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WE CAN’T TAKE HUMAN PERFORMANCE TO THE NEXT LEVEL UNTIL WE ARE WILLING TO QUESTION EVERYTHING WE DO
Traditional thinking is comfortable. If everyone is doing it, it must be right. Unfortunately, ‘Traditional’ thinking will not take human performance to the next level.
Many coaches recognize the importance of explosive strength, but know the faster they move a mass (iron) the greater the risk of injury due to high forces. This contributes to many of the injuries we see in the weight room. This is also why we associate speed of movement with danger, both in sports conditioning and rehab. It’s not the speed that is the problem, but rather the forces that result from moving the iron at faster speeds.
Why do we build a strength
base first in rehab?
We build a strength base first in rehab because we don’t think we can begin any speed work in the early stages of rehab. We need the strength base to prepare for the types of impact loads that will be encountered later in the rehab when we begin to step up the speed of movement. We’ve been conditioned to think this way because of the use of iron and the impact loads due to acceleration.
We tend to ignore what we can’t measure or train. We focus on strength, because it is easy to measure. Even before iron, we picked up stones of various weights and lifted them. He who could pick up the heaviest stone was the strongest. It hasn’t changed much since then.
Since iron wasn’t conducive to improving speed, the focus remained on strength and speed was considered to be genetic, hence, our focus on recruiting fast athletes and making them stronger.
The Coach can no longer look at the resistance system and say, “How do I take that resistance system and improve my athlete’s performance?”
The Coach has to look at the athlete and say, “How do I improve my athlete’s performance?” and then choose the resistance system to do so.
Once the Coach puts the athlete first, ahead of the resistance system, the Coach becomes a Performance Coach
and the chief mechanic for these high performance engines we call athletes. Yes, engines. We humans are engines.
The emphasis we have put on making athletes bigger and stronger is like putting a big diesel truck/lorry engine in a Formula One car. Likewise, a Formula One engine wouldn’t work in a truck. Trucks and Formula One cars serve totally different purposes, and therefore, require different engines.
Likewise, so do athletes. Life was simpler for the Strength Coach when all the coach had to do was make the athletes stronger today than they were yesterday.
This will not be the case in the future. A thorough understanding of the game and the demands on the athlete will be a must. We will need to know the angular velocities and forces required to change direction in soccer, to come off the line in the NFL, to pitch or swing a bat in baseball, to improve vertical jump in basketball, and to propel a long jumper nine meters when his foot hits the board. Data like this will be the basis for the training protocols of
the future. It’s not enough to just focus on Power; it’s finding and building the right balance of strength and speed to optimize the Power needed in any given sport and any position played within that sport. They all require different engines.
What if we had a Resistance System:
• That would provide a concentric and eccentric resistance like iron, but without
the shock loads due to acceleration?
• That could provide the proper variable resistance throughout the ROM, being light when the muscles, joints, and connective tissue require it and heavy when the muscles, joints, and
connective tissue need it?
• That could be used at any speed and
the force curve remains consistent?
• That would allow for maximum acceleration and speed throughout the ROM without the fear of injury due to
acceleration forces?
• That could take human performance to
a higher level and do it safer? Perhaps we already do.
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