Whoa – who was the a-hole this week and barely wrote anything for the site?
And by “anything” I mean “zero, zilch, nada.”
My bad.
But it was for good reason. I travelled to Colorado Springs this week to film some stuff with the National Strength & Conditioning Association (NSCA) for their upcoming 2019 (Virtual) Personal Trainers Conference, as well as made a cameo appearance at T-Nation headquarters.
Man, between those two establishments AND the National Olympic Training Facility AND The Air Force Academy, Colorado Springs is one buff and beautiful city.1
Also, as it happens, I’m off to Edmonton (<– that’s in Canada by the way) tomorrow to go film the (Even More) Complete Shoulder & Hip Blueprint with Dean Somerset this weekend.
So, yeah, it was a busy week. SO GET OFF MY BACK YOU BIG JERK
Melbourne, Australia: July 19-21st and Melbourne Strength & Conditioning. (<— Includes bonus “Psych Skills for Fitness Pros” pre-workshop with Dr. Lisa Lewis).
Luke (Worthington) and I did this workshop last summer in London and figured it’s only fair to bring it State side.
Combined we have 30+ years of coaching experience (I.e., one Mike Boyle or Dan John) and this workshop will be two days where we uncover every nook and cranny as it relates to how we assess our clients/athletes and how we best prepare them for the rigors of every day life/sport.
Upper/Lower Extremity Assessment
Technique Audits (how to coach common strength training exercises)
Ways to integrate PRI (Postural Restoration Institute) strategies that don’t make your brain hurt.
This will be a unique opportunity for people to learn from myself, but especially Luke, who is one of the best and brightest coaches I know. This will be his first time teaching in the States.
For more information and to register you can go HERE.
This will be the only time Dr. Lisa Lewis and I will be presenting this workshop together in 2019. In previous years we’ve presented it in Boston, London, Toronto, Bonn (Germany), and Austin, TX.
This 1-day workshop is targeted towards fitness professionals and digs a little deeper into what really “bogs” them down and stresses them out….
…their clients!
Click THIS link for more details on topics covered as well as date/cost/location.
SOCIAL MEDIA SHENANIGANS
Twitter
I still find one of the hardest things for me as a coach is to remember to keep things simple.
I get in my own way overthinking things. The best programs I write (and not coincidentally the ones clients tend to like the best) are the “simple” ones.
Fun Tony Fact: I can count on one hand the total number of times I’ve ever attempted to skate on ice. I say “attempted” because I believe the longest I’ve ever stayed upright before crashing to the ground (and taking someone with me) is nine seconds.
That said, despite my lack of skating skills I know a great program when I see it. Kevin and Travis have produced an outstanding resource here, and if you work with hockey players this is an absolute NO-BRAINER.
Speed Training for Hockey is currently on sale at a very fair price, but it only last through this weekend.
Today’s guest post comes courtesy of trainer, writer, and guy I hate because he is waaaaaaay too good looking, Michael Gregory.
Michael wrote an excellent post on nutrient timing for my site last year which you can check out HERE. He’s back again discussing an important topic: “reframing” injury and how to use (more) training to aid recovery.
Warning: Avengers: End Game spoilers ahead.
But come on: It’s been three weeks for crying out loud. If you haven’t seen it by now it’s your fault.
Let’s talk about acute injuries in your clients: those accidents that leave a scar in the shape of a teddy bear.
“Oh! What a cute injury!”
Allow me to elaborate, for those of you who aren’t a fan of Dad jokes.
If you hurt yourself, the best recovery plan you can follow includes continuing to train and actually treating the injury as if it is less egregious than it may actually be.
I’m not suggesting that you act as if nothing happened, but I am suggesting that you only adjust your training as much as you have to in order to work around the pain.
As a coach, you aren’t a doctor, so don’t act like one. You are, however, in the chain of recovery, and may be the only fitness professional around when an injury first occurs.
Know your role Snoop Lion
How you react matters to your client more than you realize.
The Assumption Is You Know What You’re Doing
You’re a shit hot programmer that doesn’t plan anything your client isn’t ready for because you follow the principle of progressive overload.
One-rep maxes are not a spontaneous event that you perform when the sunset is a particularly auspicious color. They are planned for and prepared for, for weeks or even months in advance.
Because you program smartly, you know that any injury a client sustains under your care isn’t going to be a career ender.
It’s simply a kiss from the weightlifting gods that initiates them into the barbell illuminati.
If you train hard you will have battle wounds. That being the case, it’s time you learn how to get your clients past their injuries in the most economical way possible.
The Biopsychosocial Model of Pain for Acute Injuries
This entire process is about facilitating the best environment for healing. That means not freaking out and quitting, but rather, changing training only as much as is needed.
Step 1: Reassure AKA “Don’t freak out.”
Even if someone’s eye is hanging out of their skull, the best thing you can do is keep your cool. The power of positive thought is a hot topic these days.
Even if those stories are only 10% accurate the power of the placebo effect is a wildy useful tool to have on your side. Keeping your cool and addressing unhelpful thoughts and fears are the first things you can to do to help your clients harness the effects of the placebo.
This is the psychosocial aspect of the model. It is the most important to get right the first time. Poisonous thoughts are really hard to uproot once they’ve been planted.
This whole step is the opposite of what my Junior Varsity football coach did to me and my relationship with the 2-plate bench press.
He told me I’d never be able to bench 225 with my long-ass arms unless I weighed 300+ pounds and the gravitational pull of the moon was twice its normal strength.
(Brief aside: Of course, the world’s weather and tidal patterns would be thrown into absolute chaos if all of a sudden the moon was twice as strong. So the joke’s on Coach J, because we’d all be dead before I could even make it to the gym. Try to remain calm after that sick burn.)
Regardless, I struggled for years with that negative reinforcement (nocebo effect) in my head. I could rep out 205 for sets of 5 but as soon as that second plate went on the bar “it was too heavy.”
Step 2: Assess the Situation
Like a good cub scout that just stumbled onto the remains of a deer that had been hit by a car, you’ve got to get your bearings.
