New Post

Hello,

Just wanted to let everyone know, I will be having new posts every several days on my new blog: www.justflyperformance.blogspot.com

This blog is featured on my new website: www.just-fly-sports.com

Check us out! We are updating the site rapidly and aim to be the best out there in terms of helping you become a better athlete.

Joel

Moving into the future

Hi!

I haven't posted in quite a while! I just wanted to let everyone know that a GREAT new series is coming up and I am getting ready to release it on this blog and several websites. It is going to be the flagship article series for my new website (www.just-fly-sports.com) and will be called JUSTFLY101. This will feature articles that talk about the solid facts of training theory, periodization, vertical jumping, sprinting and strength training. It will form the ground work for what we base our training programs and help to weed out the mud of the internet training world.

The first 4 part series of this upcoming information will be released in the next couple days.

Also, my new blog which will be updated much more frequently and that will complement my new website is located at http://justflyperformance.blogspot.com/

The first post will be coming tomorrow as soon as I can film a new exercise I need for the series. Hope to see you there!

Joel Smith, MS, CSCS

CNS Series Part III: Tuning the Nervous System for Maximal Power

Editors Note: My new site is now at www.just-fly-sports.com Check it out for a wealth of information on jumping higher and running faster, all backed by research and practical experience!

CNS Series, Part IIIA: Tuning the CNS for max performance (weightlifting method)


Welcome to the last article(s) in this series on the Central Nervous System. I am really aiming for this to be the most practical and easily applicable of the three. The first two articles in the series spoke a lot about the general theory behind some aspects of training. This article is going to deal with the practical ways of teaching the central nervous system to be as powerful as humanly possible. In a nutshell, you will learn the most powerful training techniques available for increasing speed and explosiveness.

There are basically three training systems when it comes to maximal nervous system recruitment. These would include weightlifting, plyometrics, and complex training. Part A of the third part of this series will deal with weightlifting, while part B will involve plyometric and complex training methods.

The most common method of improving strength and power of the human organism is that of resistance training. Today we have entire college degrees focused on this area of performance improvement, which would indicate that it probably plays an important role in training. Resistnce training is very effective for several reasons: increased cross-sectional area of muscle, neuro-muscular efficiency and strength to bodyweight ratio to name a few. If performed correctly it can also improve neuro-muscular patterns in the body such as triple-extension of the hips, knees, and ankles (with Olympic lifts). Resistance training has many forms and varieties, so a common question is which type of lifting will help transfer to dynamic ability (running/jumping) in the best way?


Here are a few simple answers to the question:

1. Use primarily ground based movements (Squat, Deadlift, Olympic lifts)
2. Use less reps and more sets (most lifts at 1-4 reps per set)
3. Train with both heavy and light weights for strength and speed
4. Make sure to train using movements that emphasize hip extension

I think it would be a safe assumption that most of the people reading this are pretty familiar with the above recommendations. In this article, I would like to discuss the strength training methods that I use to create a high nervous system output through resistance training methods. First, I would like to talk about the lifts that I like to use. I will then discuss the sets and reps for each specific lift that I feel tend to work the best for training goals and phases.


When it comes to lifting, there are two types of lifts that can be done for performance:


Traditional and Dynamic.


I consider traditional weightlifting to include: squats, deadlifts, lunges, step-ups, presses, calf raises, and similar types of slower tempo lifts. Dynamic lifts are the explosive lifts: Olympic lifts, jump squats, and barbell skips….basically anything that involves a high level of explosiveness and the where the feet tend to leave the ground. All these lifts are standing-ground based, so for the main part of my workouts, I don't use leg-presses, lying hip extensions, or anything like that, although sometimes I will put these in as supplements.

When it comes to the traditional lifts, there are a lot of possibilities that are available. In terms of vertical jump development (all forms) I like the following: backsquats to parallel, partial squats, front squats, squats with a 3 second pause at the bottom, tempo squats, deadlifts, deadlifts standing on a plate, barbell step ups on 12-18” high boxes, Romanian deadlifts and calf raises.

