Strength

Improving your strength as an athlete gives you the increased ability to improve your performance, decrease your chance of injury, and decrease your recovery time if an injury does occur.

These are extremely important if you are trying to become a highly competitive athlete.

A team or individual that is functionally stronger and in better physical condition will usually win the competition. Athletes that follow a structured yearly training program become the stronger athlete. This structured program would consist of training in all areas of strength, as well as movement, flexibility, nutrition, agility,and speed.

Unlike weight and power lifters who compete in the exercises they train with, you will be using weight lifting to improve your sport specific skills and fitness.

Athletes need to train their bodies for movement rather than just training body parts. Most sport movements involve more than one joint so it makes sense to incorporate more multi-joint exercises. Training multi-joint movements (like ones involving the ankle, knee and hip at the same time) has a higher carryover value to sports than single-joint movements.

Plan Your Year

Break down your training year into time periods, each with their own goal. You should use these training periods to prepare your body and mind to be ready for competition when the time arrives.

Each of the following areas will need to be considered and adjusted for each time period. Intensity, volume, frequency, exercises, recovery, developing linear speed, plyometric training, skill development, aerobic and anaerobic conditioning.

The annual plan is different for each sport, but it would begin the day after competition concludes for one season and end the last day of competition the following year.

The three stages of the annual plan should be rejuvenation, developmental, and competitive stage.

Rejuvenation Phase

The rejuvenation phase starts right after the last game of the last season. It can be divided into post-season and off-season programs. It may last 2-8 weeks. This is a time to maintain a general level of fitness while allowing the athlete to rest, relax and regenerate. This is a good time for each athlete to develop strength in the areas that were injured the previous season. In this phase do high reps and many sets, but with low resistance. During this phase you should be developing your aerobic conditioning through stationary biking, the treadmill, stair stepper, Nordic trak or Rower.

Developmental Phase

This phase comes after the rejuvenation phase. It may last 18-30 weeks, depending on the sport. This time of training should enhance your level of fitness, strength, flexibility, conditioning, agility and speed. Increase the resistance of weights, and use more sport specific exercises.

Most of the strength exercises used are designed to improve overal athletic ability. These exercises will improve balance and stability. Hybrid exercises are used now to allow for greater muscle activation and in some cases increased range of motion.

Competitive Phase

This phase could last 3-5 months depending on the sport. During this stage the goal is to continue to to improve your level of physical preparedness. Competitions, sport-specific drills and exercises, and continued strength training are used to keep you conditioned and well prepared. Workouts should be high intensity and less reps.

Exercise Pool

Here is a pool of exercises that can be used to increase your strength. Click on each one for a description or demonstration of the proper technique.