what is the best max strength(squat) method for sprinters and jumpers to supplement the two and improve max strength and power…give examples of cycles that have worked well in the past…
There is no “best strenght method”. What works best is the specific method that suits the athlete’s type and point in training. It is a means to enhancing speed/power and not an end in itself.
so what works for one athlete may not work for another…which is why athletes do not train the same but use the same principels…so with the athletes you trained there programs were different but had the same principls
Pretty much- yes. There have been many arguments over methods and I usually don’t get involved because they are a supporting means and not an end in themselves. Usually, athletes who buy into these “ideal” weight programs come to grief because the weights become primary, forcing the sprinting/jumping into a secondary role.
there was an article cited here a while back listing the "Top Ten exercises to improve your 40y. Not one of the ten involved running!!
anybody have suggestions to what are good strength routines for athletes in general. mostly i see plifting with high vol. no good for athlete
Why don’t you post your program and let members help
3 sets of 3-5 reps…
Just like RB34 said, there’s no need to get fancy. A few sets of a few exercises done 2-3 times per week is all you need. I mean, something as simple as this could work very well while leaving plenty of energy for sprinting.
Squat, 2-3 x 4-6 reps
RDL, 2-3 x 4-6 reps
Decline Abs, 2-3 x 8-10 reps
(Some people may question the last exercise, but psoas and abdominal strength and hypertrophy are very important.)
Any athlete with the requisite genetics to attain moderate to high level results in sporting competition will gain strength as easily as one will hit water if they fall out of a boat.
the process of biological maturation combined with the most rudimentary direction in the weight room will yield satisfactory gains.
Becoming a world class powerlifter or weightlifter is one thing; however, becoming ‘strong enough’ for the vast amount of the rest of the sporting disciplines is an astonishingly mindless endeavor.
If it required the attention of an expert than the predominance of ‘professionals’ in the ‘S&C’ industry would quickly find themselves out of work.
Very well said.
i was thinking of this for the squat…2x5 (4 min rest between set)
start of using 75% of 1rm eg max 130kg in the squat…so 5 reps x 100kg then 2nd set would be 90% of the first 5 reps x 90kg add… 2.5 kg next workout… a week would look like…4 week cycle…
Week 1
MONDAY:100kgx5 90kg x5
FRIDAY:102.5kg x5 92.5kg
Week2
MONDAY:add on 2.5
FRIDAY:add on 2.5…
what are your thoughts on this…or are theyre more effective methods
Very interesting comment, coming from someone who has devoted his life (at least for the present) to 1) being a strength coach at the university level, 2) has studied and written extensively about this very subject, and 3) has had some less than flattering things to say about other university strength programs in general. This is not meant to be a flame in any way, I was simply suprised to see such an opinion coming from someone who seems so immersed in training for peak athletic performance.
I think his statement refers to “max strength” only. Peak athletic performance involves all points of the speed-strength continuum, whose development obviously requires a process a lot more complicated than for strength only.
Sizerp said it well.
No worries though, I’ll clarify some things for you as I have some free time here (get to sleep in tomorrow morning) and it is clear that it would behoove me to elucidate what I stand for: (In the order of your points 1, 2, and 3)
- While I’ve used the term and work in the business, I’ve never considered myself a ‘strength coach’ or 'strength and conditioning coach’; etcetera, as the business/industry is complete shambles. I state this because in my professional career I’ve met, or heard of, less than a handful of individuals that are qualified to truly prepare an athlete beyond the one dimensional nature of what is currently defined by the status quo of the industry.
I have no hesitation in stating that I feel like an alien in a strange world.
I refer to my self as a physical preparation coach because that is what I do.
A strength coach, or strength and conditioning coach, and I don’t believe this to be semantics by the way, is, in my view, a job description that requires not much more than the aptitude necessary to pass a personal trainer certification course.
Hence, the lack of qualified individuals in this field. Hell, it’s an apprenticeship business. Most only know what their coach or their team did.
I have coaches visit and contact me routinely and when I begin to describe how this job ‘should’ be done and that it DEMANDS an understanding of the bioenergetic and biodynamic structure of the sport discipline I get these strange looks.