Here are a couple of those lifts you might not be too familiar with:

Plate Deadlift: A must-do lift for sprinters



Barbell Step-up: A must-do lift for jumpers



For most of my experienced athletes, I tend to put about 15-25 reps of Olympic lifts in one workout. After that we usually do around 30-40 reps of traditional lifting. The sets for the Olympic lifts are almost always 3 reps per set or less. 5 sets of 5 is definitely not the best way to go when it comes to the Olympic lifts! In order to really get the best recruitment out of the CNS, the reps must be lower! Some of the typical sets and reps that we use for OL’s look like this: 6x3 (2’ rest), 8x2 (90”), 15x1 (1’). Even in the early season, I still like to use lower reps for the Olympic lifts…but I will make the rest between sets a bit shorter, say 20x1 with 60% max and only 30” rest between reps. I think that putting the same mentality we have in the traditional lifts into the Olympic lifts is a mistake. In my own lifting, I can feel the loss in hip extension and explosiveness after 3 or 4 reps, so I really think that keeping those reps low is pretty important, unless you are using very light weight.




Regarding the Olympic lifts, I find that using a large range of weights in respect to the 1RM tends to work well. The lower %RM ranges will allow for greater speed, and the higher %RM range will allow for more power. Both are necessary for the best results. I have had some good success with using 20x1, starting at around 70% of the 1RM at the opening sets, and then slowly building up to 90% after set 10. I have also noticed great results doing a 20x1 or 8x3 with only around 60% of the 1RM and just working on speed of movement. There is really no magic % point in the Olympic lifts (or lifts in general) but I feel that the most important thing is to work hard at all ends of the speed and strength spectrum. Even when the weight is light, you can't take it easy on the bar, maximal hip extension is a must. Just watch some videos of olympic lifters training, and watch the hip power they put into the bar on every lift. It is one of the keys to their high level of athleticism.

I am not really huge into jump squats as a replacement of olympic lifts because I think that clean pulls and related lifts can match the dynamics and simplicity of jump squats with less strain on the back. I will use jump squats from time to time, however. A dynamic lift that I really do like that is not an olympic lift is the barbell skip. I think that it is really invaluable for single leg jumpers.

Barbell Skip: An important dynamic lift for single leg jumping




In a yearly training plan, max strength can be touched on, but I don’t really use anything below 4 reps for heavy sets more than 3-4 weeks out of the year. Now I do think that people can and do make pretty good jumping gains by using max effort squats, but I feel that if your program also has a lot of speed lifting and plyos in it, you just don’t really need to go max effort on your traditional lifts. In my own opinion, the programs that do well including max effort lifts are either combine programs or fairly low frequency training programs. If you are training on a high frequency program (6-8+ sessions a week), I think it is important, for the sake of recovery, not to spend much time going over 90%. I do think though, that you should spend a lot of time in the 80-90% range in those lifts, but above that percentage is pretty taxing.

Some studies have shown that doing depth jumps alone following a period of resistance training will increase the back squat, even when the weights have ceased. What this means is that the high CNS power in the plyometrics can fill your "max effort" lifting needs in a sense. Remember you are an athlete and not necessarily a powerlifter.

For most squatting movements, I like to go for about 20 total reps. 4 sets of 5 is my typical prescription, but early in the season I might choose 3-4x8, or 5x6. When going for power in the squats I’ll go for something like 6 sets of 4, but I don’t usually go below 4 reps in squat, simply because I choose other exercises for my power development, such as Olympic lifts and plyometrics. I feel that traditional weightlifting exercises should mainly be used for developing your motor neuron and muscle pool and not so much for max strength (some may disagree with me here).

Lastly, I would like to mention a quick point about hip extension, and strength training. Traditional weightlifting is very important, but I feel that if it is overemphasized, the athlete can lose hip extension because of the neural pattern involved in slower lifting. In order to counter this, the creative coach can come up with a few variations that can combine both time-under-tension, and explosiveness. There are a couple of variations that I personally like.

