Strength Training

How to Maintain and Build Strength in-Season in Two Hours or Less

The most difficult part of in-season training is keeping up with strength training. Team practices, throwing practice, and league games are higher priority activities at this time of year. And they should be. There’s no point to being an excellent athlete if you have no skills. At the same time, you don’t want to lose all of the strength you worked hard to gain during the off-season.

Fortunately, maintaining strength is easier than obtaining it. With a laser-like focus on the big lifts, you can even gain strength without compromising the quality of your [read more…]

August 8th, 2011 | Category: Strength Training | 2 comments
Strength Training

Two fave functional strength exercises for legs

Adductors and abductors are important for balance and to help with your lateral motion. Machines such as the one below were invented to help you isolate and work these muscles.

 

yes, this is as silly as it looks

 

I’m a huge fan of lateral movement conditioning but isolating your adductors/abductors with these machines is not the way to get the results you want. The adductors and abductors are primarily for stability. You need to train them in the way they will function on the field.

I highly recommend single leg training which makes [read more…]

June 27th, 2011 | Category: Strength Training | Leave a comment
Core Work

Friday’s complete workout: putting training components in order

I don’t post the details of every workout I do on this blog because that would get very boring very quickly. However, Friday’s training session is a good example of how to incorporate different components of training into one workout session in a logical order so I’ll post it in full.

As I’ve mentioned, I’m able to devote about 2 hours per day 5-6 days per week to my training. This has to include all of my skill work in addition to my training and conditioning. For now I’m still trying to keep four days of lifting in an upper/lower [read more…]

April 9th, 2011 | Category: Core Work, Plyometrics, Strength Training, Training Log, Training Principles | 2 comments
Endurance

Circuit Training: What is it? Why do it?

What is circuit training?

Circuit training involves performing a series of strength training exercises with less than the normal amount of rest. The rest between sets is purposefully not enough for complete recovery.

There are many ways to design a circuit. You could pick ten exercises and do one set of each with no rest. You could go several times through a circuit with no rest. You could do a series of exercises with work intervals and rest intervals. Circuits can be intense and as short as 12 minutes or they can be as long as an hour. The variable [read more…]

March 17th, 2011 | Category: Endurance, Strength Training, Training Principles | 11 comments
 
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