A couple of weeks ago I spent a solid four days at Eastern Washington University with Head Strength & Conditioning Coach Nate Brookreson and his staff.  Some of my time was spent providing soft tissue therapy to a few of the athletes and some of my time was spent watching workouts and watching Nate “coach it up”.

I love seeing coaches work in environments like this where you have a huge number of athletes and limited coaching personnel.  This sort of stuff can present a host of problems and be a complete nightmare if the coach is not well organized and very specific about what needs to get done.  Nate and his staff do a great job trying to make sure that they meet each athlete’s individual needs.

One of the things that I really enjoyed about Nate’s program was the continued emphasis on the basics.  Coaches often get very enamored by high level exercises, increasing the weight on the bar (despite large breakdowns in technique), and cutting edge progression.  But Nate’s program is centered on doing the basics very, very, well.

Over the four days I got to see football and women’s volleyball train.  The first thing I like that Nate does is separate the freshman from the rest of the team.  The “veterans” have a different training program as they have been there longer, their technique is more refined, and they “know the drill” when it comes to being in the weight room.  The freshmen are hammered with a good dose of the basics.  Things like goblet squats, RDLs, 1-leg RDLs, push ups, and rows.  This was awesome to see when watching volleyball train because you could see the progressions right there in the weight room.  On one side of the room you had girls that were learning how to train and on the other side of the room you had girls doing power cleans and front squats with great technique.  You could see the steps that Nate takes to bring the girls to the higher level right there in front of your eyes.

Football was a little bit different in that the freshmen were training in the gym by themselves, not with the upper classmen (who trained at a different time).  Again, the freshman were given a good dose of the basic lifts – even if the athlete came from a high school program where they lifted frequently, Nate makes sure that they are doing things the proper way before more intense loading.  In a sport like football where strength coaches are so quick to get their athletes under the bar and start loading them up, it was nice to see a coach take some time out and ensure that technique was appropriate before allowing the athlete to perform a more advanced progression of the lift (e.g. learning to goblet squat before they front squat or back squat).  I think most strength coaches feel like they only have a limited amount of time with the athlete so they need to get them under the bar right away.  In college setting I just don’t see how this can be though. You have at least four years with the athlete (and five years with a number of them) and many of the freshman redshirt their first year, giving you plenty of time to develop their exercise technique, strength, and fitness level.  There is no need to rush.

Another thing that I thought was really great was that within the freshman group there was a further subdivision of guys that may have come to the program with injuries from high school, guys coming back from surgeries, or guys with pain.  Those guys were pulled out of the larger group and placed into a smaller group where one of Nate’s staff worked with them on more remedial exercises to ensure that further damage was not done, appropriate healing was going to take place, and the athletes were maintaining their fitness level and getting ready to eventually go back into the normal practice environment.

I really enjoyed my time at Eastern Washington.  It was great to see a staff that puts so much effort into the care of their athletes and you can tell that many of the athletes know they are getting something special in their strength & conditioning program that some of their friends at other DI universities might not be getting.  Great job by Nate Brookreson and his staff!

On Monday, I wrote an article about my thoughts on separating strength and conditioning and the importance of thinking about them as a singular entity (Strength & Conditioning: Keeping it All Together).  Today I just want to lay out a few circuit training methods that I have used over the years.  The number of times per week you perform these and which method you choose will depend on what you are looking to get out of your training at that time.  Of course you don’t have to use circuits in your training program and may opt to just do straight sets of exercises.  There are different times to use different methods and that is going to be up to your individual situation, the athlete(s) you are working with, the amount of time you have to devote to training, and what you are trying to achieve.

There are a number of ways to perform circuits and I generally group circuits into four categories (Please note that the terminology of this stuff often confuses people.  The terms that I use to describe the circuits are just for me so to have a way of classifying how I think about intensity and the work to rest ratio of a given circuit):

1. General fitness/aerobic circuits
2. Alactic-aerobic circuits
3. Strength circuits
4. Anaerobic-glycolytic circuits (further divided into extensive and intensive circuits)

General fitness/aerobic circuits

General fitness/aerobic circuits are simply to raise work capacity, improve fitness, and can also be used as a recovery modality on days when the athlete is beat up and needs to back off. The intensity of these circuits is low and the rest interval between movements is minimal, allowing the athlete to move from one exercise to the next at their own pace.  The only time I assign a rest interval for this circuit is if we use resistance and the individual is performing 8-12 repetitions using a 15-20RM load, followed by 30-60sec rest.  However, if we are doing these circuits for recovery purposes, we rarely approach intensity/effort like that, usually just performing various mobility drills and/or core work.