Should you help it?
Put it out of its misery?
Add it to your Instagram story?
He already knows he messed up. Overreacting isn’t going to help the situation.
Start by asking the trainee what they were attempting and what they felt.
Remember, poker face: don’t let ‘em see you wince.
This is the first two “O’s” of the OODA loop, something that fighter pilots and military tacticians love to reference. Observe and Orient to the situation. (DA is Decide and Act, but you have to orient first).
No need to jump to any reactions here or start calling people lower life forms.
Be a professional.
Step 3: Move Forward by Reintroducing Movement in a Non-Threatening Context
Your special snowflake of a client is down, but not melted. You can still fix this and get them back to lifting heavy and kicking in doors faster than you can say “rubber baby buggy bumpers”.
Arnold said it first.
Your goal is to work your way backwards from the exercise that caused the injury in as short a distance as possible.
Start by asking these questions:
1st Question: Load. Is there a weight you can use that does not hurt?
If you can just reduce the weight of the exercise and the client no longer feels pain or discomfort then… do that.
If your client felt a “tweak” (technical term) in their mid-back while deadlifting, deadlift day isn’t over. Just take some weight off the bar. If it still hurts with 135, use the bar.
If it still hurts with the bar, use a PVC pipe.
The goal here is to show your client that the movement isn’t inherently dangerous at all weights.
2nd Question: Range of Motion. Where does it hurt?
If your client is still in pain conducting the movement with only their bodyweight, the next thing to adjust is range of motion.
In deadlifting, for example, if their pain is in the first two inches off the floor, elevate the bar until you are out of the danger zone.
No, this isn’t perfect form, for you deadlift sticklers out there, but your client isn’t going to be doing deadlifts from the rack or with the high handles on the trap bar forever. Pretty much as soon as you adjust the range of motion of a movement you should be planning for a progression to get the trainee back to the full movement.
If you haven’t seen it, consider this your warning.
Secondly, who the fudge decided what “full range of motion” is for any given exercise?
If your client isn’t a competitive lifter, it doesn’t actually matter.
I promise you won’t cause a rift in the space-time continuum resulting in an alternate timeline where Thanos succeeds in destroying half of all life in the universe and it stays that way. (Okay, that’s not really a spoiler so much as conjecture. Hey, spoiler warnings entice the reader to finish the article).
3rd Question (well, statement): Exercise Selection. If decreasing the weight and range of motion still results in pain, work your way backwards down the line of exercise specificity.
Only now should you be thinking about changing up the exercise entirely. This is assuming that you chose the initial exercise because it is the one which most completely trains you client to achieve their specified goal. If you just chose the exercise because it makes the vein in your biceps pop when you apply the Clarendon filter on Instagram I ask you the following question. How did you get this far in this article?
As an example, let’s say you were doing conventional deadlifts with your client. In my mind, the regression looks something like this:
Conventional deadlift
Snatch grip deadlift
Sumo deadlift
Straight leg deadlift
Romanian deadlift
Trap bar deadlifts
Rack pulls
Dumbbell deadlift variations
Single-leg DB deadlift variations
Single-arm DB deadlift variations
Single-arm single-leg DB deadlift variations
Good mornings
Cable pull-throughs
Hip thrusts
Okay, I digressed quite far there, but I think you get the point.
There are lots of exercises you can try with your client to teach them that they are not only not broken, but in fact still strong even with pain.
There is no excuse for the countless number of trainees doing leg presses and camping out on the stationary bike in the name of recovery.
Training is recovery.
It’s All Really Just Reassurance
This entire process of managing acute injuries is really just reassuring people that they aren’t fragile.
Some of our fellow humans, some of them your clients, have spent their entire lives avoiding pain at all costs. As a result, they’ve never had to learn how to overcome true adversity. By teaching this process to your clients, you are giving them the gift of self-reliance.
Resiliency is something most trainees are looking to build, mostly in the context of making their muscles more resilient. As far as I’m concerned, tenacity, fortitude, resilience, and mental toughness are all muscles. Each and every one of those is embedded in this process, and they are all made stronger every time someone learns to overcome something you or the barbell throws their way in the weightroom.
Does that tempt you to injure your clients on purpose now so that you can teach them about mental toughness?
Don’t do it.
But do be prepared to react calmly and with precision when accidents happen.
About the Author
Michael is a USMC veteran, strength coach, amateur surfer, and semi-professional mushroom connoisseur. As an intelligence officer and MCMAP instructor Michael spent the majority of his military career in the Pacific theater of operations.
He now lives in Bali where he writes, trains, and has had multiple near-death experiences in surf that is much too heavy for him.
Melbourne, Australia: July 19-21st and Melbourne Strength & Conditioning. (<— Includes bonus “Psych Skills for Fitness Pros” pre-workshop with Dr. Lisa Lewis).
Luke (Worthington) and I did this workshop last summer in London and figured it’s only fair to bring it State side.
Combined we have 30+ years of coaching experience (I.e., one Mike Boyle or Dan John) and this workshop will be two days where we uncover every nook and cranny as it relates to how we assess our clients/athletes and how we best prepare them for the rigors of every day life/sport.
Upper/Lower Extremity Assessment
Technique Audits (how to coach common strength training exercises)
Ways to integrate PRI (Postural Restoration Institute) strategies that don’t make your brain hurt.
This will be a unique opportunity for people to learn from myself, but especially Luke, who is one of the best and brightest coaches I know. This will be his first time teaching in the States.
For more information and to register you can go HERE.
This will be the only time Dr. Lisa Lewis and I will be presenting this workshop together in 2019. In previous years we’ve presented it in Boston, London, Toronto, Bonn (Germany), and Austin, TX.
This 1-day workshop is targeted towards fitness professionals and digs a little deeper into what really “bogs” them down and stresses them out….
…their clients!
Click THIS link for more details on topics covered as well as date/cost/location.
SOCIAL MEDIA SHENANIGANS
Twitter
I just left therapy.
I’ve been seeing the same therapist since 2011. At first we met 1x per week, for about a year. Now we meet 1x every 4-6 weeks; to check in.