The first is the clap-back squat:



The second is the slow-eccentric, fast concentric back squat:



(you don't need the hanging devices on the bar to do this, but it is a nice tool)

As a conclusion to this first section, I will include a few example lifting programs that myself and my athletes might use during the training year.

Pre-Season Phase III, Strength and Power
Jon Doe: Bodyweight. 168, Squat 1RM. 300, Clean 1RM. 235, Standing Vertical. 31”, 3 Step VJ. 38.5”.
Dynamic Warmup
2x10 Overhead Squats with 45lb bar
20x1 Cleans: 165lb, 30” rest (last 5 reps increase up to 205)
4x5 Barbell Step Ups, 18” box: 135, 145, 155, 165lb (3’ rest)
4x5 Glute Ham Raise
3x10 Barbell Calf Raise
3x10 Renegade Rows: 40lb dumbbells
3x20s weighted sprinters stretch

In-Season Phase II, Strength and Power
Jill White: Bodyweight. 124, Squat 1RM. 165, Clean 1RM. 130, Standing Vertical. 25”, 3 Step VJ. 29”.
Dynamic Warmup
2x10 Overhead Squats with 45lb bar
12x1 Power Snatch: 75lb, 1' rest
4x3 Split Jerk:85lb, 2' rest
5x3 Clap Back Squat: 105lb, 2' rest
3x5 Pullups
3x20s weighted sprinters stretch

German Volume Training

Editors Note: My new site is now at www.just-fly-sports.com Check it out for a wealth of information on jumping higher and running faster, all backed by research and practical experience!

I just did my first session of what is known at "German Volume Training" yesterday. It involved 10 sets of 10 front squats with a fairly slow tempo past parallel with 135lb. I took 2 minutes rest between sets. This is not a lot of weight, but it got really tough by the end! My goal this year is to get a little more cross-sectional area in my legs, so I am pretty sure doing this workout over a few months will help do the trick. My legs haven't hurt like this in quite a while.

On another note, I'll be done with my next installment in the CNS series within the next 24 hours.

Joel

Structural and CNS Training Systems

Editors Note: My new site is now at www.just-fly-sports.com Check it out for a wealth of information on jumping higher and running faster, all backed by research and practical experience!

THE YING AND YANG OF TRAINING:
CENTRAL NERVOUS SYSTEM TRAINING AND STRUCTURAL TRAINING

In my last post, I talked about how the CNS (Central Nervous System) is of prime importance in athletic improvements, and how to avoid its overtraining. In this post I would like to talk a little bit about the two sides of the training coin in athletics. These would include training the structure of the body and then the central nervous system. Here is a quick overview of both types of training before I go into greater detail.

Structural Training: Training that focuses on the muscle-tendon structure of the body, the energy systems which support movement, as well as the endocrine and cardio-vascular systems that support the general well-being of the body as a whole.

CNS Training: In a nutshell, this is explosive strength and power training…plyometrics, olympic lifts and heavy squats…you get the idea. CNS training works the neural pathways from the brain and spinal cord to the muscles that they innervate. This training stimulates the central nervous system to become more proficient, as opposed to more efficient.

To acheive the best results in your training, what needs to happen is an optimal training frequency of both types of training. The overload that tends to happen, and cause training regression, is in CNS training. This particularly will occur when too much CNS specific training is undertaken and too little structural training has occurred. To give you a picture of what this is like, imagine what would happen if an overweight, untrained, 50 year old individual suddenly had the nervous system output of a professional level athlete. What would happen would be a high count of injuries, because that untrained persons muscles and connective tissues could not take the high force output of an amped up nervous system. Likewise, their body could not sustain that type of training for very long, because they wouldn't have the endocrine and cardiovascular support that would help them recover from the intense CNS output that they now had. Needless to say, it is important to do a good job with both aspects of training.