The exercise selection is up to you as a coach (Note: for total beginners to resistance training, I will use body weight or very low intensity, however their rep ranges will be 5-8 reps per exercise to allow them to learn the movement and not have technique deteriorate.).  I find that the exercises in this circuit can range from the normal resistance training exercises, body weight exercises, specific mobility/corrective exercises (FMS correctives fit in well here), or core work.  We are looking to work for > 30min in a circuit workout and they are allowed to take a little bit longer rest at the end of a complete circuit (90-120sec) before starting over. The number of circuits you do in this time will depend on the number of exercises you use and how long you plan to work for. Commonly, a workout using this format would consist of a warm up (10-15min), 30min of circuit work, and then 30-40min of tempo work on the bike or running in a field.  When using this method of circuit training for recovery purposes, we tend to focus more on joint mobility exercises, various stretches (yoga type sequences), and dynamic mobility activities.

Strength circuits

Strength circuits are focused on improving strength, just as the name implies. Usually I go to a superset of two main exercises with a mobility or core exercise in between them or I do a circuit of push, pull, legs, core. The important thing here is the rest interval, which so many do not obey. If you are able to perform this sort of work with no rest interval or very little rest then you probably need to place more weight on the bar and work towards getting more strength.

Reps in this circuit are </= 5 per set and the rest interval is anywhere from 3-5min. Rest can be active rest, which is why I use the mobility or core work in between; however, there are times when complete rest is going to be desired in order to allow for full recovery.  Additionally, I do not pressure the individual to move rapidly from one movement to the next, rather, I allow them to take their time when moving to the mobility/core exercise so that they can get sufficient rest and prepare for the next exercise or next set. The rest interval is very important here to allow for recovery and allow them to output as much force as they can.

Alactic-aerobic circuits

Alactic-aerobic circuits are used to try and improve the individual’s ability to repeat their effort in an explosive task. You wouldn’t really be at this type of circuit if the athlete does not have a well-developed work capacity to tolerate this sort of activity. However, you can scale back the intensity and perform aerobic plyometrics (a method that Joel Jamieson covers in his book Ultimate MMA Conditioning).

Aerobic plyometrics can be good for preparing an athlete to develop a sport specific work capacity. These are similar to the alactic-aerobic circuits; however, the intensity of the jumping activities you choose is much lower. For example, when using aerobic plyometrics, I am a fan of the skipping activities that Gary Gray/Todd Wright have talked about (multi-directional skips and hops) and various medicine ball throws. You would perform these in a work to rest ratio of 6-10sec  or 8-10  reps of work followed by 10-30sec rest and you would do this continuously for 5-10min.  This is a great way to train sports and athletic movements in the initial phases of training when an athlete may not be prepared to tolerate more intense methods of jumping or plyometrics and may need to work on more general type movements.

The alactic-aerobic circuit can be performed in a similar fashion however the intensity of the activities will be greater – more intense jumps, skips, hops, or sprints. The work period is again around 6-10sec or 8-10 reps followed by a rest interval of 20-40sec depending on the intensity of the exercises choosen and you ability to recover.  For example, 10yrd sprints with 30sec recovery, or a circuit of  jumps and/or hops for a desired number of repetitions.

Anaerobic-glycolytic circuits

These are what most people think about when they hear the word “circuit”.  These sorts of circuits have gained popularity recently with the various bootcamp and crossfit type of training methods out there.  Oftentimes people refer to these as “metabolic circuits” or “metabolic training”.  I would, however, caution people from using these circuits so frequently and/or year round.  The intensity of these types of circuits can take their toll on the body and this type of work is not a great starting point for someone beginning training with a limited training background.

Anaerobic circuits can be divided into extensive or intensive. These can be timed sets of work or they can consist of lifting weights to failure or near failure in the 6-8 rep range (similar to the repetitive effort method talked about by Mel Siff in Supertraining and made popular by Westside Barbell).

