is easier said than done of course, because we are biased toward negative stuff. Been there, done than. Trust me. This approach demands a lot of work.

Another fine read on this pedagogic aspects of coaching is Lyle’s mega series Because We Let Them. Really good read when it comes to Motivation 2.0 (see The Drive book) or carrot~stick, punishment~reward. Anyway, behavior can be explained by context as well (’what looks like a human problem is often a situation problem’) as presented in some of the videos above. 

The more I am involved in coaching the more I realize that psychology is crucial things. To be honest, I suck at it. But hell, I admitted and I am learning :)

Random thoughts from the training camp. Part 2

Recently, we went on two training camps (the first one was on Mountain Tara, and the second one was in Stara Pazova, in the national team state of the art facility). I’ve been pretty busy lately and unable to blog due all that training and travel. Anyway, here is the second part of random thoughts from training camps.

Strength training

            I’ve been reading Dan Baker’s articles regarding strength training and conditioning and I have found one old one (from 1994) especially interesting: Periodization: The Effect on Strength of Manipulating Volume and Intensity. 

            One of the conclusions of this paper was that:

Over a short training cycle, non-periodized strength training results in the same gains as does linear and undulating periodized strength training, when training volume and relative intensity are equated

This non-periodized strength training is simple 5x6 training program, where linear is 5x10 to 3x3 (please read the full article). This 5x6 is very similar to Starting Strength 3x5 or Bill Starr’s 5x5 which are both non-periodized (for more info please read Planning the Strength Training articles). The question is what is the rationale behind more complex rep/set alternations (or Cycle-Length Variants as Dan Baker use to call them)? I think I gave pretty much extensive answer to that question in Planning the Strength Training and What the Heck is Periodization Anyway, but I would love to present another ‘paradigm’ behind it. 

Why would one need to progress from 10 reps to 3 reps, when doing a simple non-periodized strength program may yield same training effect (over a short cycle for beginner/intermediate athletes)? If we take ‘repetition continuum’ (anatomic adaptation zone, hypertrophy zone,  relative strength zone) out of equation, I think that we are dealing with training potential (please take a look at SST: Manual for Coaches) of certain percentage of 1RM. From the principle of using  the least amount of training load to bring up the adaptation, the beginner and someone coming from off-season will yield same (or almost the same) adaptations (in terms of strength improvement) by utilizing the 70% or 95% of 1RM, while the 70% will be a lot safer and done with better technique. The greater the intensity/intensiveness the quicker the results, but also the quicker the stagnation and shorter the residual training effects. Easy come, easy go. Just my 2 cents on the issue.

Training potential of different training means

 

Another interesting topic is intensiveness of training and build~test concept. In short, intensiveness is how hard the set feels or should I say proximity of failure or true RM (repetition maximum) and it is usually expressed as RPE number. Training programs utilize certain Cycle-Length variations that ‘plays’ with loading parameters (intensity, reps, sets, volume, rest, etc), but I guess the real rationale behind is the progression in intensiveness even for non-periodized programs (like 5x5, where once you stagnate you reduce the intensity for 20% and start all over, for example).

First you start easy, you build and you peak. Rinse and repeat. If you keep pushing it, you will need to do training for the broken. What I want to say is that on the fundamental level programs progress from easy to hard. These are intensiveness concepts. 

Progression in intensiveness

 

This concept goes pretty well with every training program out there. Take 5/3/1 for example. You start easy with 10% reduction in your 1RM. Even if the last set for key movement is usually done for max reps (RPE 10), this can be ‘cycled’ too, by “picking up your battles” (as stated by Jim Wendler in the new 5/3/1 for Powerlifting).  When you start to struggle, you reduce 1RM for 10% and start all over. Rinse and repeat. You cannot force adaptation, you need to take it into account. 

The point being taken here is that we have certain ‘limited energy’ for doing intensive work before we burn-out and stagnate. I think this is substance principle of all form programs (substance~form complementary pair) and it is principle behind all training programs (construct in construct~constraints). The question is how this fundamental principle evolves as the lifter advances and how it affects his planning (based on his level). For example, beginners can do intensive training for all exercises in certain workout. Intermediates need to pick their battle within the workout in terms which exercise(s) are they going to push real hard. Advanced need to do that too, but also needs to choose during what days are they going to do it.  Elites have short periods during which they are able to spend their ‘limited energy’ to push key exercises. More on this can be found in Planning the Strength Training.

In my opinion this can be applied to Build~Test complementary pair. Building strength and testing strength is not the same. As Jim Wendler said, if it was the same, then all you would need to do is do a meet every day. Smart guy that Jim. And strong. Damn strong. 

