Optimum Sports Performance

The recent injury to the rotator cuff of Maria Sharapova illustrates the need for qualified sports performance coaches and quality inseason injury prevention programs for athletes of all sports.  For those of you not in the know, Sharapova tore her rotator cuff and has played with it since at least April, finally getting the diagnosis last month.  Apparently, this has been a persistent issue since 2006, when she felt a pull stretching for a shot.  This is the stuff a strength or sports performance coach should be targeting to avoid.  Often times these coaches work on complex drills to improve speed, agility, power, or footwork.  The problem is, the fastest athlete on the planet is worthless from the bench.  I work with quite a few female tennis players, and interestingly enough, I find teh exact same issues with most of them.  For one, nearly every one of them has an internally rotated shoulder on their hitting side.  To illustrate the problem with this, stand with your hand at your side and the thumb pointing forward.  Without rotating your hand, raise it as high as you can.  Now, with your arm at your side again, turn your thumb so that it is pointing to your hip and try the same thing.  There is a substantial decrease in the range of motion in the second example than the first.  The second example is an exaggeration of what happens when the humerus(the upper arm bone) doesn’t sit in the glenohumeral joint(shoulder) properly.  It is typically seen in the tennis world in players who hit far more forehands than backhands and who do not address this issue in training.  Unfortunately, if not identified and treated, it can often lead to shoulder/rotator cuff injuries.  Just another example of why injury prevention should always be goal #1 in a strength and conditioning program.

Dave

This has been a very busy summer for me here in New Jersey.  All tolled, I have been able to work with over 40 tennis players at various times.  So busy, in fact, that I have been unable to update my side of this blog for quite some time, but here goes.

2 girls that I have been working with on a continuous basis have been progressing very nicely.  The first one that came to me had previous issues with her wrist and was weak in general.   After close to 6 months of work, she has had no issues with her wrist and actually upgraded to a heavier racquet.  She also had decent speed, but she is not fast.  What I mean with this is that she can get from point A to point B quickly, but factoring points in C-G would kill any notion of speed.  She has just about the strongest core I have seen, and is progressin on a daily basis.

My second one-on-one came to me after having trained with a group that conditioned her aerobically and weight trained her like a football player for a year.  During a typical week, she would play tennis for 10 hours, not including tournaments, weight train from 4pm-5pm, and then do 60-90 minutes of speed and agility after doing 2-3 minute intervals on a treadmill.  She came to me with a resting heart rate of 72 and a blood pressure of 140/85, all of which were way above the norm for her according to her mother.  She was severely overtrained, and a girl that was once considered the best in the state was now relegated to losing in the first round of most every tournament she played.  I am happy to say that after taking 2 weeks completely off and 4-5 months of training, she won her last tournament and is progressing in the World Team Tennis sectionals.

My groups are going well.  Omar Gonzalez, who is a local tennis pro and a Bollitieri representative has been using me in each of his camps.  These camps are going very nicely and it is fun to get to work with so many different groups of kids.  This first camp we did was a 2 day camp that was filled with competitive 12-16 year olds from the area.  This was done with Bollitieri as well as the Manchester Athletic Club (MAC) who are a Bollitieri affiliate in Massachussetts.  These kids all worked hard and it was great to see them realize how important speed and agility training is for their game.  I would like to thank Omar, as well as Francisco and Todd from MAC for having me.  These are guys who just seem to get it when it comes to the speed/agility and fitness component of tennis and they serve their kids well by staying on top of current trends.
This past week I finished up another camp with Omar and start another one next week.  The kids are great and it is very cool to see some of the kids I worked with over the winter.  The best thing is that these kids are also starting to get it, I know they are working on this stuff because I haven’t seen them in a couple of months and the ones I have worked with continually outperform the new ones.

Well, that’s it, I’ll keep this blog updated as stuff continues to happen over this busy summer.

Dave

Q: I’ve brought this up before, but resources for designing an adequate stretching program just don’t exist, at least not good ones anyway (from what I’ve found)

-Daniel

A: Hi Daniel,

Thanks for writing in! Sorry it took so long to get back to you on this as I just got home after being at the NSCA National Convention for the past 4 days. What a great time! I learned a ton.

Anyway, to your question…

As far as resources go, the Aaron Mattes Active-Isolated Stretching stuff is really great. If you haven’t checked that out yet, I would take a look at it.