It’s been an invaluable asset in my life. Just wanted to toss that tidbit out there. Your mental health IS important
Fun Tony Fact: I can count on one hand the total number of times I’ve ever attempted to skate on ice. I say “attempted” because I believe the longest I’ve ever stayed upright before crashing to the ground (and taking someone with me) is nine seconds.
That said, despite my lack of skating skills I know a great program when I see it. Kevin and Travis have produced an outstanding resource here, and if you work with hockey players this is an absolute NO-BRAINER.
Speed Training for Hockey is currently on sale at a very fair price, but it only last for one more week.
In all seriousness I haven’t worked in a commercial gym since the summer 0f 2007 when I “retired” to go off and help co-find Cressey Sports Performance.
It’s been a while.
That said, I did spend the first five years of my career working in both corporate and commercial fitness and even though I may be a bit rusty much of what follows is still relevant and undoubtedly help some of you reading to separate yourself from the masses.
Lets assume the obvious: 1) You have a degree or certification, 2) you’re competent in the areas of assessment, exercise prescription & technique, and Shaolin shadowboxing (hey, I don’t make the rules), 3) you practice basic hygiene and don’t smell like an old lady fart passing through an onion, and 4) at the very least you can name all four muscles of the rotator cuff and their functions (you’d be surprised how many trainers are unable to do this).
You’re already a step a head of your competition if you can place a checkmark next to all of those things.
And while I can sit here and wax poetic on the importance of all the things mentioned above in addition to the nuances of psychology, basic anatomy, undulated vs. concurrent periodization (what they are and when you’d use them), how to write a program for someone dealing with secondary external impingement, breaking down the Kreb’s cycle, or, I don’t know, even knowing what the fuck the Kreb’s Cycle is….
…..none of that, truly, will be the “x-factor” in determining whether or not any one specific trainer is capable of filling their client roster.
Although, if you know this by heart we should hang out.
Will possessing those attributes help?
You betcha.
However, I think it was my good friend, former business partner, and Cressey Sports Performance business director, Pete Dupuis, who stated it best:
“If you can’t hold a basic conversation and make small talk with people, you’re going to have a hard time in this industry.
Also, Tony’s pecs can cut diamonds.”
You’re Always Being Watched…Always
The best piece of advice I can give any trainer is to always act as if you’re being watched and observed.
Because you are.
When I was a commercial gym trainer I always treated every session as an opportunity to audition for other prospective clients. Meaning, my actual client – you know, the person who was paying good money for a service – got my undivided attention.
I didn’t want to come across as the cliche trainer who just stood there counting reps waiting for the hour to be over with.
Or worse, this trainer:
An acquaintance of mine, who’s a coach himself, posted this picture on my Twitter feed today. This is a trainer “working” as his client attempts a 2x bodyweight squat.
#byefelicia
Now, if you’re a trainer struggling to fill your client roster or struggling to hit session quotas every month and EVERY other member of the gym saw that this is what they’d be paying for, would you have any room to bitch and moan about how the man is keeping you down?
A few months ago my wife and I were in Florida visiting family and we needed a place to train for a few days. We ended up going to a CrossFit that was two miles away. The first morning we arrived was Day #1 of the 2019 Open. The energy when we walked in was palpable.
Loud music, people getting after it, coaches coaching, it was awesome.
I just went into one of the corners and did deadlifts.
Fast forward 30 minutes, everyone left, and the next group came in which happened to be two older women not competing in the Open. The coach then sat down in a chair and maybe every ten minutes who would look up and half-heartedly say “nice job” and then go on doing whatever the hell she was doing.
Talk about a 180 (and a complete letdown as an observer).
Be a shark, in motion at all times.
Be an active coach…always.
Give feedback, provide cues, give a shit.
Be a participant for crying out loud.
That’s how you’ll get clients.
Oh, and Don’t Be An Asshole
This is Mike Boyle 101.
People don’t want to train with an asshole. They don’t want to train with someone who talks over their head and uses big words all the time and they don’t want to train with someone who’s a judgmental jackass.
YEAH…I ATE A CARB YESTERDAY, TONY. DON’T JUDGE ME!!
Smile, say hello to other members, introduce yourself, offer some pointers here and there, put on free 15-30 minute clinics to get more eyes in front of you to showcase your value, and, if you’re going to train where you work, maybe consider not turning into “I’m wearing headphones, I’m a psychopath, don’t you dare look at me guy,” or be overtly obnoxious, hooting and hollering all over the place and sniffing ammonia packs before a set of deadlifts.
Being approachable is part of the game.
If members are watching you sniff ammonia packs before every set deadlifts you’re not doing yourself any favors.
Kevin knows how to train hockey players. However, the information below can be applied to any athlete. In short: when it comes to making someone faster the answer is rarely “just go do some sprints.” Digging deeper and understanding inherent limitations from athlete to athlete needs to be considered.
Speed is one of the most highly coveted physical attributes in almost any sport, but particularly in ice hockey.
Unfortunately, many speed development programs take a bunch of dynamic warm-up and sprint exercises from track and field, scramble them together, and assume players will get faster.
There are two fundamental flaws in this line of thinking.
First, there is a lot more to speed development than simply sprinting.
Second, the assumption that all players (regardless of age, training background, physical development, etc.) will respond favorably to this type of program is clearly misguided.
The “this is what most people need” logic leading to this type of program is unique to the fitness industry and clearly unacceptable in almost every other area. For example, can you imagine picking your car up from a mechanic, and having he/she tell you…
“I rotated your tires, changed your oil, and topped off your windshield wiper fluid.”
“Why’d you do that?”
“Well that’s what most people need.”
“Yes…but I came in because my car is leaking transmission fluid.”
Having a diagnostic system to help identify limiting factors to speed development will help you avoid both of these mistakes by providing clarity on which physical qualities need to be the focus of a training program, and by tracking progress to ensure the training is actually leading to the results you desire.