If the sets are timed they can be anywhere from 30sec to 2min. The 30-60sec intervals are what I would call more intensive and the 75-120sec intervals are what I would call more extensive. The rest interval in with these circuits is typically a 1:1, 1:2, or 1:3 work to rest ratio (so work for 30sec rest for 30sec or work for 30sec rest for 60sec, or work for 30sec rest for 90sec).  This type of work would be used only at the appropriate time in the training program. I do not start with this sort of work with people and it may only occupy a short block (2-3weeks) in a training program.

The type of exercises I choose here would be either general resistance training exercises (if you are using 6-8reps to failure or 1-rep shy of failure), some sort of complex (barbell complex, KB complex, DB complex), or sprinting activities (bike or running).  Another thing I have used are medicine ball circuits where we have a specific number of repetitions for each of the different throws and I time how long it takes them to go through the circuit and have them rest 1-2x’s their working set.

The important thing with anaerobic-glycolytic circuits in the intensity you are working at.  This method could easily fall under the general fitness circuit method if the intensity is too low.  Medicine ball circuits can be used in either an aerobic or anaerobic fashion as can various complexes (DB, KB, BB) depending on the weight on the bar and how hard you are working.  However, if the goal is to develop the anaerobic-glycolytic system then the intensity needs to be appropriately chosen for the given work duration.

Rest Intervals

The rest interval for the various circuits is essential!  Too often coaches and athletes cut their rest interval short in order to try and “do more work”or just get things done in a faster period of time.  If you want to properly develop some of these energy systems then the rest interval is an important rule to follow as it will ensure that you are able to put the greatest amount of effort into the work interval.  There are times when doing things under fatigue and trying to repeat your effort in this manner are important, however, you should work up to this sort of training by first making sure that you can give 100% and slowly lowering the rest interval until you can repeat maximal or near maximal efforts with minimal rest.

Many coaches tend to view strength and conditioning as two separate entities – “We strength train and then we condition”.

Oftentimes, this sort of thought process leads to a rigid compartmentalization of qualities as the coach is trying to develop too many different and/or competing qualities at one time.  This sort of separation ends up creating an antagonistic environment within the training program and can have a dampening effect on the end result as the individual does not have the opportunity to really develop one thing, but rather, becomes a jack of all trades and master of none.

Perhaps it may be more beneficial to look at both strength and conditioning as a singular entity working together to enhance the physiological state of the athlete.  In doing so, we can efficiently establish training phases that prioritize whatever fitness quality we are looking to enhance.

For example, if the athlete is just starting their training program (perhaps coming back from an injury, the start of offseason training after taking time off, or a total beginner with a training age of zero) your initial goal would be to develop general fitness in order to set them up for more intense training and higher volumes of training in later phases.  Therefore, your training program in this phase should reflect that goal and the methods you choose – whether it be lifting weights or performing conditioning on the field – should work together and not compete with one another.  In this example, the resistance portion of the program should be of a lower intensity (65-75%) for a moderate number of reps and the methods selected for your field work should be lower intensity also (tempo runs, aerobic plyometric activities, cardiac output work, etc).  This does not mean that you cannot work at a little higher intensity/lower reps in resistance training, it does not mean that you cannot work on a low volume of plyometrics, and it does not mean that you cannot work on a more intense method at the field; HOWEVER, these sorts of things are not the priority at this time!  A greater amount of your training should be spent focusing on the goal of the training phase, keeping strength and conditioning as one singular entity, and only a very small percentage of the time should be spent with the other qualities.  This allows you to prioritize your training – give the athlete what they need – without making things too cluttered and having a program that it schizophrenic.  I know block periodization is very popular these days and there seems to be a ton of semantics surrounding that stuff depending on which book you read and which coach you listen to.  I really don’t think it has to be any more complicated than: Train everything but have only one emphasis at a time and rotate that emphasis as the training program progresses on. 

The way that I do it is I set up a spread sheet and put down each phase and the length of time I am looking to spend in each phase (obviously this is flexible depending on how the athlete is progressing) across the top of the page.  On the left side of the page I write down the various qualities and from there, I fill in the boxes determining how much frequency each quality will be trained in a given phase, again, always keeping the goal in mind and the idea that strength and conditioning are not separate and need to work together.

What about hypertrophy training and general fitness?