When you are stretching, it is important to focus on structures that are tight and NEED to be stretched. We don’t need to increase length in structures that already have good length. One thing you have to do, is determine where the areas of tightness are. This really goes back to having a good assessment plan and determining where your greatest restrictions lie. Another resources that I have talked about, if you haven’t checked it out yet, is Gray Cook’s Athletic Bodies in Balance. It is an excellent book that tells you how to movement screen yourself and find out where the limitations are. This can then help you plan a flexibility program and start correcting some of these limitations.

Sometimes, things that feel tight are not tight at all. In fact, they may have proper length, however we perceive them as tight do to issues with the way that we move or how we test them.

A good example of this is the test were, you lie on the ground and lift your leg straight up in the air to look at your hamstring flexibility. This may show you that your hamstrings are tight, or you may have a false positive (meaning that you test positive for hamstring tightness but, the hamstring length may actually be unaffected). This can be due to tightness of the hip flexors on the opposite leg (the leg on the ground) and weakness in the rectus abdominus. This will cause the pelvis to anteriorly rotate as you bring the leg up in the air. This will limit the amount of hip mobility (in this case hip flexion) you can attain and give the appearance that the hamstring is tight, when in fact it may not be.

On the flip side of that, if you have weak hip flexors on the leg which you are testing, as you bring the leg up off the ground straight, you may not approach a normal 80-90 degrees of hip flexion and may think that the hamstrings are tight. However, the hip flexors on that leg may just be weak and not able to sufficiently pull your leg up any higher.

Another thing to consider with this test is that often times, people will have adequate hamstring length, but feel that the muscle is tight. They may actually be feeling more neurological stiffness as they may feel a stretch in their dura mater (this is the outer most sheath that surrounds the spinal cord). This can sometimes give you that “tight” sensation.

Something else to consider with this test is where are you feeling the stretch? Some people will feel their first sensation of this stretch in their calves, indicating that the gastrocnemius muscle may be tight (but, the straight leg raise test would give the impression that the hamstring is tight). This would mean that you need to stretch the gastroc first to the test and/or stretch the hamstring. Others may feel this stretch first in the front of their hip, indicating that there is a possible bunching up of fascia in the hip flexor region. In that case, you would want to go and perform some soft tissue work on those structures to allow proper movement to take place.

Also know that there are several methods of stretching, and static stretching is only one modality in the toolbox. Dynamic stretching, contract-relax, contract-relax-contract antagonist or active isolated stretching can all be very helpful and you may find that you respond better to one form of stretching than another. Soft tissue work (massage, ART, myofascial release or foam rolling) can be helpful prior to stretching as they can have a positive impact on the fascia by releasing adhesions and helping allow the tissue to relax before it is taken into a lengthend position.

Finally, remember that flexibility is a neurological problem as much as it is a muscular problem. If something is tight (or if something is weak) it will be relaying info to the nervous system that will affect other muscles (synergists and antagonists). When we are working on flexibility (or even soft tissue work) it is important to make sure that we try and re-integrate our flexibility back into normal movement to “re-program” the nervous system to remember that it is okay to move through these new ranges of motion.

Thanks for the Question. Hope that helps give you some ideas.

Patrick

Only July 4th, I spent my morning down at a 5K race in Peoria. I set up a massage table and performed post event sports massage and stretching at the AZ Tech training tent. I was there from about 6am until 8:45. I don’t know exactly how many people I saw, but it was a lot.

Some things I noticed:

- Before the event started, there weren’t a whole lot of people performing an adequate warm up. Rather, opting to just go out there and run once the race got underway.

- After the race, there weren’t a whole lot of people performing an adequate cool down (aside from those who where in line to get on my table that is); stretching or using the foam rollers (that were available there) to take care of soft tissue problems.

- I would say the majority of people I got to work on had some sort of problem that was chronic. This wasn’t, “I my calf cramped up today” or “My hips were just really tight this morning. It was more like “My Achilles tendon has been hurting for the past 3 months” or “My lower back always hurts and it has been this way for a few years.”

- When asked what these people do for their problems, aside from maybe a half-hearted stretching program, there was not much else! No soft tissue work, no specific stretching or mobility protocol and no specific strength training program to help correct some of the issue they may be having. Rather, most of them just opted to “run through it”, in the hopes that it just goes away.