So I would like to now go into a bit of detail with structural training. Most of what I am concerned about when it comes to the structural training of an athlete is that of their muscle-tendon complex. In human movement, it is not just the muscles that bring about the movement, it is also the tendons. Our tendons act as speed and force amplifiers for the muscles in the body. Think of them as giant rubber bands, lets actually use a slingshot as an example. When you shoot a sling shot, your front hand is on a forked apparatus, while your back hand pulls back a band which usually contains a rock/bb/paintball/whatever you can come up with when you are 8 years old. Think of your front arm putting pressure on the fork as the work your muscles do….then think of the band being pulled back as your tendon action. The end result? A projectile being shot much faster than you could throw it. The mechanical and elastic elements work together to produce an enhanced reaction.

Back a few years ago, I did a large amount of research on tendon structure in athletes, and how it changes through training. To cut a long story short, tendons play an incredibly important part in human movement, and to neglect the fact that running and jumping is a dynamic interaction between the muscle fibers and the tendon units can really hurt your athletic performance. Now, when training volume is cut low to the point where one is only doing CNS type training (you can only do so much CNS work) you are going to start to neglect the "springyness" of the muscle-tendon structure. This will especially happen when the majority of your CNS style work is done in the weightroom. In fact, what most athletes will typically find if most of their training is done in the weightroom is that...their standing vertical jumps, and maybe 10m dashes will go up, but running jumps and top end sprint speed will go down. Bottom line…..the faster the movement…..the more the elasticity of the tendons will play a role. Sprints and running jumps rely a lot on tendon spring.

If you are not training your body structure to run fast or jump high, CNS training will not pick up the slack, even if you are doing a decent amount of plyometrics. I will say though that a fairly intensive plyometric training program certainly helps, but you can't sustain it all year long. So what exactly are some methods that are used to train the structure of an athletes? Its really a lot simpler than you might think.

The best exercises to train the structure of an athlete are simply repeated jumping or running exercises. If you are involved in a team sport, such as basketball or football, you are probably getting plenty of structural training in. If you don’t really play a team sport, or play a team sport, but don’t really practice the sport much in the offseason then you might need to do a little extra work in regards to your muscle-tendon structure. Some training methods that some elite track coaches use to remedy in-elasticity are called “rudimentary jump circuits". These jump circuits involve multiple jumps over a distance of around 20-30 meters. The jumps are low intensity, however, and instead of shooting for max distance, each jump only covers between one and three feet. In each jump, the aim is for minimal flexion of the knees and also low ground time. Biomechanically speaking, the tendon units will come into play to a greater extent when the ground time is minimized.

From my understanding and experience, changes in tendon stiffness are the result of repetitive efforts (100+ contacts/session). Research has shown that distance running has a positive effect on increasing the stiffness of the Achilles tendon. Now I don’t think that aspiring strength/power athletes should spend a lot of time running distance, but I think that repetitive efforts are important to optimize the tendon function of the body. So, take home message of this section, you are not going to get a whole lot of elasticity by only doing 4 sets of 5 depth jumps a week for jumping work. The elastic changes are the result of prolonged stretch-shortening cycle work. Flash back to discussions about the "training" of guys like team-flight-brothers (they don't train in the traditional sense, they just play basketball and practice dunking) these guys get a great mix of structural and CNS work, from just playing ball all the time, and then practicing dunks.

So what exactly would constitute a “structural” type workout for an athlete? Well, for a team –sport athlete, just playing your sport usually is a pretty good structural workout, as there are many ground contacts, jumps, cuts, etc. For non-team sport athletes, such as track, structural work includes warmup and general strength work, mobility, tempo sprints and repeated jumps, hops and skips and med ball throws. For those of you familiar with track, I am sure you are also familiar with many of these exercises. Here is an example of a typical non-CNS, pro structure and fitness based training day.

Jog 800m
General Strength (squats/lunges/inchworms,etc) and Light Accelerations
Hurdle mobility work
Sprint Drills, A-Skips, B-Skips, C-Skips, etc.
Repeated Skips: 3x20m for distance, 3x20m for height, 3x20m double arm
3x200m at submax pace
10 minute medicine ball circuit
Abdominal/Core work and stretch

So that would be a structure based training day. The opposite of this would be a CNS training day. A CNS training day might look something like this.

