I would say the performance at the required/expected level of the event one is training for does bring in itself all the necessary requirements ,development/adaptation wise.
Is just repeating the specific event stimulus over and over the best option we have to exploit one’s potential,and the the best possible use of whatever mean is available to advance over time?
thanks for this!
no i am not saying this and i am not against any strength programmes -for Super…- but as you say, all the necessary requirements for development/adaptation, i suppose, will come from the event itself
strength -if this is what you are referring to- of any form and kind, is supplementary -at least for running- and should be treated as such; or to put it in another way, let the athlete reach a “limit/plateau” without including such specialisation in the weight’s room and allow the athlete to develop “naturally” and then at this higher level, have a risk/benefit analysis and act accordingly…
let me know what you think about this!
There are many ways to obtain strength and improvement should occur year to year. The rate of diminishing returns takes place as soon as you start your first wt. session ever. This means that your 1RM does not increase as much in subsequent sessions; although, it is still increasing but only at a decreasing rate. It is only when the strength gain is minimal should one start to think of decreasing the volume of lifts; for example, say you started lifting like most sprinters when you started your first year of college at the age of 18. After which, you lifted till the age of 35 which would have been 17 years of weight lifting before you decide to hang it up like most sprinters. I have been lifting close to this exact amount (16 years, I started when I was 12) and I still see IMO significant gains! And even when you hit the strength plateu after you exhaust all resources then how well are your olympic lifts (which translate more into athletic performance one general strength is in place say 3 years)? Answer: They probably suck pretty bad! So you try to master those lifts as well and focus less on strength, this could happen say the last 4 years for you to peak for the olympics at 35! Your technique should flawless then! The point being is that you should have perfected such lifting whether it be strength or olympic in your last quadrennial cycle which I doubt will ever happen if you lift the way you seem to do by the implications in your previous posts! I guarantee you that if you do this I or some other elite sprinter (BJ) will own you! Hence the comparison between BJ and Carl Lewis and we all know how bad Carl got beat! Keep in mind this post reflects 100m primarily and in any other event say 400/800 these qualities are still important but how much so I do not know bc I have never run those distances nor do I care or have interest in the slower races.
A couple things I have been wondering about:
When taking into account a philosophy of Organism Strength, does it make more sense to wear weight belts for heavier squats and deadlifts?
I used to not wear a belt because I wanted to strengthen my low back. As I am learning new things every day, including the Organism Strength concept, I am not sure if this is optimal anymore.
How does one choose squat/deadlift depths when taking Organism Strength into account?
People would argue full squats will hit the glutes/quads more, wide stance squats hit the posterior chain more, etc. and they are right.
But if one adheres to an OS (organism strength) philosophy, this type of thinking is less important, is it not?
For example, a squat with less depth would be more weight, and thus possibly more stimulating to the nervous system. But then, does one just put as much weight on the bar as possible, and do a walkout with it? At what point does it become too much weight/too little depth or too little weight/too much depth for optimal stimulation?
If anyone can chime in with their thoughts on this I’d really appreciate it.
You are already giving an answer to BOTH your questions with your own words along the line of thought above.
I thought I fully understood the concept of organism strength but I am still struggling with it a bit. My question is if high intensity sprint work will build organism strength then why is starting maintenance weights too early an issue (a la the optimal performance window in the maximizing explosive power graph). Wouldn’t the speed work/races maintain/build organism strength and weights would be more a means of “expressing” that strength in the weightroom… which could have psychological benefits?
Hopefully that was clear enough to get my point across. Any help is appreciated.
Weights are stimulatory to the sprints and a loss of too much strength reduces the ability to create enough stimulus for runs/meets. You need to balance the demands, just like in the previous post about weight depths vs weight lifted- you need to balance goig deep enough to hit the post chain with the weight moved and a belt may well allow you to provide more stimulus.
Thanks Charlie, your answer about weights being stimulatory makes sense, however I have a couple questions about the depth issue that you brought up:
You posed some very interesting questions.
My experience with heavy (>80%) deadlifts is that they impact the nervous system probably more than any other exercise. I believe this partly explains why the squat has become the lower body exercise of choice in most programs.
Where I differ from Charlie is that (flexibility) permitting I have always advocated full range squats. Reasons for this include a reduction in the risk of injury; greater time under tension AND reduced nervous system stress. I certainly wouldn’t change the range of motion for an exercise deep into the season, simply to generate a nervous stimulae.
I agree about the deads in terms of CNS but we were warned off because of the extreme weights the athletes were moving even by 1984 and felt the squats covered enough.
I wouldn’t change the ROM either (unless there was some sort of problem that had to be dealt with)- the body doesn’t like stimulus changes, especially late in the season. The squat must be deep enough to activate the post chain.
It is my experience also that deadlifts give a big nervous system stimulus. From use of a device that I have that measures CNS tone :rolleyes: , I have found that the CNS may be heightened the day after a moderately heavy deadlift session (4x3 ~85%) compared to a squat session.
It’s possible that deadlifts have more of an effect on “CNS training/stimulus/coordiation” but less on the muscular side (due to the lack of an eccentric component).
Take it for what it’s worth (prob not much).
Why do you think that is the case re the deadlifts and the impact on the CNS?
The other thing to remember is that CNS impact is stress (load with is exponential in effect) x number of Motor Units involved (which is linear). Check the chart on Vanc 2004 for reasonable approximations of MU involvement in various lifts.
More load, relatively low % of total muscle used, much less eccentric stress.
The “CNS impact” as you defined it above is basically the “height” in (height) x (breadth) that you’ve talked about, correct? So the total CNS “exposure” would be (MUs involved)x(volume)x(load)^2, is that right?
Some more questions :o… are we looking for the greatest possible stimulus from the weights or are we looking for the optimal stimulus that fits the given situation (different role in training vs. during a final taper, etc). I guess this is similar to my earlier question; at what point is it optimal and at what point is it too much? When do the weights go from being more and more stimulatory for the sprints (better times, higher speeds) to becoming detrimental (slower times, greater likelihood for injury). The more I think about this the more confused I get!
More load relative to what? I’m certain a high % of total muscle is used during the deadlift (70% motor unit involvement according to CF)? During the deadlift there is also less time under tension.
Where do your priorities lie? If you do a lot of sprint type work you would try to limit the stimulus via weights ie., general, “bodybuilding” type methods.
More load relative to exercises that use more total muscle (squat, clean, snatch, etc).
If thats the case, why do any weights at all if your priority is lower times? Also, that doesn’t seem to be the approach that Charlie takes since he has a 3-1-3 max strength phases during SPP when there is a lot of sprint type work.