fbpx

It seems in the realm of strength and conditioning; everybody has the strength component down. Get your guys stronger and they will improve their RFD, speed and the rest will take care of itself.

If only it were that easy. The reality is, that couldn’t be further from the truth.

Athletic performance training that includes plyometrics, power, speed, agility and proper mechanical movement seems like a grey area in our industry. It seems very simplistic in nature.

Pick a few “well known” exercises for developing speed and power and perform them before your strength movements.

At Varsity House Gym, our GAMESPEED program ensures that our athletes get faster, more power, and more agile to improve REAL speed in games.

Here are 3 reasons you or your athlete’s are going to get faster this summer.

 

#1) We Treat Performance Work Like We Do Our Strength Training

Developing strength requires a large amount of time spent on building proper movement patterns, neural efficiency and proper technique. It works exactly the same way with performance work.

You must constantly “grease the groove” and re-wire the brain to move and fire efficiently.

There must be a specific sequence of warm up patterns, proper programming, progressions and phases of training dedicated to different qualities.

As strength and conditioning specialist we would never have a novice athlete with no training experiencing start squatting heavy weight. Novice athletes with little training experience have very weak tendons, muscles and connective tissues.

Maximal sprinting and jumping are the two most taxing things you can do in the gym from both a neurological and physiological standpoint.

For a novice athlete you may perhaps have them start with bodyweight squats, then kettle squats and empty bar squats.

The same principles apply when training athletes to sprint and jump properly. You must perform basic mechanical drills like A-Skips, B-Skips, High Knees, Power Skips and further technical movements that will help the athlete understand how to move their body through space in the least amount of time possible.

I’ve grown fond of the term “Greasing the Groove” lately. It holds merit.

By practicing these movements, you are developing a controlled rhythm.

We must always have the end game in mind. An athlete’s long-term development is far more important then short-lived gains. Strength is part of the equation.

However, if you want to your athletes to develop optimally you must have a well though out system that has the athlete’s long term success in mind.

Remember, controlled is smooth, and smooth is fast.

 You wouldn’t have a new athlete who has never lifted before start going for new 1RMs. The same concept holds true with performance work. You must build the athletes base and get their tendons, connective tissue, and joints ready for the more taxing sprints and jumps.

 

#2) We Have a Locked Down GAMESPEED System Based on the 5 Principles of Speed and Power

  1. Increase Slow Velocity Strength

Get Stronger

  1. Increase High Velocity Strength

Sprint and Jump Variations – maximal effort

  1. Increase Rate of Force Development

Resisted Jumps and Sprints

  1. Increase Stretch Reflex

Reactive based jumps, minimal ground contact time

  1. Increase Inter-Muscular Coordination and Skill

Properly executed athletic movements

 

Most programs only account for 1 of the above concepts.

As mentioned previously, most coaches pay close attention to their strength work. You have different meso-cycles dedicated to different areas of the strength curve.

At Varsity House Gym, we make sure that our athletes are actually “Athletes first, lifters second.” We want them to be injury free and posses the ability move FAST.

 

#3) We have Extremely Detailed Testing Parameters

 You would never take a year of classes without ever getting a grade on a test.

How do you know if you are improving?

We have a full detailed excel sheet that accounts for every single performance metric in the gym. Every week (including testing weeks) we make sure that our numbers are trending upward.

This allows us to assess what is working and what we need to change.

We pride ourselves on being world leaders in sports performance and the results speak for themselves.

 

Conclusion

Speed Kills! It is the most sought after commodity in sports. The game has changed for all sports.

The game is faster; athletes are faster than ever before. If you don’t want to fall behind, we suggest you start with improving your speed.

At Varsity House Gym, our GAMESPEED training sessions are on Tuesdays and Thursdays.

 

We hope to see you there!

Coach Adam