Limiting Factors to Speed Development
Below is a slide from a talk I gave at the NSCA’s Training for Hockey Clinic a few years ago. While this is overly simplistic, it provides a starting point for understanding the key elements that underlie performance in each area, and therefore what areas need to be “tested.”
Focusing in on speed, there are 4 key areas that contribute to speed development and expression.
1. Technique/Pattern
Speed can be limited by a player’s technique or skating pattern. This is why skating coaches are so important – if players aren’t taught to skate efficiently, to find their optimal skating depth, feel comfortable on their edges, learn optimal transition mechanics, etc., they’ll inevitably be wasting energy and skating slower than they could if they improved their mechanics.
2. Mobility/Stability
That said, from an off-ice training perspective, one of the major goals of training is to remove barriers that may be preventing a player from skating with optimal technique, which brings us down to the rest of the items on this list.
From a mobility standpoint, if a player doesn’t have the ankle and hip mobility to get into an optimal skating position and execute an effective stride, they’ll be leaving speed on the table.
In support of this concept, Upjohn et al. (2008) compared the skating patterns of high and low caliber players, and found that high caliber players set up with their hips, knees, and ankles all flexed more, and this allowed them to have a longer and wider stride length, and greater knee and ankle extension during the push-off phase of skating. In other words, a lower skating position translated into a longer stride length, which allowed for a more powerful push-off with each stride.
In this way, ensuring that the player has the adequate range of motion to get into a deeper skating position can be viewed as speed training.
This research is insightful because it highlights the importance of having adequate ankle mobility. A lack of dorsiflexion, or knees going over the toes, will limit your skating depth, and a lack of plantar flexion, or pointing the toes away from the ankle, will limit your power through the end of the push-off. What isn’t as readily apparent, is how a deeper skating stance will require increases in other components of hip mobility, notably hip abduction or moving the foot out to the side away from the hip.
Another way to illustrate this is to consider the lateral split.
The further apart the feet spread, or the further the hips move into this abduction position, the lower the hips drop. So if someone doesn’t possess the hip mobility in this direction, they’ll have to stand up higher to allow for a full stride.
This, along with a lack of ankle mobility, is one of the major reasons players will adopt a higher skating position. Again, all of this just illustrates that mobility in very specific areas can improve skating position, stride length, power through push-off, and ultimately speed. In other words, mobility work IS speed training, and if a player with a mobility restriction just runs more sprints, they’ll be missing out on a huge opportunity to improve their speed.
Note how greater hip abduction range of motion allows the player in red to achieve a much lower hip position, despite being several inches taller than the player in gray.
3. Muscle Size/Strength
Within a similar context, one of the major limitations to skating speed, particularly in high school and younger aged players, is a lack of lower body strength. Strength is a function of both how large the muscles are, listed as “muscle size” on the chart, and how effectively the brain can activate those muscles to produce force.
Strength can limit skating speed in two important ways.
First, if a player doesn’t possess the strength and local muscular endurance, listed in the stamina column, to maintain a low skating position, they’ll start to stand up taller as fatigue sets in. As they stand up taller, their skating stride shortens, they produce less push-off force with each stride, and they slow down.
Secondly, speed is largely determined by how much force a player can put into the ice with each stride. The more force that pushes into the ice, the further the player is propelled forward. By improving the player’s ability to produce high levels of force, you allow them to increase their propulsion with each stride, which simply means that each stride will push them further forward, allowing them to cover more ice with the same number of strides. Force is really just another way of saying strength. So in this way, strength training is really speed training.
Great example of a player possessing significant relative strength in a single-leg pattern.
4. Rate of Force Development
Lastly, ROFD stands for rate of force development. If a player produces the same amount of force, but does it faster, it will shorten the time it takes for them to complete the stride, allowing them to initiate their next stride sooner.
I don’t see this a lot, but in some players that have spent a lot of time developing strength using traditional bodybuilding or powerlifting methods, they’re capable of producing high levels of force, but they do so slowly, so the thing that’s limiting their speed the most is their ability to produce that force at a faster rate.
This is really the first time in this discussion where sprinting, plyometrics, and other more traditional speed and power work has a place in improving a limiting factor to speed.
That isn’t to say that these methods aren’t important in a comprehensive speed development program, but hopefully you now have a better appreciation for how speed training is MUCH more than just simply running.
Relevant Tests for Tracking Progress
There are a lot of performance tests available to help provide insight into limiting factors to speed development, and many of them have merit. Below are a few that I’ve found particularly effective, both in terms of the information they provide and the ease of implementation.
Mobility/Stability
This section could easily be its own article, but in the interest of simplicity, players should have some assessment of ankle mobility, hip range of motion, and single-leg stability. I’ve used several tests over the years to accomplish this, but want to highlight the Y-Balance Test, which has a few notable benefits:
Performance in this test correlates with ankle dorsiflexion and hip flexion range of motion, two important areas for achieving an optimal skating depth
The test serves as a reasonable off-ice assessment of stride length
Some studies have found a relationship between performance in this test and injury risk
The Y-Balance Test is really designed to be an end-range stability assessment, but if you watch how the player goes through it closely, you can get a sense of what may be limiting them from going further. For example, if the knee doesn’t smoothly drift forward over the toes without the heel popping up, the player may have an ankle mobility restriction.
Addressing mobility restrictions and improving single-leg stability should improve performance in this test AND stride length on the ice.
Speed/Acceleration
20-Yard Sprint with 10-Yard Split Time: The body positions, movement pattern, and ground contact time in the first few strides of acceleration more closely resemble the characteristics of skating than top-speed running.
With this in mind, a 10-yard sprint provides valuable information about a player’s ability to accelerate.
However, because hockey players aren’t the most polished sprinters (and they don’t need to be, as mentioned above), there can be a lot of variability in the start. Extending the sprint 20-yards gives a great indication of the players early and late phase acceleration while minimizing the impact a variable start will have on the overall time.
Lower Body Power
Vertical Jump: The vertical jump is one of the most commonly used tests to assess lower body power, and has been shown to moderately correlate to on-ice sprinting speed.