I take my valuable time to explain that programming and organizing training is not limited to ‘strength development’. That the block system, Charlie’s Vertical Integration System, the Conjugate Sequence System, etcetera are NOT STRENGTH DEVELOPMENT METHODOLOGIES they are complete training models and encompass the totality of training irritants and we coaches must account for the totality of training irritants and do our job to ensure that the training transfers more positively as the SPP approaches.
Again, more strange looks.
- Trust me, in the scope of furthering my understanding of sport preparation the novel concept of ‘strength training’ is elementary dear Watson. If you review my work you’ll notice that the vast majority of any writing I’ve done, solely directed towards ‘strength training’, has been done in the form of explanation.
In terms of exploratory efforts, believe me; it took me a New York minute to realize that strength development for ‘athletes’ is something you simply let happen.
Yup, just let it happen.
The novel concept of ‘strength training’ is something that I could fully explain to any reasonably intelligent person in an hour or so and the simplicity of it is referenced in my falling out of a boat and hitting water analogy. Again I must clarify that I am not speaking to the elite level powerlifting/weightlifting community.
Hell, why do you think my good friend Jim Wendler’s 5/3/1 method has received such enormous interest, or Starr’s 5x5 method, and so on…because these methods are galactically SIMPLE yet EFFECTIVE.
You won’t find such elementary formulas for speed development, or sport form development, for instance, because THERE AREN’T ANY.
Shit, in this business, S&C coaches fall into championship programs, win rings by default, and so on. How often, on the other hand, does a T&F coach, for instance, squat, press, clean, ‘functionally train’, jump, and run the shit out their athlete and win a medal or break a world record…NEVER But a whole plethora of S&C coaches muddle the fuck out of the training process and hang their hats on all the trophies and rings their program has earned.
- No doubt that I have little positive accolades to direct towards most of what I’ve witnessed in this business. That’s precisely because I am immersed in my endeavors more than most people could possibly know in a direction that diverts far from the common course; however, don’t be surprised by my statements because if you’ll agree that I am in the athlete construction business then you’ll also agree that ‘strength training’ constitutes only one of the many tools on my belt.
…and a partridge in a pear tree
Understood. Actually I had just finished reading some of your work on block training when I saw your post and thought for a brief moment you’d left for greener pastures. I understand your first post now. However, the original question asked about improving max strength and power. Do your comments about improving max strength also reflect your feelings about optimizing power training?
Yes, to me, the processes of increasing Fmm and RFD are very straight forward.
Of course context must be specified in so far as how the strength or power is demonstrated.
Wow, couldn’t have said it better myself. Oh wait, no I did say the same thing, when Dan asked this on my forum. 
nothing wrong with asking questions…i should have phrased the question better…
Could you expand on something please? I think we would agree that most/all weight room training is general in nature, with the primary goals being increasing Fmm, RFD, functional strength and/or power. My interpretation of what’s been said here, is that it would seem that any idiot could develop these properties in themselves or others. I’m sure I’m missing something here. I would think that being a D-1 strength coach, you would agree that a good strength coach is invaluable to such a program. If not, I don’t understand why you would choose that as a profession and devote time to writing/speaking about it. What am I missing here? Go easy, I know I’m setting myself up to get whacked out of the park.
Well, I think that I’m able to much more clearly communicate my views and directives in lecture format. On that note, I will be speaking at a seminar in May in New Jersey.
I don’t want to list details here on Charlie’s site. The information is listed at athelitetraining.com
In a nutshell, I do agree that a qualified physical preparation coach is highly beneficial towards a programs success. It’s my unpopular view, however, that very few of these exist.
What there is no shortage of, are ‘strength and conditioning’ coaches. It just so happens to be that, according to my view, the curricula and apprenticeships that generate the populous of these coaches are fantastically incomplete and often misdirected.
I often ask myself the same question and then I go to the facility the next day and train my athletes and I’m reminded why.
It’s the athletes, not all of them- the special ones, and the feeling I’m rewarded with when I know that what I’ve done has assisted them in heightening their sport results.