Some thoughts:

This type of behavior is very typical of runners. Most of them only look at one aspect of their training program…running! In all honesty, I more comprehensive and well-rounded program would serve them better as it would (a) prevent over training and (b) work along with their running program to prevent injury and increase performance by fixing problems (weakness, compensation patterns, etc) and helping to keep them healthy.

Something that the AZ Tech training group does that really sets them apart from other running groups in the valley is they look at the athletes posture and running technique and come up with some stretching and strengthening program that can help develop the athlete (be it an elite or recreational athlete). This is in-line with my beliefs, as these problems don’t just go away! You need to be proactive about taking care of them, before they manifest into something potentially worse.

Being proactive is all about going through a proper assessment and then taking the time through out the week to work on the weak links in your chain. Wouldn’t you like to know what it feels like to run without pain? Don’t you want to have a healthy running career, free of injury?

Stop pushing through the problems, and start looking for solutions!

PS, this week I will be out of town, In Las Vegas for the National Strength and Conditioning Associations National Convention. It should be a great time and I hope to learn a lot from the lectures. Next week I will be back with some more Q&A’s. If you have any questions, please leave them in the ‘comments’ link at the bottom of each blog entry.

Patrick

James Waslaski is a sports and orthopedic massage therapist who has helped to treat injuries and chronic pain with everyone from the general population to elite, Olympic and professional athletes.

I heard about James Waslaski from a great Scottsdale based massage therapist, Don Miller. Don is a really smart guy and when he talks I listen. So per his recommendation I went to Mr. Waslawski’s website, read the published articles (which were informative and interesting) and decided to make a purchase. I know I could have bought just one of the DVDs and checked it out first; but, when it comes to my continuing education I don’t believe in doing things on small scale. So I purchased the entire 6 DVD set. I want all the knowledge, not just 1/6th of it!!

Honestly, if you are a massage therapist, physical therapist, athletic trainer, chiropractor, orthopedic surgeon or anyone working in the sports medicine field, these DVDs are a must have! The best part about these DVDs, which sets them apart from other DVDs of its kind, is that Mr. Waslaski doesn’t just give you some protocol to follow. He gives you his thought process! This is huge in this field because when treating people, it is important to remember that no two people are alike. Individual differences are going to create changes in your treatment protocol, and those that watch and follow a protocol based DVD are not going to be able to pick up on these difference, ultimately leaving them with a half-hearted treatment.

I feel that the review of this product is fitting given that my last blog entry was a research review centered on functional assessment and some of my feelings on proper assessment in the field of strength and conditioning. As everyone who reads this blog knows, I am an assessment junkie. It was refreshing to see that Mr. Waslaski is the same way! Most massage therapists don’t do a proper assessment and just go and “dig right in.” It was great to see Mr. Waslaski go over his process of assessment and treatment. Really focusing on assessing posture, active ROM, passive ROM and muscle strength testing. This really helps to make the treatment specific to the client’s needs, and again, a feature that those who view more protocol based DVDs are going to miss out on.

I enjoyed how Mr. Waslaski went through his treatment process and talked about various techniques of soft tissue therapy and how and when to use which ones depending on the feedback from the client and how the tissue feels (palpation assessment). This is critical as I feel that a lot of people get so wrapped up into one thing. For example they only do Neuromuscular Techniques or the only do Myofascial Release or they only do Active Release Techniques. All of these techniques are great, but they all have different places in a treatment program, and it is really up to the therapist to determine which one is the proper technique to use and when to use it. Again, it is essential to get away from protocol based work and more into interpreting what the clients’ needs are.

It was also excellent to see a massage therapist stress the importance of stretching (especially contract-relax-contract antagonist) following soft tissue work. This is really a missing link in a lot of massage therapists’ treatments of soft tissue injuries. Restoring proper length and helping to re-align collagen fibers is essential in facilitating a healing environment. While stretching is an integral part of most treatments in physical therapy, athletic training and strength and conditioning, massage therapists seem to overlook this modality. The other great thing that was stressed in these DVDs was to only stretch what needs to be stretch! To often people try and go in and stretch everything, using what I call the “shotgun approach.” IE, if you just stretch everything, one of them will work. This really comes back to having a good assessment and then being specific with the treatment. The more specific you can get, the better your treatment will be (just as in Strength and Conditioning, the more specific we can get with our assessment and program design, the more efficient we will be in helping athletes’ correct their weak links and movement impairments).

I really can’t say enough good things about this product. If you are in this field, you really need to have this product in your collection!