Aside from published research studies, I’ve personally been involved with testing a wide range of players both on and off the ice (youth players, junior teams, NHL Development Camps, NHL Training Camps, Olympic Training Camps, etc.) and the relationship between VJ height and on-ice speed is consistent across all of these groups, making it a suitable option for all players.
Part of the value of the test is that it’s so heavily used that it’s fairly easy to find normative data to look at how a given player compares to others in his or her age group, playing level, etc.
Equipment can be a limitation for some, so using a broad jump (or long jump) is a reasonable alternative. However, I’ve found that broad jump distance correlates with height, so ideally you’d divide the jump distance by height to get a scaled number to track over time.
Lateral Bound: This is a movement included in most hockey training programs, but not one many players are using to track progress.
Compared to the vertical and broad jump, this tests power in a lateral/horizontal pattern, which is more specific to skating, and provides an opportunity to identify side to side imbalances. I’ve also found that in players that are quick on the ice, but don’t have great vertical jumps, they tend to perform well in this test. Including both tests gives a more complete picture of the power profile of the player.
Leg length also plays into jump distance in this test, so it’s important to take a quick measurement of that (or split distance) as well.
I’ve published normative data for players in different age groups here: Hockey Power Testing.
Lower Body Strength
Dumbbell Reverse Lunge (5-RM): For strength testing, it’s possible to get a really good snapshot of the player’s ability to produce force through their lower body with this test.
Similar to the lateral bound, the reverse lunge is a unilateral exercise requiring single-leg stability and dissociated movement between the two legs, two fundamental characteristics of skating. It’s also a fairly easy movement to teach, so it’s safe to implement with players across all age groups.
Strength will fluctuate across developmental years, but by the time players hit high school, they should be able to use at least their body weight in external load (e.g. 90lb dumbbells for a 180lb player).
Wrap Up
There are two major points I want to leave you with.
First, developing speed involves a lot more than running sprints. It’s important to recognize the potential limiting factors to a player developing and expressing higher levels of speed to ensure these are being addressed through a comprehensive training program.
Second, running through these (or similar) tests can be helpful in both identifying individual areas for improvement and ensuring that a player’s training program is leading to the desired results.
The ability to produce force is the foundation for producing force quickly, the recipe for speed. If a player does not have adequate strength, that should be the primary focus. If the player is very strong, but doesn’t perform well in the jumping or sprinting tests, then exercises to improve rate of force development and acceleration should be the primary focus.
A well-designed, comprehensive speed training program should lead to improvements in all of these areas. Addressing a player’s limiting factors is the key to optimizing his or her speed development.
This is a no-brainer if you happen to work with hockey players.
What’s refreshing about this resource is that, while Kevin works with NHL players and has worked with many elite level hockey players throughout his coaching career, this is about keeping things simple and honing in on the basics.
This is about making better athletes.
Speed Training for Hockey is currently on sale at a hefty discount for the next two weeks, so act quickly before the price jumps up.
Melbourne, Australia: July 19-21st and Melbourne Strength & Conditioning. (<— Includes bonus “Psych Skills for Fitness Pros” pre-workshop with Dr. Lisa Lewis).
NOTE: The Early Bird rate of $100 OFF the regular price ends THIS WEEKEND (May 5th)
Luke and I did this workshop last summer in London and figured it’s only fair to bring it State side.
Combined we have 30+ years of coaching experience (I.e., one Mike Boyle or Dan John) and this workshop will be two days where we uncover every nook and cranny as it relates to how we assess our clients/athletes and how we best prepare them for the rigors of every day life/sport.
This will be a unique opportunity for people to learn from myself, but especially Luke, who is one of the best and brightest coaches I know. This will be his first time teaching in the States.
For more information and to register you can go HERE.
This will be the only time Dr. Lisa Lewis and I will be presenting this workshop together in 2019. In previous years we’ve presented together in Boston, London, Bonn (Germany), and Austin, TX.
This 1-day workshop is targeted towards fitness professionals and digs a little deeper into what really “bogs” them down and stresses them out….
…their clients!
Click THIS link for more details on topics covered as well as date/cost/location.
This article doesn’t really have anything to do with fitness, but it does have A LOT to do with your health. My friend Tessa (who’s the head health/fitness honcho at Boston Magazine) asked my wife, Dr. Lisa Lewis (who’s the head honcho of Jedi mind tricks), to provide some basic suggestions on how people can begin to ween themselves off of social media.
Given how social media, in particular Instagram, has transformed the way we get and digest health/fitness information, this article is never more relevant.
I had a new client start at CORE recently who, before we even met in person, let it be known that 1) he hated techno and 2) he hated squats.
Well, why don’t you let me know how you really feel?
Personally, whenever I email someone for the first time, my approach is to just, you know, introduce myself, say I’m a big fan, and maybe butter them up with a savory compliment like “oh, and your cat’s adorable.”
I generally refrain from taking a proverbial shit on the things the person on the other end enjoys:
“…and while I’m at it, Tony, I also hate 8o’s cartoons, cheese, rainbows, and your kid.”
I’m exaggerating of course, but once I dug a little deeper and had a bit more back and forth with this individual I got a better sense of his lack of enthusiasm towards squatting.3
When “Ken” came in for his initial assessment he noted that he had, at one point, enjoyed squatting.
Admittedly, those days were more than a decade ago, and despite his current disdain for all things squatting, he was still very much interested in putting them back into his training repertoire and giving them a go again.
The obvious question from me was, “why?”
“If you don’t like back squatting and more to the point, they hurt, why insist on doing them? We can also perform other variations – Goblet, Front, Zercher – that may be a little more back friendly.”
“That’s the thing,” he said, “they didn’t always hurt. When I trained all through college and into my early 30s I never had any issues.”
“But then, you know, I became more sedentary due to life, was stubborn and not taking into consideration I wasn’t 25 anymore, and things just fell apart.”