Jog 800m
Sprint Drills/Accelerations
2x20m, 2x30m, 2x40m sprints @ 97%
10x jump attempts/dunk attempts
2x5 depth jumps over hurdle
4x4 hurdle hops

So I am sure you get the idea, and it is a pretty simple concept really. I feel that the more difficult aspect of this comes in the split of the weekly workload and deciding what workouts to do. I think early in the season, aka preparatory period, structural workouts will dominate the training of the athlete. A preseason schedule could look something like this:

Monday: Structural
Tuesday: Structural
Wednesday: Rest
Thursday: CNS
Friday: Structural
Saturday: Structural

Once the season is a little farther along, the training will shift to a little more CNS intense work. The week might then look something like this:

Monday: CNS
Tuesday: Structural
Wednesday: Rest
Thursday: CNS
Friday: Structural
Saturday: Competition (CNS)

The last training setup listed above is a more traditional program, but works well. My favorite training setup for jumps actually wouldn’t really fall into a clean-cut version of dividing CNS and structure work, but I’ll try to divide it up below.

So here is my favorite training split for jumping events.

Monday: Weightlifting and Structure (50%CNS/50%Structure)
Tuesday: Track Work and Plyometrics (heavy CNS demand)
Wednesday: Structure, non-impact focus…med ball, hurdles, core circuits, etc.
Thursday: Weightlifting and Structure (50%CNS/50% Structure)
Friday: Track Work and Plyos (heavy CNS again)
Saturday: Long jog or tempo sprints (structure and fitness)

The reason that this setup will work is because of the principle of workload spacing. Olympic lifters will lift over 10 times a week, and sometimes more than that. The reason that they can handle it is because the space out the lifting sessions, and have a lot of recovery sessions. In the 4-day CNS training setup, each CNS session is fairly short (45 min) so the heavy fatigue from a big lifting/plyo session is not there. I will say though, that this type of block, over time, will bring about some serious CNS fatigue so it is important to schedule rest/structure weeks.

The main goal of this article was to show a little bit about how it is important to balance training the CNS and the structure of the body. I covered the structural training aspect of things a bit more in this particular article, so in the next one, I am going to cover how to maximize gains in the training of the Central Nervous System. Hope this is helpful to you! If you have any questions, the best way to get them answered is to email me at joel.smith.7@gmail.com

Joel

Final Note: This past weekend, Chaunte Howard Lowe broke the American Record in high jump, with a leap of 2.05m! This jump is also currently #1 in the world!

Central Nervous System Series: Part 1

Editors Note: My new site is now at www.just-fly-sports.com Check it out for a wealth of information on jumping higher and running faster, all backed by research and practical experience!

So I am dedicating myself this summer to writing some more articles, and fortunately, I think I have learned just enough in the last year to put some new fresh information out. My summer vacation is underway, and right now it is the first time in 8 years that I haven't spent the months of June, July and August slaving for the man to make some extra change. So basically, this should give me an opportunity to write just a bit more than I have been in the past year.

So right now I would like to talk a little bit about the Central Nervous System (CNS). I think that this is a buzzword and popular topic in strength training today (as it should be), so lets get into it shall we? In a nutshell, the CNS is the primary controller of strength and power gains in athletic pursuits. Most of the gains that you make early in a strength training program are not the result of your muscle-tendon unit becoming stronger, but that of your CNS working more powerfully and efficiently. A simple way of looking at this is in terms of fiber recruitment. In any movement, a certain number of muscle fibers are involved. In a state of de-training, however, there will be a lot of muscle fibers that are left out in a given movement. When you train though, your body will turn on more of these fibers. You can't turn on 100% of your fibers though, except for in life/death situations (lifting a car off a baby, etc.). I beleive the maximal number you can turn on in normal situations is around 80-90%, but you get the idea.