Building strength demands certain volume and less intensiveness. Please note that I didn’t say less intensity, but lower intensiveness. Lower intensiveness will allow you more volume. Testing strength demands very small volume and high intensiveness. Both processes are important and complementary.  

At the end of  the mentioned article, Dan Baker stated that: 

Training volume appears to be an important training variable for developing LBM and muscular strength. Prolonged high intensity/low volume  training should be avoided.

If we consider training intensity as the most important criteria in terms of what adaptation is seen (training effect and training potential): hypertrophy, anatomic adaptation, maximum strength, relative strength, power, etc then we are left with a combo of intensiveness and volume to manipulate recovery, maintenance, build and test of preparedness. I think this can be applied to all training types besides strength only, like energy system development (build~test of aerobic energy system, glycolytic system, etc). 

Like Socrates, I am struggling to find the Truth, or unifying principles (of construct~constraints, biology of adaptation and training programs ) that are common to all good programs out there…

Socrates

World Congress for Science and Football

            I recently came across this by reading Carl Valle’s blog and Mark Upton’s website. I have downloaded most if not all videos from wcsf2011 YouTube Channel and I am watching one presentation after another. 

 

I have seen presentation by Inigo Mujika and Mark Williams and they are really good. Other articles that go well with William’s presentations are Lyle McDonald series on Talent~Work and a short article by The Science Of Sport. 

The SWITCH

I have just finished this book that I waited for a long time. It is an easy read and provides some great ideas how to induce change in team sport settings among everything else without using carrot~sticks. It goes pretty well with the Drive.  I am contemplating how to utilize it within my club settings at the moment. Really good book that you should read. 

Psychology... Effort versus Details

I was just reading interview with coach Buddy Morris and he made couple of insights on the difference between working with pro athletes and college athletes. I don't know how it is working with college athletes and in that kind of environment, but I do know how it is to work with Serbian pro soccer athletes and pro volleyball players. At least I think I know.

My 2 cents for today is that there is not a lot of info out there that deals with psychology of working with pro athletes. You know, organizing training, monitoring, motivation and stuff. In my opinion, 80% of results comes from doing the basics with full effort and commitments, while other 20% comes from doing the details and other fancy-shcmensy stuff. There is no point on doing advanced loading patterns, specialized exercises, chains, bands, periodization schemes, supplementation and stuff  with half-assed effort and sucking at the basics. I see a lot of coaches talking about CNS fatigue, hormonal system load, advanced recovery procedures, EMS, gadgets, etc. while their athletes are unable to do a proper BW squat, 10 pull ups and a clap push-up. Well, to do that you need to freakin' training hard (in the basics) in the first hand.

The problem I deal with is how to motivate the athletes to do the basics with full effort commitment. How do you approach the group, how do you motivate them to keep pushing hard and smart. We know that athletes doesn't care how much you know until they know how much you care, but the info stops here. Do we need to teach them how to fish (if they actually give a fuck about that, and pro's actually don't in most of the cases) or we need not to give them any choice? How do we juggle the team as a whole and adapt to individual (character, emotional) differences? This is the skill of coaching that you don't learn in school nor from books. And I am first to admit that I have problems with this. Hell, stop writing about periodization stuff and other sport science crap, and let's deal with the fact that you need to make a guy squat regularly and deeply when:

1. He is not playing in the game but rather warms up the bench
2. His paycheck is delayed for 3 months
3. His girlfriend banged his co-player from the club
4. He got ankle sprain while helping his friend move furniture to another appartment

Let's get back to real life people.

I remember one quote from NSCA journal when they made a poll on 'periodization use' of training in American Football. One guy answered that he trains them when they are not broken. That keeps ringing in my ears since then, especially now.

Hell, we need to take mindset, culture and everything into context, get more pragmatic, do the basics and stop obsessing about advanced stuff. Stop pretending you are an expert coach who knows all about training planning, periodization while you are unable to make your athletes do the basics. Keep it simple stupid.

Training for the „Broken“

So after writing down the Riding the Wave, a blog entry on cyclic nature of the training process, I decided to take a break from heavy lifting, grinding out and chasing PRs and obsessing with progressive overload. My SI (Sacro Iliac) joint started to nag me again, as well as my left shoulder. Nothing special, just a sign that I was overdoing something. Too much of a good thing can be a bad thing too. 

In the recent years there seems to be a certain pattern emerging from my training. I start easy, build up, start chasing and grinding PRs and then I get injured or burned out. So, this time to prevent this from happening I decided to take a week or two from that type of work and mindset and get back to the basics, enjoy & play a little and work on imbalances, mobility, stability, technique and anatomic adaptation.