I’ll be back later this week with more research and training info! As always, if you have a question (or comment) for the Q&A segment, please use the ‘comment’ feature at the bottom of each blog entry.

Patrick

Q: What is better for training, especially for middle distance - speed or miles?

A: Middle distance can be a real bear, because it is a little to long to be considered a sprint and a little to short to be considered a distance run. You really need to have the best of both worlds as far as energy system development goes. So, in this instance, there is no “better”. Rather, you need to be prepared to break your training up through out the week into more intensive days, where you are training shorter/more speed distances with full rest/recovery in between repetitions and extensive days, where you are doing longer runs and working on developing work capacity. I really like tempo runs for this as they help to develop work capacity, but allow you to get rest in between your sub-maximal runs so that you can focus on form and not allow high amounts of fatigue to destroy running technique.

Typically, because of the intensity of the speed work and the high amounts of neurological fatigue it can induce on the bodies system, you want to keep the volume of this work low through out the week. I feel that 2x’s a week of intense sprint work will be sufficient. The other days you can perform your tempo work and/or distance work (since I am unsure if you are a recreational runner that likes to just go out and run sometimes with the running groups in town. Not everyone is training to be a high performance athlete, and that is fine). So, at a weeks glance, your running program may looks something like this:

Mon - Speed work
Tue - tempo runs
Wed - off
Thu - Speed work
Fri - tempo runs
Sat - easy run (or long distance if you typically run with a running group on a Saturday, as most do)
Sun - off

That would be a generic little program to follow. Another thing that you may want to keep in mind is that depending on where you are in the season, the amount of speed work and tempo runs or longer distance work may shift, as you can not and should not, train maximal speed year round. This is a great way to burn out and potentially get injured. The planning of your program should be set up by a qualified coach to ensure that the variables are set up properly.

Of course there are other things that you would want to consider. You may want to think about adding in some resistance training in order to help increase your strength and power and to fix any movement problems or technique flaws that you may have. This will not only increase your performance in the middle distance events (or in longer or short distance events), but also will help to prevent injuries.

A proper assessment is needed in order to understand what your limiting factors are in the race so that a solid training program can be set up. Again, just like with the running, strength, power and muscular endurance work are going to shift in volume through out the season in order to prevent over training and ensure that you are fresh and ready to run when it comes to race day. Also, when you add lifting into the schedule above, the schedule becomes very “busy”. It would be best for you to sit down with a qualified coach to determine the best way to set up your schedule for your goals and for the amount of time each week you are able to train.

The worst thing you can do is attempt to do too much and over-train yourself into a ditch. When it comes to speed training, the “less is more mantra” is always a great philosophy to follow. Always opt for low volume/low amounts of higher quality work rather than a high volume/high amount of low quality/poorly executed work. As they say, “Practice doesn’t make perfect. Perfect practice makes perfect!”

Good luck,

Patrick

Q: I know it is important to warm up, but I am concerned about it affecting my performance in the race. Should I not warm up and just start out running in order to have fresh legs and try and set personal bests.

A: Warming up is extremely important. It prepares our bodies to move and helps facilitate an environment in which we can perform at our best. Going out and trying to exercise or compete (especially if you are trying to hit a PR in a run) is never advisable.

If a true concern of yours is that the warm up will detract from your performance time then, not trying to be mean here, you probably shouldn’t be running the race anyway. You probably need to develop your work capacity and general health and fitness.

The goal of the warm up is to get the body warm. You need to raise your core temperature and properly warm up the joints and muscles that are going to be stressed in your event. Exercise physiology textbooks will tell us that we need approximately 10 minutes to warm up our body and prepare it for training or competition. For runners, this can start by simply standing in place and loosening up the joints (ankle circles, hip circles, shoulder circles, planks, bridges, lunges, etc.) and then taking brief warm up jog to help prepare the body for running.

The main thing is that the warm up should not be extremely stressful! This is not a time to get out there and see how fast you can run 100 meters or do anything silly like that. It should however, be adequate enough to raise your temperature and make you break a little bit of a sweat. After the warm up, you should feel primed and ready to go.

No go warm up and set some PRs!

Patrick

I was asked to participate in a coach’s panel today at a 5K race in phoenix. It was part of a series that Aztech Training is conducting to help runners get educational information with regard to their running, program, and nutrition. This will be taking place at several of the runs this summer and then during the weekend long runs in August in preparation for the Phoenix PF Chang Marathon. So, if you are planning on running any of these races, please stop by and say hi! Also, if you need a team to join for the PF Chang Marathon, AZtech really is the best in the city!