For speed/power type work, training emphasis is usually on "recruiting the fast twitch muscle fibers/fast twitch motor neurons", which is theoretically done by doing explosive work with all out effort (to recruit all available fibers). This is why doing 3 sets of 5 depth jumps with 5 minutes rest between sets beats doing 2 sets of 100 squat jumps with a minute rest (the sets of 5 will allow each jump to be much more explosive, and thus have higher recruitment, then the 2 sets of 100).

Now eventually, in any strength program, the gains that your CNS will pick up will max out, so to speak (can't recruit any more fibers/all available fibers are now recruited), and now the only way to keep gaining strength will be for the muscle to increase in size. This is not a completely fine line (pure neuro gains for certain time/then all muscle size), but a small muscle can only produce so much power. Also, an interesting and important fact is that performance gains that are acheived by muscle size gain will last longer than those gains which are brought about by CNS recruitment gains. Part of the reason that this is true is the "soon ripe-soon rotten" principle. An athlete who does high powered CNS training for 6 weeks prior to basketball season will probably make some great gains in that 6 weeks, but will also lose it pretty quickly once the season is underway, unless he/she is somehow able to maintain that training.

Before I get onto the next section of this article, let me quickly get into what I would consider "CNS" training. I have ranked these in order of the CNS demand of these exercises.

1. True Plyometrics: Depth Jumps, Hurdle Hops, Bounding....Basically any type of max-effort rebound style exercise. These are very high demand exercises!

2. Heavy Weightlifting: Anything 80% or greater definitely falls in this category, but explosive lifts in the 50% and above range could fall in this category as well.

3. Short Sprint Work: The shorter the sprint, the higher than CNS strain. Sometimes sprint coaches will actually steer athletes with weak nervous systems towards towards longer distances in their sprint workouts to avoid overstraining the CNS. I would say sprint work that falls into this category would be any sort of max effort sprinting that is 100m or less. Hill work also falls into this category.

3. Jump and Dunk attempts: Any sort of high jump/dunk attempts would be considered a high CNS effort, but not so much as something like a depth jump. I would put this in a similar CNS category as short and intense sprint work, so I labeled them both #3.

4. Medicine Ball and Shot Throws: Any all out full body overhead or underhanded shot or med ball throw. Not talking about chest passes or ab twists here. This is more of a track and field specific exercise.

Alright, so there are some way to train the Central Nervous system.....so whats the point? Well, the point is that too much CNS specific training, or too much sequential training with an emphasis on the CNS will lead to overtraining and greater likelihood of injury. Also, although CNS training gains come the soonest, overtraining of the CNS will also last the longest (as opposed to overtraining other systems in the body). Overtrain the CNS of an athlete and they will be functioning submaximally for weeks, or sometimes even months if you did it bad enough. This alone is a very important reason to pay attention to the amount of CNS in training. I am assuming most people reading this article have, at some point in their training reached a point where they were very worn out because of this type of burnout.

Now I am not one for babying training, and only going hard once in a great while, in fact, I think that you can train hard every single day. The catch though is, that you can't train the CNS hard every day, you have to rotate the trainable facets of the human organism. A great DVD I bought in the last couple years is on the 5 biomotor abilities in athletics. They include speed, stength, endurance, flexibility, and coordination.

You can find a link giving a greater rundown of these abilities HERE: http://www.coachr.org/fitness.htm

Now really, you can divide these qualities up into CNS and non-CNS demand abilities. The CNS demand abilities would be Speed and Strength. The non-CNS demand abilities would be endurance, flexibility and coordination. I don't really recommend training the CNS hard more than 2 days a week in most situations, so a weekly setup involving the training of the different motor abilities for a team sport such as basketball could look something like this:

Monday: CNS Speed-Strength (Plyos and Weights)

Tuesday: Specific Endurance (maybe something like 10x45 second sprints)
Wednesday: Coordination and Flexibility (this could be as simple as game drills and stretching)

Thursday: Upper Body Submaximal Lifting (under 80% max)

Friday: CNS Speed-Strength (Speed and Weights)

Saturday: Endurance and Flexibility (2 mile jog and stretch)

Ok, so this is a weekly setup with 2 intense CNS training days a week. An average trainee will be able to make some decent gains off something like this for a month or two, but after that a plateau will occur because of the CNS stress. This will happen even with a switch of exercises and format. I will mention that some athletes have stronger nervous systems than others. There are a few things you can do to reduce the total CNS stress of the training system. Probably the best thing you can do to combat CNS overtraining is have an easy training week every 3rd or 4th week. This is one of the most important, but overlooked principles in sport training. In an easy training week, you could have one or zero CNS intensive days, but still train the other qualities throughout the week. The following is an example for a low CNS stress week.

