I have been doing my own little experiment on CNS recruitment when I am doing my baseball workout, which includes swings with bats of various weights and hitting a swinging tire and that kind of stuff as well as my typical throwing routine which consists of mainly long distance (200+ feet) long toss. The thing I train for the most is sprinting and I am starting to follow Charlie’s guidelines very strictly, especially with High/low intensity days alternating. I personally feel that swinging and throwing lay more within the high intensity category from having to generate maximal force with each individual rep, but I’m not entirely sure. So my question is…to anyone who reads this… do you think swinging and throwing should be included on high or low intensity days?
Definitely high intensity days because you are trying to exert maximal force. I would use a variety of high intensity medicine ball throws to benefit those elements even more.
Your perception that it is high intensity dhould be your guide. Keep it on the high intensity day.
Maximum Speed and maximal force are not the same. I look at batting practice as a High Intensity day and long toss as more of a recovery day since it is used for pitchers after games. Long toss is more postural fiber and rotational while the glutes and hamstrings get tested in a batter’s position and is much of the impulse of the swing. Alternate IMO.
Thanks for the replies guy. I didn’t want to mess up my training by mismatching my intensities so I appreciate your input.
not sure, but if long toss is used for recovery by pitchers, you’re prob right- but does it vary for other positions?.
From my own experience long toss does vary by position. When I myself have done long toss after pitching, it was more of a relaxed cool down than anything. I still threw the ball long distances, but I didn’t try and throw each ball maximally. It was more of a stretch it out kind of throw and I definitely didn’t take crow hops. Where as, when I’m training for outfield I do attempt each throw maximally and I do take crow hops. I think long toss for pitchers is more of an exercise to stretch everything out, generally speaking of course, but for outfielders its to increase throwing distance/speed. Like I said, this is from my own experiences though and might differ for other people.
I was wondering if you are using any particular program for singing your bats with various weights, or if you are creating your own. I am a pitcher and I have had pretty good succes with the program from setpro.com
I’ve been doing an overload/underload routine that I found in a few different places on the internet, but can’t remember where. It pretty much consists of swinging 35 times with a bat 3-4oz. heavier than your game bat…rest…
then swing with a bat 3-4oz. lighter 35 times…rest… then use your normal game bat for 35 swings. You go through this three times and on top of it are supposed to do medicine ball work and grip strength work. It doesn’t really seem like anything too special, but my bat-speed has increased an average of approx 7mph in 3 weeks, with a few of my swings peaking 12mph faster than my fastest 3 weeks ago.
Hey guys. This will be my first post here because I don’t understand the sprints as well as I do throws. I did hit 50m in the disc when I was younger and now coach a very good 18u baseball team, more specifically the catchers (which I did too). Thus I know pitchers very well. Two things I see off the bat (no pun intended) is that I have never really heard of pitchers performing soft-toss after an outing. I apologize if that is a misunderstanding, but it is usually right to the ice, and some poles if anything (foul pole to foul pole jogs). Our pitchers, as well as most on a team with a set 4-man rotation have at least 4 days off, more if games are not every day. What is done in between starts is what I believe we actually may be talking about here. In this case, long toss is predominantly used for “air-ing out” the arm, or basically a feeling of actively loosening the shoulder muscles. Like I said this is a feeling, whereas I would think that it is more specifically lengthening out the force production on the ball, thus increasing velocities and distances without the ballistic stress on the internal rotators, and decreasing the rate of decel by the externals. This is opposed to bullpen work which is much more mechanical through the body, ending with more ballistic throwing. If you are doing long toss for 200+ feet “on a line” then that would definitely be HT in regards to throwing, but if “airing out” I would consider LT. That is really the first time I have thought about it in those terms but that is what forums are for aren’t they?? I may be wrong here but I have done this thousands of times as prep for the much more ballistic throws of catchers.
Secondly, as for overspeed/overweight drills, we as coaches believe essentially that while it may or may not increase each variable of the power equation, the alteration to hitting mechanics and/or timing is not acceptable to incur the method. Same with over/underweighted balls. We witnessed this problem this past weekend as we played a tournament with aluminum bats when we use wood all year. While we should be crushing with aluminum, it takes us sometimes games to get used to the change. Switching back and forth within a practice, or daily, just makes it worse. Tire hitting drills are used to reinforce the palm-up/palm-down position of the hands at the point of contact and promote driving through the ball in this position. Strength as a result of this? Possible, but it is often a byproduct of training technique isn’t it?
I hope this helps a bit and hope that my unfamiliarity with CF method don’t show through too much. I’ve read about here on some other great power fourums/q&a’s.
We use two types of throwing variations in our long toss program: long and loose and pull down. I have been able to impliment these two variations of long toss quite successfully within the CF/Bompa high/low intensity alternation scheme.
Long and loose throwing can be used for a number of reasons (recovery from competition, lengthening of arm action, active stretching through the throwing motion, mechanical feed back for proper arm action, just light work on low intensity days).
The technique requires the athlete to increase range of motion, relax the arm and feel the integration of the lower half and torso assisting in the development of force in the throwing motion. The athlete accelerates the arm throw the throwing motion utilizing the mechanics of an outfielder making a throw to a cut-off man except the trajectory of the ball has an exagerated arc in the middle of the flight (not flat / no pull down). There is no casting of the ball (arm and body do not finish / body flies away from target), the release poin is higher and earlier in the motion. This will allow coaches an opportunity to see many technical flaws in throwing athletes, the velocity is slower, and athletes get more reps (less stress and energy). A lot of infieders / pitchers are unable to improve their velocity due to the short nature of their throws, and mechanical flaws. The improvement of velocity occures when throwers become more efficent (improved mechanics) and the arm can travel faster(better use of the legs and torso /summation of forces).
The Pull down variation of long toss is the maximum velocity, and pull down of the seams on the ball. The trajectory is as flat as possible. There is much more stress on the arm and body, and is usually done only 2 times a week.