TRAINING PRINCIPLES

GROUND BASED ACTIVITIES

Most sport skills are initiated by applying force with the feet against the ground and having that force transfer through the body.  Therefore, selecting strength training exercises and conditioning drills that apply force with the feet against the ground, along with loading the core, are essential to any strength training program.  Examples of theses exercises are the squat, hang/power clean, and push press.  The more force you can apply against the ground while maintaining core stability, the faster you will run, the higher you will jump and the more powerful you will be.  

MULTIPLE JOINT ACTIONS

Multiple joint actions improve your athletic performance through improved coordination and the ability to generate explosive force.   Your strength and conditioning program should be based on exercises and drills involving multiple joint actions.   Sport skills require multiple joint actions timed in the proper neuromuscular recruitment patterns, otherwise you have little coordination and ability to generate explosive force.   The power clean is a core lifting exercise.   It requires joint actions at the hips, knees, ankles, shoulders, and elbows to work together as a unit generating explosive force.  Using single joint actions might work for bodybuilders to improve their appearance, but athletes need to concentrate on activities involving multiple joint actions to improve performance.

THREE DIMENSIONAL MOVEMENTS

Sport skills involve movements in the three planes of space simultaneously:  forward-backward, up-down, and from side-to-side.  Your strength training program should improve functional strength with exercises   simulating these skills.  Strength training with free weights allows movement in three dimensions simultaneously.  This makes the transfer of strength and power easier to merge with the development of sport skills.  Machines limit the development of   functional strength.  For example, when you use free weights, the muscles regulate and coordinate the movement pattern of the weight, while machines use lever arms, guide rods, and pulleys to dictate the path of the movement.  An additional benefit of strength training with free weights is that they aid in preventing joint injuries because of the stabilization they require.

TRAIN EXPLOSIVELY

Many times an athlete will get stronger because of an improved ability of the nervous system to recruit motor units.   A motor unit is a motor nerve and all the muscle fibers that it innervates.  The more fibers a motor unit consists of, the more force it can generate.   Through training, the body learns to recruit more motor units, so more force can be generated.  The amount of force required for a given activity is regulated by the use of two different types of motor units found in the body, fast twitch and slow twitch.  The number of fibers that a fast twitch motor unit innervates is greater than that of a slow twitch motor unit.  Also, the contractile mechanism of fast twitch muscle fibers is much larger than that of a slow twitch muscle fibers.  Therefore, a fast twitch fiber generates a force that is as much as four times greater than a slow twitch fiber.  For this reason, training explosively with free weights can greatly improve an athletes performance potential.

  PROGRESSIVE OVERLOAD

The load or amount of weight lifted for each exercise is the most fundamental component of a strength training program.   The application of the load has a crucial impact on maximizing performance and keeping injuries to a minimum.     Overload occurs when the body responds to training loads greater than normal.   The overload causes the muscle tissue of the body to go into a catabolic state or to break down.   The body then adapts, through   proper nutrition and rest, by compensating through the development of more strength or endurance.   Intensity and volume are the key factors used to progressively increase the overload.   The use of heavier loads increases the intensity while adding more repetitions increases the volume.   Each method causes specific training adaptations.   Increasing the weight and keeping the repetitions low develops strength and power; where as increasing the number of repetitions and keeping the weight lighter causes improvement in muscular endurance and muscular size.