SIDE NOTE: “Ken” is 47, works long hours mostly at a desk, and I can’t stress this enough, hates techno…;o)
To speed things up all I’ll say is that, while Ken isn’t the most supple person in the world, nothing during his initial assessment came up as a stern red flag or required an exorcism. Sure, he had a few aches and pains, but nothing outside of the normal “niggles” that come with the territory of lifting heavy things for a large portion of one’s life.
I did notice with his passive vs. active squat screen that his active ROM was limited (while his passive ROM was pretty darn okay).
Pertinent information. And if you want to know why that’s pertinent information read the article hyperlinked a sentence above this one.
He also noted he had worked with several trainers in the past who, like me, noticed his lack of ROM with his active squat.
Seriously, read the article.
It’ll help.
As a result he was used to being given a laundry list of hip mobility drills in addition to a plethora of aggressive soft tissue “smashes” to perform daily:
A1. Take a 88 lb barbell and roll it over your thighs. Have someone stand on it and jump up and down for added pressure. Doesn’t that feel great!?
A2. Take a lacrosse ball and poke around in your glutes. If you feel nothing, glue on some razor blades to make it more challenging. Splendid!
A3. If neither of those work, go get a chainsaw. RELEASE.
brb
Moreover, Ken was also given poor advice and told to arch his lower back aggressively whenever he squatted because, #powerlifting.
As a result, whenever he hit a certain depth – usually juuuuust as he passed 90 degrees of hip flexion – he’d compensate with more lumbar flexion and exhibit what’s often referred to as “butt wink.”
Photo Credit: GirlsGoneStrong.com
Again, pertinent information.
No wonder his back always hurt when he squatted:
His issue wasn’t a mobility issue, but rather a POSITIONING issue.
Squat cues that work for powerlifters usually don’t work well with non-powerlifters.
Alignment Affects ROM
To be clear: I am not some anti-anterior pelvic tilt lobbyist.
Anterior pelvic tilt is normal.
There’s a natural lordotic curve to the lumbar spine which is accompanied with a slight forward/anterior tilt of the pelvis.
It’s when it becomes excessive – or people are encouraged to seek it out – that it can (not always) elicit negative repercussions.
Ross et al (2014) noted that:
In 3D modeling of pelvic motion from x-rays of test subjects an increase of anterior pelvic tilt of 10 degrees resulted in:
In short: more anterior tilt (may) require more spinal motion during squatting exercises compared to more posterior tilt.
The dotted section(s) to the left represent the acetabulum (or hip socket). As you move down from A to C we lose site of the acetabulum due to increased anterior pelvic tilt. This will incite increased bone on bone contact – or impingement – sooner as we go deeper into a squat.
Now, I am not suggesting we all walk around in more posterior pelvic tilt like a bunch of Ed Grimley wannabes:
However, what I am suggesting is that nudging a little more posterior pelvic tilt so our clients/athletes get out of their aggressive anterior pelvic tilt (and closer to neutral) may be the more appropriate long-term play.
Sure, it may entail “some” releasing of this and “some” mobilizing of that…but not as much as most people think.
Much of the time the more pertinent approach is to have your clients adopt a better bracing strategy in addition to spending more time strengthening the anterior core and glutes (both of which aid in posterior pelvic tilt).
Likewise, I don’t feel cuing people to “arch their lower back” during a squat is beneficial. As pointed out above, increased anterior pelvic tilt resulted in increased impingement of the hip. Once someone runs out of room in his or her’s hips, in order to squat deeper they have to gain ROM elsewhere.
Their soul lower back.
Moreover, the reason many powerlifters adopt a hard arch when they squat is more out of necessity than because it’s better.
They wear gear/squat suits (that require an aggressive arch in order to hit passable depth).
Photo Credit: EliteFTS.com
People who don’t compete, don’t wear squat suits (and “passable” depth is arbitrary and highly individual anyway).
Circling back to Ken (remember him?), all I had him do in our initial session(s) was to appreciate POSITION. I took away the cue to arch his lower back, and instead had him focus more on posteriorly tilting his pelvis to scoot him closer to neutral (which, remember, is STILL an anterior tilted position).
He was able to squat pain free AND was able to squat deeper without “falling” into that butt wink posture.
Today’s guest post comes courtesy of TG.com regular contributor, Travis Hansen.
He shares his approach to core training as well as numerous exercises he uses with his own athlete/clients. I’m willing to bet there’s a number you’ve never seen or tried before.
In the world of core training, there is a vast array of option to choose from and it can be overwhelming perhaps at times to decipher which options are more appropriate for you and your specific training goals.
What’s more, is that there are six sub-categories that absolutely need to be incorporated into your training regime so that you satisfy complete development of your core and all of its specific parts.
Here are the six categories for you:
#1- Prehab/Rehab based drills
#2- Anterior core drills
#3- Lateral/rotational core drills
#4- Posterior chains drills
#5- Explosive core work
#6- Core endurance work
1. Prehab/Rehab
Anytime there is a major weakness in the core there will be both a reduction in the recruitment of specific muscles in the core on outward to the rest of the body.
For example, it has been found that the TVA (Transverse Abdominis) muscle is suppose to be one of the first muscles to fire in the human body upon any movement initiated. This function is concrete enough to warrant a very valuable term/training principle that has been coined its honor.
The term “proximal to distal sequencing” has been adopted by many practitioners in the field on a regular basis, and helps explain how muscles activate inside at our core and then outward to the limbs sequentially. It’s also pretty well understood at this point that individuals with lower back pain tend to present with a timing delay of the TVA muscle which can prose several subsequent problems for you.
As a result, it becomes important that these individuals and even you partake in regular core training to either help remedy a current back issue, or prevent one from emerging in the future. And with 80% plus American who report back pain this issue becomes very urgent.
So in the context of prehab/rehab drills, here is a short list of drills you can include in your program if you aren’t already:
#1- Deadbugs
#2- Plank Progressions<— click to check out some plank progressions that don’t make my corneas bleed.
#3- Quadruped Progressions
2. Anterior Core
The next category on the list involves the development of the anterior core region or everything attached proximally from the lower sternum down all the way to the pubic symphysis. The TVA, Rectus Abdominis, and the external obliques are notable muscles within this sub-system of our anatomy.