A young strength coach asked me a question recently about setting up training phases and was concerned that doing more hypertrophy type of training in the first phase (a quality that some of his rugby athletes needed) would interfere with their development of cardiac output in the conditioning portion of the workout because the hypertrophy work would be more “anaerobic” in nature.

I think it can be easy to get swept away in all of this stuff and writing a training program can be a daunting task as there seems to be so much stuff to consider.  In this instance, however, I don’t see too much of a problem.  First, it is important to remember that most people who are unfit and in need of cardiac output type training are going to make some anaerobic adaptations first.  What I mean by this is that anything they do with any little bit of intensity will push them up into an anaerobic state to meet the demands of the task.  Of course, after a few weeks of this sort of training, they will begin to make the necessary adaptations, their fitness level will increase, and it will take a different sort of stimulus/stress to get more changes and improvements.  For an athlete in need of hypertrophy training, 2-3x/week of hypertrophy specific work with low to moderate volume (when just starting out on the training program) should be sufficient to see those sorts of adaptations.  This leaves a lot of time to develop the main quality of cardiac output and ensure that the athlete is recovering properly and making the adaptations that you seek.

I think the key thing is to look at your training week and ensure that you are managing stress well and that the progressions you are using are sound and not destroying the athlete right from the get go.  Too often coaches will start a training program with incredibly high amounts of volume and/or intensity only to have an athlete that is broken down 3-4 weeks later.  As I talked about in a previous article, Movement Reserve: Enhancing the Physiological Buffer Zone, managing stress and training appropriately are paramount.  An athlete who is just starting their training program should be eased into the process to ensure they are sufficiently tolerating the stresses you are exposing them to and the training program should be created to help them develop a higher level of fitness over several weeks.  Train only as much as you need to get an adaptation and then no more.  The problem of undertraining is an easy one to remedy – simply add a little more work and see if you get the changes you want.  The problem of overtraining can be a bit more difficult as you are always trying to playcatch up with the athlete as they are generally breaking down more frequently from training and needing to take time off only to try and start over again.  Additionally, if the athlete is overtraining because they are slammed from their offseason training program, as the pre-season approaches this presents a serious problem as the athlete is not going to be able to miss practice or pre-season games, causing the strength coach to determine what parts of training the athlete should miss out on or scale back on and then sometimes the athlete will also need therapy (which is an additional stress on the system).

At the end of the day it really comes down to two things:

1) Figure out what you need from your training program and prioritize that.  Don’t separate strength and conditioning, as they should work together.  Separating them causes the program to have mixed messages as there is a bleed over between strength and conditioning when they are trained as separate functions and one will start to rob the other.

2) Manage stress, start slow, progress properly, and only train as much as you need to get what you want.

There has been, and always will be, much debate about why athletes get injured.  This is the holy grail question that keeps researchers busy in the lab, coaches scratching their heads, and athletes constantly frustrated.

Injuries are a complicated event and usually cannot be linked to one single variable (aside from a contact injury).  In my mind, I think of three main categories that influence the state of the athlete:

1. Stress Overload
2. Poor Fitness
3. Poor Movement

The first two have been discussed before in previous blog entries.  Obviously, we should be doing everything we can to try and monitor and manage the stress and fatigue of the athlete to ensure that they are in an optimal state of readiness for their competitive season.  Part of being able to tolerate the stresses of practice and the game is being in shape.  Plain and simple, being out of shape is huge problem!  An athlete can have an amazing movement capacity but if they are unfit the chances of them being able to sufficiently use their movement throughout the course of a game, as fatigue sets in, will drastically be reduced.  Additionally, athletes who do not possess a level of basic general strength (which is a component of fitness) will lack the ability to tolerate the stress of the season.

Poor movement is an interesting addition to the puzzle and one that has come under scrutiny lately as many want to take shots at the idea that having a decent movement base to draw from can potentially limit your chances of getting injured.

I tend to see many of these arguments being one-sided, with advocates arguing either for or against the issue.  I’d rather take the middle ground and say that (a) we probably don’t know exactly why most injuries happen and (b) it is probably a combination of all of the things above instead of just taking a myopic view and saying that one thing is the only thing or one thing is more important than anything else.  As stated earlier, if you have great movement but poor fitness, you are no more bullet proof than the guy with great fitness but less of a movement base.

Theory of Movement Reserve

With all of this in mind it led me to come up with my idea of what I callmovement reserve.