I have decided to take some of the questions and answer them here since some that are reading this blog may benefit from it. I will tackle a few of the questions each week and hopefully, they will spawn other questions from my readers (if you have any questions, just leave it in the ‘comments’ section at the bottom of each entry and I will try to get to it).

Q: Why does my shoulder hurt when I run, and what can I do about it?

A: This is a great question and one that I happen to get a lot. I will say that without being there to see you run or do a proper assessment, it is tough to pin it to just one thing. As well, I am not a doctor or physical therapist, so I do not (ever) diagnose anything. I do put people through assessments (both movement assessment and, now that I have been working on completing my massage licensure, more specific soft tissue assessments). From there, I try and get any idea of what may be causing the pain and determine whether or not I can help you with this problem. When I need to, I do refer out to the physical therapist for a specific diagnosis. So, to answer the second part of your question, what you can do about it is go to see a professional to determine what the problem is and get on some sort of treatment plan. This can be a trainer who has a solid assessment, a massage therapist (specifically someone who focuses on orthopedic massage and neuromuscular techniques) or a doctor or physical therapist (for a specific diagnosis).

As we say, never chase pain. All that means is that if you have some sort of pain, it may (or may not) be due to the specific structure that is giving you the problem. You really need to look at everything when you are analyzing why someone hurts. Symptoms are nothing more than presentations of a problem. They don’t tell us WHY you hurt, they just tell us that SOMETHING is wrong. It is up to the professional to figure out what that something is. When it comes to shoulder ‘pain’, there are a few things that I look at:

1) Breathing patterns- Is the person an upper chest breather? This tends to create lots of tension in the shoulders and chest and can cause postural problems or exacerbate already existing postural abnormalities (especially late in a race when you are more fatigued).
2) Thoracic spine mobility
3) Cervical spine mobility
4) Scapular movement and position
5) Soft tissue assessment
6) Shoulder mobility and flexibility
7) Scapular stabilizer strength
Core strength
9) Posture- Not just upper body posture or thoracic spine posture, but the entire body. Remember, if something is off in the foot, it will affect everything above it. Sometimes, the pelvis can be out of position, causing posture to change all the way up the chain. Total body posture is a big one and it is always the first thing I look at when assessing someone (even though I didn’t list it first here).

As I stated earlier, it is also important to look at how you run late into the race, in a fatigue situation. Runner’s, especially distance runners, don’t always like to do strength training as they feel that it will hinder their performance. I do feel that some of the problems they have can be alleviated with proper strength work. Again, seeing a professional to help determine areas of weakness is really critical to ensuring that you are on the right program at the right time in your training season.

In other news…Tiger Woods Ya’all! Tiger Woods! What an incredible US Open it has been so far. I can’t wait for the playoff round tomorrow. It is almost unfair that I have to work. I feel like it should be some sort of holiday!

Patrick

Low and Moderate Plyometric Training Frequency Produces Greater Jumping and Sprinting Gains Compared With High Frequency.
de Villarreal ES, González-Badillo JJ, Izquierdo M. J Strength Cond Res. 2008 Mar 22(3):715-25.

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to examine the effect of 3 different plyometric training frequencies (e.g., 1 day per week, 2 days per week, 4 days per week) associated with 3 different plyometric training volumes on maximal strength, vertical jump performance, and sprinting ability.

Methods: Forty-two students were randomly assigned to 1 of 4 groups: control (n = 10, 7 sessions of drop jump (DJ) training, 1 day per week, 420 DJs), 14 sessions of DJ training (n = 12, 2 days per week, 840 DJs), and 28 sessions of DJ training (n = 9, 4 days per week, 1680 DJs). The training protocols included DJ from 3 different heights 20, 40, and 60 cm. Maximal strength (1 repetition maximum [1RM] and maximal isometric strength), vertical height in countermovement jumps and DJs, and 20-m sprint time tests were carried out before and after 7 weeks of plyometric training.

Results: No significant differences were observed among the groups in pre-training in any of the variables tested. No significant changes were observed in the control group in any of the variables tested at any point. Short-term plyometric training using moderate training frequency and volume of jumps (2 days per week, 840 jumps) produces similar enhancements in jumping performance, but greater training efficiency ( approximately 12% and 0.014% per jump) compared with high jumping (4 days per week, 1680 jumps) training frequency ( approximately 18% and 0.011% per jump). In addition, similar enhancements in 20-m-sprint time, jumping contact times and maximal strength were observed in both a moderate and low number of training sessions per week compared with high training frequencies, despite the fact that the average number of jumps accomplished in 7S (420 jumps) and 14S (840 jumps) was 25 and 50% of that performed in 28S (1680 jumps).