This is system is your power pump per se as well, when it comes to core development.
Of course all systems are relevant in locomotion and none should be discounted, however, your individual power potential truly lies in this region along with the posterior chain, since they “co-contract” against one another in the sagittal plane.
If you don’t’ believe this then just witness performances across multiples exercises that are directionally linear dominant in nature versus those that are classified as lateral or rotational based: Squat, Deadlifts, Bench Presses, Jumps, and sprints are going to absolutely trump any shuffle, carioca, hip turn/crossover step, or lateral raise so on and so forth.
There are a few exceptions just like with everything, but overall our species was designed to express more strength and power in an up and down, front to back manner.
Here is a short list of anterior core drills for you:
#1- Reverse Crunches
#2- Stick Crunches
#3- Hanging leg raise progressions
#4- V-ups
#5- Rollouts
3. Lateral/Rotational Drills
The next category carries distinctions, but due to a natural lack of available variation with lateral based core drills, it’s much easier to just merge the two types together into one category.
If you play any sport, whether it be recreationally or what have you, you will need to incorporate lateral/rotational based core exercises into your program. Movements such as throwing, swinging, change of direction, etc. heavily rely on this region of our core anatomy.
Moreover, some of the fibers in the anterior core muscles will possess specific lines of pull that are geared towards rotation, such as the Rectus Abdominis muscle.
That means that by doubling up training to this muscle group and others, you are effectively covering all portions of the fibers within that muscle group and making them more sensitive to contracting in the process.
Some of examples of lateral/rotational based drills are as follow:
#1- Side plank variations
#2- Pallof presses
#3- Russian Twists
#4- Chops and Lifts
#5- Renegade Rows
4. Posterior Chain
The posterior chain has been discussed ad nauseum before just about everywhere on the internet, and it was alluded too briefly earlier, so we wont spend too much time on this one.
The “Deep Longitudinal Sub-System” is the more geeky and technical term for your posterior chain and if you analyze all of the target muscles you will see that it composes a vast majority of gross muscles or more than any other system which implies its extreme value in human movement and the core specifically.
The system begins at the heel then moves up through the shins, continuing up through the hamstrings and glutes, then across the thoracolumbar fascia and then the lumbar erectors, respectively. And if you haven’t heard it enough already, then its worth repeating, that if you aren’t absolutely crushing your posterior chain in the gym your are leaving a lot of strength and power skill in reserve.
Here are some common drills for this type of core training:
#1- Bent Knee Hip Extension Work (glute bridge, slideboard leg curls, stability ball leg curls, GHR’s)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AE3BygMmgzo
#2- Straight Knee Hip Extension Work (Swings, Deadlift variations, pull-through variations, sled sprints)
#3- Lateral/Rotational Hip Work (Jane Fonda’s/hip abductions, clamshells, and bandwalks)
5. Core Power
Core power is next on the list.
As an industry, there would to be more of a focus on promoting power in the lower and upper body regions, with less focus on the middle of the body. Then again, the core is implicated in many of the popular power training methods, like medicine ball throws, jump squats, and swings to name a few.
Truth is it doesn’t matter if you are an athlete who has to change directions frequently, or you’re a lifter or gym junkie whose trying to maximize your strength and power potential or raise your RFD (Rate of Fore Development) to the next level, you have to build high levels of reactivity in your core to initiate, anchor, and even match upper and lower body efforts. Once again you are only as strong as your weakest link.
Here are some core power training exercises:
#1-Standing medicine ball throws
#2- Medicine pullover throws
#3- V-up throws
#4- Rope plank swings
6. Core Endurance
And the final category of exercises is the more slow and higher volume-based approach.
Before we continue though, please understand that considerable research has shown that every possible motion of the lumbar spine is linked to some type of injury.
And if this were the case then we should all act like rigid hot dogs right?
Not a chance.
So what gives?
Well, like most things related to training: injury history, structural variances, program design, age, genetics, nutrition, work capacity, and much more will dictate future outcomes.
Dr. Stuart McGill is one of the best in the world when it comes to spine biomechanics, and he postulated at one time that the spine has an eventual limit to how many times it can bend and extend in a lifetime. Everyone took this information and ran with it. He also understands and appreciates that the rigorous daily demands of an athlete require us to potentially exceed or really challenge thresholds of the spine, so we need to prepare the highly delicate and vulnerable region as best we can.
And it’s inevitable that less than ideal postures and patterns will be produced in training, but managing these potentially threatening scenario’s is the end goal. Also consider that even if someone were to stress the core and spine heavily in their youth, intense activity will eventually decline since this type of activity is inversely related to aging.
As such, it will probably all balance itself out in the end and we shouldn’t worry too much if your training is in order.
With that being said, it’s imperative that you build the work capacity/endurance of your core just like all other muscle groups.
In one study, a timed superman or back extension test that was performed isometrically was useful in treating patients with non-specific lower back pain.
This would make obvious sense since discs have been shown to slightly slip as fatigue emerges in the core.
Endurance training of the local core musculature satisfies this TUT (Time Under Tension) specificity and when progressed properly, may help center the disc more and surrounding structures right where we want them.
Moreover, the core is comprised of a lot of slow twitch muscle fiber which have a tendency to respond better more with longer sets and TUT according to Henneman’s Size Principle.
Last but not least, witness all of the athletes throughout history who regularly performed thousands of crunches over the course of a training cycle with no back issues and stellar performances. How do you explain that one? Maybe there would be a slight link to back health or a lack there of in these instances, but more than likely it’s probably satisfying a psychological compulsion which drives other forces and is important.
Now that you have a compete infrastructure of core training you can effectively design your core training program so that it suits your individual needs and preferences. Just make sure to include all elements of the program. The core is synergistic in nature just like the rest of the body, where one part will fail to match the strength of all the components combined.
Programming Suggestions
I wanted you to go away with some rough parameters on how to program for the various options of core training.