A discussion on Monkey Island made me think about utilizing ISO Holds (Isometric Holds) as a method of achieving my goals for this transition period.  

In that particular thread you can find links to the studies supporting to a degree my idea that ISO Holds can help rehabilitation, because scar and injured issues utilize lactate as a form of fuel for repair (and in blood occlusion happening in ISO Holds there is going to be plenty of it, and plenty of it in extreme stretches) .  Besides, ISO Holds can work wonders for technique in the extreme ranges (bottom) and they are not so taxing and also work wonders for flexibility. So, I decided to give it a try, again.

The workouts are fairly random, because I don’t want to fixate over the minutiae  (I am obsessed with the details and sometimes this make me burnout once in a while), but rather go in the gym and lift (or pose if you think more about it, since with ISO Holds you are not lifting). Workouts can be full body or upper/lower, but I love full body better for this purpose and period.

Anyway, even if the workouts are basically full body, I will classify the exercises on upper/lower/core topology.    

LOWER BODY

Back Squat. You can keep it parallel or let the fatigue drift you ass to grass. Work on the strong arch, knee positions, upper body tightness  and weight balance (you can play and shift the weight from heel to forefoot and see how it feels). Also, a loop band can be used around the knees to help activate the glutes and hip rotators.

Good morning. Same as with back squats. Work on posture, arch and balance. Great for improving hamstring flexibility and low back awareness.

Split squats. I love these. You can do them regular, rear leg elevated, front leg elevated or both legs on the benches (to gain more ROM).

Glute Bridges.  Put a band around the knees, lift and hold. Great for the butt and hip rotatores.

The next exercises I found great to be included in this phase. They are done with slow tempo and maybe a short iso hold at the end position (1-3sec hold). These are small muscles often neglected when chasing the PRs.

Clams and hip abduction. Lie on the ground, put a band around your knees and do sets of 10-15reps.

Hip flexion. Can be done seated (Sahrman Hip Flexion) or with a band attached to a immobile object while lying down.

Hip PNF diagonals.  This stuff helped me when I had sport hernia symptoms. I do them lying down, with the core braced (flat back), then lifting one leg at a time in diagonal patter without moving my core. Great for abs too.

Calves. I love to do single leg eccentrics with slow lowering phase (around 5 secs). This helped me with my tendon issues every time I did them.

VMO. Can be done with the band wrapped around the knee, or like a Peterson Step Down. Maybe some controlled eccentrics if you had tendon issues in the knees in the history.

A lot of stretching.   A lot! Hip flexion, hip rotators, quads, hams, calves. A lot

UPPER BODY

Push up. Get into a perfect push up position (normal or leg elevated, later with weight vest), pull yourself to the ground and hold. Work on posture and arms/shoulder position.

Declined row. Get under the bar, pull yourself  up and squeeze the shoulder blades and hold.  You can also do chest supported DB row and hold. Also, barbell rows can be used here too.

Pull-up/chin-up  hold.  Touch the bar with the chest, squeeze and hold. This is tougher than you think.

Bench press.  Work on technique and thingness of the shoulder blades. Can be done with DBs too.

Chest Flys.  Great for stretching the pecs, especially if you combine with the rows.

The next exercises I found great to be included in this phase. They are done with slow tempo and maybe a short iso hold at the end position (1-3sec hold). These are small muscles often neglected when chasing the PRs.

External rotation. A lot of external rotations, and Ws for the lower trap.

YTWLs. A lot of this stuff.

Rowing. A lot of rowing variations.

Delt Flys. I plan doing some delt flys in scapular place or maybe L-flys. Progress to DB Overhead press. Maybe wall slides before all this if your shoulders are “broken”.

A lot of stretching.   A lot! Did I say a lot? I was playing with the jump stretch bands stretching. You can find some stuff by Dave Tate on this here.

CORE

Side bridges. Do them. Use weight west to progress or play with legs (lift the top leg for count of 5, lift the bottom leg for count of 5).

Pallof press.  Can done in squat position or even split squat position.

Hip flexion.  Hanging hip flexion or on the dip station. Lift above 90 degrees and hold.

Various exercises for the low back.  I use some exercises from corrective gymnastics as we call them here in Europe.

Each ISO hold is done for 30-60sec utilizing barbell or even bodyweight only and progressing from there. Work on the posture and relax. 3-5 sets can be utilized with short rest (around 1 min).

Before or after I will do some steady state or variable (fartlek) running or cycling. No brainer. Love to be outside because of nice weather and change in the environment (can’t stand to be inside the gym all the freaking time). Maybe I should do the stuff outside on grass barefoot like a real Paleo Man (this was a joke).

It’s Monday. The soccer season is over. I am giving my brain and body a little rest for a week. Going to train.