Conclusion: These observations may have considerable practical relevance for the optimal design of plyometric training programs for athletes, given that a moderate volume is more efficient than a higher plyometric training volume.

Some thoughts: A lot of times, coaches load up their athletes with plyometric work, especially if they are in jumping sports (IE, basketball, volleyball, etc.). The more is better philosophy still holds true today.

This study set out to evaluate whether or not you can get the same benefits from plyometric work with lower amounts of training volume.

The researchers concluded that the moderate amount of plyometric frequency/volume (2 days per week) group had better results that the high frequency/volume plyometric group. This study may be helpful to coaches who are planning their training programs that include plyometric exercises, specifically if the athletes are preparing for sports which require high amounts of jumping already.

One of the times when coaches run into problem is during inseason workouts. Usually, they continue on with the same training program that the athletes’ were performing in the pre-season phase of training. The problem with this is that not only are the athletes’ still doing the same workout, they have just increased their activity by including practices (usually 5 days a week) and games! This leads to a great amount of overload. This is especially true for those who play in a jumping sport and are trying to balance practice and a high frequency/volume plyometric program.

The main thing I tell coaches in these situations is that they need to drop the plyoemtric training volume so that the athletes’ are fresh and ready to perform properly in practice. This study should give those coaches some insight into how their program can be set up to accommodate the training stress of practice and competition.

Additionally, this program was conducted on physical education students (42 subjects in all) and not elite athletes. At the elite level, the athletes may require high a frequency/volume of training in order to get the same neural benefits that plyometrics provide. The determination of training volume/frequency/load should be established by the strength and conditioning specialist and the athlete should adequately be prepared to handle this level of work by completing prior phases of strength and conditioning to help enhance their training base.

Happy jumping,

Patrick

First off, if you are in the Phoenix area on June 8th (that is a Sunday), I will be speaking at the USA Volleyball AZ state coaches seminar, which will be held at South Mountain Community College. I am presenting on movement preparation techniques. This is going to be broken down into two parts. The first part is a lecture and the second part will be hands on where we are going to go through some of the exercises and teach coaches how to cue them. I will also be talking about assessment and some common movement faults we see with young athletes. If you are in the area, please drop by and say hello!

Second, over the next few entries, I have some recent research on plyometrics that I will post about that I found interesting and hope you all like.

Finally, I was talking with Andrew Fitzgerald today. Andrew is a good friend and I had the pleasure of working with him back in NYC when I lived there. Andrew also happens to be the owner of E3 sports (http://e3sports.com/). E3 sports is an up and coming sports performance company in the tri state area, working with athletes of all ages (youth, college, amateur and professional).

We were talking about sports performance training and about how a lot of strength coaches seems to only prioritize STRENGTH. Now, I am not saying that strength is not important; because it is. It is very important. The more strength you have, the greater potential to display power you have. Also, most kids need more strength. However, the key is to not prioritize strength and forget about the importance of other qualities. We have to remember that we are preparing athletes. Not powerlifters and not Olympic lifters. It is almost like a paradigm shift. About 20 years ago (maybe even less) coaches seemed to focus primarily on aerobic conditioning in order to prepare their athletes for the competitive season. Now, we have the total opposite, and coaches are focusing on the other end of the spectrum. I guess, as with most things in life, the true answer can be found somewhere in the middle. If you focus on strength, don’t forget about the conditioning (and vice versa).

The other thing we spoke about was the importance of really having good progressions in your training programs and making sure that you are correcting faulty movement patterns that your athletes are producing (this comes back to having a comprehensive assessment). This can be very difficult when it comes to working with teams and groups of athletes. You need to be really creative in terms of understanding what each person in the group needs and be flexible with your program in order to incorporate those needs. A lot of times, this can be accomplished by not wasting time in between sets and exercises, by having the athlete perform a mobility drill or corrective exercise to help refine the movement pattern they are working on for the day. Also, the warm up time is a great time to address these needs, as is the cool down. Being proactive about trying to correct your athletes’ movement faults will really help set you apart from other coaches.

Patrick