Some methods can be performed in higher quantities and frequencies than others. Again, this is just a general scheme that applies to a majority of clients:
Frequency/Sets/Reps/Rest/Int/Tempo (E-I-C)
#1-Prehab/Rehab based drills 3-5x 4-5 12-24 0-30 sec Mod. 3-1-1
Melbourne, Australia: July 19-21st and Melbourne Strength & Conditioning. (<— Includes bonus “Psych Skills for Fitness Pros” pre-workshop with Dr. Lisa Lewis).
NOTE: The Early Bird rate of $100 OFF the regular price ends THIS WEEKEND (May 5th)
Luke and I did this workshop last summer in London and figured it’s only fair to bring it State side.
Combined we have 30+ years of coaching experience (I.e., one Mike Boyle or Dan John) and this workshop will be two days where we uncover every nook and cranny as it relates to how we assess our clients/athletes and how we best prepare them for the rigors of every day life/sport.
This will be a unique opportunity for people to learn from myself, but especially Luke, who is one of the best and brightest coaches I know. This will be his first time teaching in the States.
For more information and to register you can go HERE.
This is a free self-paced mini-course from Jon Goodman and his team at the Online Trainer Academy. They are the experts who have helped more fitness pros transition to online training than every other company and coach combined.
You will learn:
1. The systems you need to repeatedly generate clients.
2. The marketing know-how to ethically and douchily (<– my word, not their’s) attract the right people.
3. The tools to get high-paying clients.
4. An action plan to make it all happen.
Here’s another compilation article I was part of via T-Nation.com. Some great insights courtesy of coaches such as Lee Boyce, Eric Bach, Nick Tumminello, and others.
That was the message my coach, Greg Robins, relayed to me two weeks ago after our weekly program check in. I had just hit a new squat PR that week and he proceeded to congratulate me on a job well done and then followed suite with his “things are going to get interesting” comment.
My mind swirled.
Like, did “interesting” mean we were going to switch gears and maybe emphasize muscle building over max weight? Did “interesting” mean something sphincter clenching like 5/3/1 or German Volume Training. No, wait, shit, Smolov? Please god, no, not that.
As it turns out, I found out exactly what he meant by interesting when I opened up my Google sheet this past Monday to see what was in store for me this week:
Lifting
a
Metric
Shit
Ton
of
Weight.
I couldn’t help but do a double, nay, triple take when I saw what was on the agenda. I was slated to come close to if not surpass PR’s in the “big 3.”
Squat
Bench Press
Deadlift
I wasn’t expecting that.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a1Y73sPHKxw
I was both excited and defeated.
Excited in that I’m always down to lift heavy things. However, I’d be lying if I said I felt ready. Not to make excuses (even though that’s exactly what I’m going to do), but the weekend prior I was in Philadelphia presenting the (Even More) Complete Shoulder & Hip Blueprint with Dean Somerset.
I always feel like a bag of dicks after presenting for 14 hours between Saturday & Sunday, but that feeling was exponentially compounded due to some hefty travel woes both Dean and I had to deal with making our way to Philly.
My flight was delayed seven hours from Boston on Friday and Dean ended up stranded in Toronto when his flight was cancelled due to inclement weather
Moreover, Dean texted me Saturday morning 90 minutes before our workshop was to begin to say he wasn’t going to be able to get on a flight until the following day which meant it was going to be the Tony Show all day Saturday into Sunday afternoon.
My best bench ever is 315 lbs and it’s been a while since I attempted 300. I was disappointed I missed 290, and felt it prudent to share because, well, you know, everyone uses social media to highlight their wins.
I figured I’d keep it real and showcase a “fail.”
Although my buddy, John Rusin, did a wonderful job at making lemonade out of lemons with this comment:
“This is great for people to see. Not the miss (c’mon mayne!!) but a proper setup utilizing pins the way they were designed for. No horrific bailing, no jeopardized positions, just bar on safeties safely. Nicely done.”
And then today (Thursday) I missed my 605 lb attempt on the deadlift. I hit 585 (kinda-sorta easily) and was supposed to go for 615.
My training partner, Justin, kept it real though. He saw my 585 attempt and when I looked at him and said “what do you think? Should I go for it?”
He encouraged me instead to go for 605 since that would still be a 5 lb PR.
Annnnnnnd, nope.
Goddamit!
Two BIG misses in a week.
Not cool.
A few things to note from this video, though:
1. 0:24s = amazing post-DL fail ups.
2. 0:29s = Tony’s tantrum belt toss.
3. Because I want this to be a somewhat educational post, Justin did point out a great piece of constructive criticism on that particular pull.
If you look real close you’ll notice the bar get away from me a bit; you’ll see the plates roll forward juuuust a smidge as I initiate my pull.
Here, I slowed it down for you:
Full Disclosure: I think I would have missed the lift either way, but it does go to show how meticulous you have with regards to your set-up and execution to hit a big lift.
Nevertheless, I’d like to sit here and chalk up this entire fail of a week to stress, travel, and lack of sleep of late.
If I’m going to be honest with myself, though, I have to call bull to the shit on all that.
You see, I’m just like you dear reader.
There are times where I’m dialed in with my training, sure. But there are also times where I can get a bit complacent and lackadaisical and start to cut corners. I’ll skip my warm-up and there are even times where I don’t work as hard as I know I should be on my accessory work.
Hell, there are even times where I won’t complete all my accessory work.
I’m not perfect nor infallible; and this past week was a stark reminder I need to cut the shit. I need to hold myself more accountable and to DO…THE…WORK.
I want this to be a reminder to some of you reading too, because I know some of you can commiserate. Are you in a bit of a slump or not getting the results you want?
Go to bed. Hydrate. Eat to support you goals. Understand you’re not going to feel like Voltron every day. You’re bound to miss a lift here and there (it shouldn’t be a regular occurrence).
But too, be honest with yourself:
Are you really working as hard as you can in the gym?
Michael is a USMC veteran, strength coach, amateur surfer, and semi-professional mushroom connoisseur. As an intelligence officer and MCMAP instructor Michael spent the majority of his military career in the Pacific theater of operations.