Monday: Endurance/Flexibility

Tuesday: Coordination/General Strength Training

Wednesday: CNS-Weightlifting (the one intense day, but no plyos...the #1 stressor)

Thursday: Endurance/Flexibility

Friday: Coordination/General Strength Training

*General Strength Training would be bodyweight style circuit training and possibly low intensity repeated jumping drills.

So over the long haul, say 3 months time, a training set up designed to reduce CNS burnout could look like this:

Week 1: CNS 2 day

Week 2: CNS 2 day

Week 3: CNS 0 day

Week 4: CNS 2 day

Week 5: CNS 2 day

Week 6: CNS 1 day

Week 7: CNS 2 day

Week 8: CNS 2 day

Week 9: CNS 2 day

Week 10: CNS 0 day

Week 11: CNS 2 day

Week 12: CNS 3 day (shock week)

Week 13: active rest

Week 14: active rest

Week 15: start over again (bump up the volume 5-10% next time around)

So this concludes the first part of this series. The next article will talk about training the structure of the musculo-skeletal system in conjunction with the nervous system for optimal results!

10 Training Tips for the New Year

Editors Note: My new site is now at www.just-fly-sports.com Check it out for a wealth of information on jumping higher and running faster, all backed by research and practical experience!

I don't write much online anymore. Maybe it is because I ran out of good ideas, or maybe it is because I feel like these journals are not as well read as I would hope for my current level of professionalism.....but really I don't think either is the case. I think the real matter is I have just gotten comfortable with my job and a bit lazy with the "self promotion" of the blogosphere. Anyhow, I do need to write a bit more, and so....due to the lack of frequency in my posts, I would like to try and put a bit "extra" in for this particular post, in the form of 10 ways to make your training better. Despite the fact that I am in my 14th year of my own training, and my 4th year of training other athletes, I am still learning new things on a fairly regular basis. So, here goes, 10 ways to make your training better in 2010. I mean you only have 2 years now until the world ends, so better make it good! Actually I think what is really going to happen in 2012 is that the Gazelle is going to make a world-wide comeback.

On to the training:

Number 1> Progress your training volume. Basically, if you did 5,000 meters of bounding last year, and lifted 20,000 tonnes of weights, do 6,000 meters this year and lift 22,000 tonnes of weights. It's really that simple. A gradual increase in volume from year to year will produce results. Try to look at old training logs, and just put a small bit of extra volume in from what you did last year, or, try to gradually progress to slightly higher volume in workouts a few months down the road. A nice way to increase your training volume, if you have the time, is to divide up your workouts into AM and PM work. I enjoy doing weight training in the morning and then sprints at night. The day after this I might do upper body weights in the morning and hills at night. It tends to work a lot better than cramming it all into one session.

Number 2> Increase your plyometric and jumping volume. The problem with doing high CNS type work and not a lot else is that your muscle-tendon structure won't really adapt well to the high powered changes that your CNS is making. One thing that I have noticed is that a high volume of bounding, hurdle hops, depth jumps, etc... is that this not only will tune up the CNS and make it more powerful (if you don't overtrain by too much too soon) but it will tune your muscle-tendon structure into a jumping machine. It is by this principle that something like "air alert" could produce at least some results (although it is hell on developing a powerful nervous system). One thing that is a downfall of a lot of weights and little jumping/sprinting is a severe structural hit in terms of spring and elasticity. When you do a lot of jumping or sprinting, you are training your natural body structure to be powerful. Just be careful in terms of building up to high volumes.