What this basically means is that the athletes who do have a well-developed movement capacity appear to have a little bit larger physiological buffer zone when the circumstances are not perfect and the stars are not all aligned.

Obviously we do all we can to manage stress but no situation is 100% perfect.  If the team has to fly across country, the plane is delayed getting in, everyone misses dinner, and then they don’t get a good night sleep, the head coach cannot just go to the other head coach and say, “Our team is really exhausted.  Do you think we can put the game off until tomorrow so that we have another day to rest?”  It just doesn’t happen!  And, as an athlete, if a coach says “you have to play”…you have to play!  Even if that means you are a little bit tired, the HRV numbers are poor, and your level of stress is high.

In these instances, when there is more fatigue/stress than usual and when their body is not fully recovered/rested, it is the athlete with better movement capacity (and better general strength) that can get in the game and challenge their bodies knowing that their physiological buffer zone is a little bit greater than the guy who, when trying to push himself and operate under a high level of fatigue, doesn’t have the ability to manage his bodies ranges of motion and joint positions.

In a nut shell, when the chips are on the line, when the athlete starts to fatigue those with the greater movement capacity have some movement reserve to fall back on.  I believe that this may be one of the reasons why when looking at the research on the Functional Movement Screen it appears to be most valid in the NFL population.  This is a group of people who are trying to push their body to the max limit of its capacity and do so under some considerable amount of fatigue.

If you take the time to do all of the things above:

• Manage stress with a good training and recovery program
• Develop fitness – work capacity, strength, power, etc – to adequately prepare for the season
• Enhance movement reserve – ensure that joint ranges of motion, mobility, joint stability, etc, are healthy – and then integrate of all of these things into systematic whole body movements to help increase the physiological buffer zone

you have a much better chance (in my opinion at least) to keep athletes as healthy as possible.

Look at all the factors of the athlete and try not to get stuck in the black & white arguments.  Nothing in the body is as simple as that.  Allow the body to express its complexity and embrace the grey area between the black & white by accepting the fact that no one has all of the answers (and maybe never will).

You’re only as good as your ability to recover.

Stress is a necessary component in training.  If we don’t do anything to stress the system and disrupt homeostasis, then we never get anywhere.  Conversely if we apply so much stress that we are unable to recover from it we begin to breakdown, overtrain, and risk injury.

Thus, recovery is the name of the game and coaches and scientists are always looking for better ways to influence the body to promote a more advantageous healing environment.  Thanks to Dave Tenney for passing the following video of Aaron Coutts lecture on recovery strategies in Australian Rules Football:

I enjoyed Mr. Coutts’ talk and ideas. I especially liked to hear his ideas about performing a lower intensity of work in the 24-48hrs following competition. This period, according to Mr. Coutts, should be devoted to “recovery” so that more intense work can be completed later in the week.

This recommendation contradicts some of the ideas I have heard a few strength coaches make who recommend doing the most intense training session the day following competition so that it is performed furthest from the next competition and the athlete can have greater time to recover before the next game. I often wonder if this recommendation comes from coaches who are not monitoring stress and recovery as much as Mr. Coutts is.

Mr. Coutts’ point about ensuring that the athlete recovers well being the key priority following a game is a very good one and shows that flexibility in the training program is essential. Oftentimes coaches get roped into a very rigid program that they overlook the needs of the athletes in an effort to “stick with the plan”.

Managing stress during the season is a difficult task due to the high number of variables the athlete is dealing with – competition, training, therapy, practice, travel, etc. Ensuring that the athletes’ are well recovered following game day not only helps to manage fatigue and any nagging aches and pains that may follow competitive play but, as Mr. Coutts points out, allows for a higher intensity of work to be performed in the middle of the week. In the example I gave earlier regarding performing the most intense training the day after competition it would be difficult to get a lot of quality work out of the athlete to see any true benefit. Some athletes may initially be able to tolerate this sort of schedule; however, as the season goes on, I think you will see more athletes start to break down. By allowing the training program to be flexible you can make changes in intensity on any given day depending on what the athlete needs and can tolerate. Having a system of monitoring stress will help you better meet the athletes individual needs on any given day.

Enjoy the video!

Also, if interested, Joel Jamieson just wrote an interesting piece on using the sauna as a recovery method.