I’ve been seeing a lot more on IG lately about how lifting weights and LISS cardio alone isn’t enough if you wanna reach your true athletic potential.
People recommend doing Plyometrics, sprints, jumps, etc in order to become more explosive and powerful, more often than not making out that lifting weights will make you slow
I can’t help but think that sprinting is just force production in a specific context, a bit like getting stronger at a barbell low bar squat vs leg press: both will increase the ability for the legs to produce force in their own way.
Therefore, the best approach for true ‘athleticism’ is most likely to build a solid base with a variety of lifting and cardio and then apply those adaptations to your sport/skill when you need to by actual practicing whatever it is you wanna display. Does that sound about right?
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Howdy!
I think the through-line is correct: get strong and proficient in a variety of different exercises. Then, apply and/or specialize as needed for sport and/or preferences.
I do think that directly training high velocity force production improves that quality beyond what traditional resistance training can do, even when all reps are moved as fast as possible. My read of the literature with respect to both health (e.g. falls in older people) and performance (1RM strength) suggests directly training high velocity force production does not improve these outcomes more than traditional resistance training. For sport however, that’s a different story.
Moving quickly is a skill and there ought to be some element of that in a comprehensive program. For most, moving the weights quickly will suffice. For those looking to go above and beyond, allocating some training load towards direct power training is reasonable. I like our General S/C programs as an example of this.
-Jordan
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Thanks Jordan!
I’m quite interested in starting sprinting, but haven’t properly in over 10 years. I’ve also seen people recommend not to jump into all-out sprinting due to increase injury risk, often recommending hill sprints as an attempt to manage load.
How would you recommend someone start sprinting? I have a pretty good cardio base, getting 200+ mins of zone 2 weekly.
I like having people do some sprint work on the bike and rower first, usually 8-10 second efforts on the minute at the end of a shorter steady state piece: 30 min z2, then 10 “surges” (8-10s sprints, w rest in between).
Then, I’d start incorporating something similar at the end of a run, but ideally do the surges up a hill and at ~ 80% effort to start. Gradually building from there.
I stretch the whole process out over a number of weeks, as I’m pretty risk averse on this front. Some “special” exercises like box jumps, Nordics, and/or copenhagens may be useful.
You might benefit from a consultation if you have more specific on this stuff. Admittedly, we should get going with making a resource on this too.
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