Number 3> Work on your core more. You know what, squats/oly's/deadlifts are good for the core....BUT....they come far short of what I would call optimal core development. To develop the core well, try a large volume of trunk flexion, extension and rotational work. You can also take these core routines and link them up into circuits to help with overall fitness. If you want some great core routines, check out Dan Pfaff's general strength DVD. My personal favorite is the "pedestal circuit". A lot of athletes who seem strong can turn into glass when it comes to these types of circuits.

Number 4> Get in killer shape. This seems obvious, but is it really? What is killer shape? Basically, it is this.....if you want to be a great athlete, you should have (in addition to a powerful CNS) a great endocrine/cardio system and low bodyfat levels. How does having a good endocrine/cardio system help the CNS? Well honestly, it probably doesn't much, but it does help your movement tissue become stronger and recover faster. It also is going to lead to lower bodyfat levels, which means a better power to weight ratio. I think a lot of people are just afraid of doing too much work past the 30 second window because it doesn't develop the CNS, but this work is vital to helping overall fitness. An example of this might be running repeated 100-200m sprints, a 10 minute light jog on a cross country course, 50 yard sprints followed by pushups, weight training circuits with 50% 1RM, 20 minutes of sprint drills/jumps in a pool and anything else you can creatively come up with that isn't just straight cardio on a machine.

Number 5> Get some sleep. 8 hours a night. At least. This will most likely be easier if you single and don't have a lot of other committments, but for what it's worth. Sleep=recovery. Oh yeah and while you are at it, try to watch your alcohol consumption and stress levels.

Number 6> Try using some tempo in your strength training routines. A lot of athletes freak out at tempo because, well, its SLOW and sport movement is FAST. Plus, I mean we want to make our strength training specific to sports right? Well, yeah sort of.....but, basically a lot of research has shown that the specificity of weightlifting to actual ballistic movements is like apples and oranges. The muscle-tendon interaction and muscle firing sequence is VERY different between doing squats and jumping for a rebound in basketball....even though the joints involved are similar. Now....I was one myself who really shied away from tempo in training for a long time, but I was forced to use it after a back injury from squatting. Anyways, long story short, I set a standing vertical jump record after only about a month of tempo based squatting movements. I feel like tempo is a great option in training, but I would make sure that there are fast or olympic type movements in the program as well. Here are some example tempos that can spice your training up a bit: 3-0-1, 5-0-1, 2-3-x, 4-0-2. (tempo is read E-I-C, or eccentric, isometric, concentric). Research has been positive when it comes to tempo work, and other benefits of tempo style work is increased muscle cross-sectional gain and hormonal response to training. You will also have a lower chance of injuring yourself.

Number 7> Find a glute-ham machine. Get on the glute-ham machine. Do glute-ham raises. Jump higher/Run faster.

Number 8> Change your sets/reps on olympic lifts. I picked this one up from HPC sport. Instead of doing something like 6x3 or 4x5 for your olympic lifts, try 20x1. Ever since I have switched the set/rep schemes, I have put 20 lbs on my clean in 6 weeks and don't feel like going back to 6x3 any time soon. I use 45 seconds between reps, and about 80% of my 1RM although I go a bit heavier on some of the last sets. Each rep should be all out power, just like plyometrics.

Number 9> Work some hill training into your routine. Especially in the early training months. Hill training, isn't really what I would consider a special form of training any biomotor ability, but blends a lot of them together nicely. It also is a really great stimulus for the posterior chain and hips when it comes to developing sprint speed. Some examples of good hill workouts would be 2x(6x30m) all out with walkdown recovery, or for more of an aerobic effect, 3x(3x100m) with slow jog down recovery.

Number 10> Keep it simple. There is no need to jump way off the training templates that you have found work well for you. There are really only small changes that need to be made in the course of a training program. Back squats to front squats, 2-0-1 tempo to 5-0-x tempo and hurdle hops to depth jumps are examples of small changes that can go a long way.