{"id":740,"date":"2012-06-25T04:43:21","date_gmt":"2012-06-25T04:43:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/optimumsportsperformance.com\/blog\/?p=740"},"modified":"2019-01-19T23:25:28","modified_gmt":"2019-01-19T23:25:28","slug":"tweaking-physiology","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/optimumsportsperformance.com\/blog\/tweaking-physiology\/","title":{"rendered":"Tweaking Physiology"},"content":{"rendered":"

One of the hot topics over the past year or so has been energy system development and the idea of developing a sport specific work capacity to further enhance an individual\u2019s athletic potential.<\/p>\n

Taking this a step further, a common theme in many of the discussions I have been having with some of my friends\/colleagues in the field has been the idea of tweaking physiology to optimally get what we need from the athlete \u2013 specific to their needs, their sport, and their position within that sport \u2013 whether it is to prepare them for\u00a0a competitive season\u00a0or in some of the ideas we have been bouncing around about the athlete\u2019s\u00a0return to play following an injury.<\/p>\n

No two people are alike and the idea of\u00a0individualized\u00a0<\/em>training is one that gets tossed around a lot \u2013 How individualized does training need to be? Does each person need their own program? What if we have a large group of athletes, how do we individualize then? What about the general fitness qualities\u00a0which are consistent between all sports\/athletes?<\/p>\n

What do I mean by\u00a0\u201ctweaking physiology\u201d<\/em>?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Each athlete has some sort of physical quality that makes them great. Some athletes possess an incredible aerobic system. Some athletes may have an amazing alactic system and\u00a0are able to display great strength, power, and\/or speed. Other athletes may have a mix of both and be\u00a0ahybrid\u00a0<\/em>of sorts.<\/p>\n

As I stated earlier, when looking at the individual it is important to take into consideration their sport, their position on the field or court, and what physiological qualities are needed to succeed in those two situations. From this understanding we can then begin to develop a training program that is specific to that individual\u2019s needs.<\/p>\n

For example, we may have an athlete that has a lower aerobic capacity compared to others on the team but is highly explosive and quick. Depending on their position on the field or the type of system the coach runs, this\u00a0sort of makeup may be optimal. However, if the athlete played a different position on the field or was asked to play a different role on the team (for example if there was a coaching change and the new coach ran a different style of offense or defense) this type of makeup may not be optimal and may require a change in program design to tweak the athlete\u2019s physiology a different way.<\/p>\n

A good example of this might be seen in football where you may have an offensive lineman that plays in an offense that is all about pounding the ball, taking time in the huddle, and slowing down the pace of the game. If all of a sudden a new offensive coordinator came in who wanted to run more of hurry-up style of offense and play more of a \u201crun-and-gun\u201d type of game then the offensive lineman needs to develop more of an aerobic capacity to allow\u00a0himself to repeat efforts rapidly with minimal rest to keep up with the rest of the team and ensure that the pace is fast enough to keep the defense on the field and not allow them to substitute out players so that they can get rest.<\/p>\n

This concept was discussed by a few of the coaches during the\u00a0Sounders Sports Science Weekend<\/a>\u00a0during the soccer periodization round table discussion and then further emphasized by Christ West during his lecture.<\/p>\n

Sometimes the flame burns too bright: Looking at physiology a different way<\/strong><\/p>\n

Some athletes possess a very\u00a0wired\u00a0<\/em>nervous system. Their 90% seems to be a much more intense effort than other athletes 90%. They go harder, they push more, and their nervous system is always\u00a0running hot\u00a0<\/em>(I refer to this as their flame burns a little\u00a0brighter than everyone else).<\/p>\n

The problem with these individuals is that they may be able to really turn it on and display amazing power but over the course of several attempts, when rest is incomplete (as it so often is in American team sports), that flame that burns really\u00a0bright tends to also die out a bit quicker.<\/p>\n

The flip side of this is the athlete who\u2019s flame doesn\u2019t burn as bright but it stays lit for a long period of time. They may not be overly explosive or have a lot of power but they can repeat their efforts consistently without much variation (even though those efforts aren\u2019t as intense as you would like them to be).<\/p>\n

In both of these instances, training will have to take on a different shape and result in us trying to\u00a0tweak\u00a0<\/em>their physiology. In the first case, we actually may need to dampen this athlete\u2019s flame a little bit. While their 100% effort may be incredibly impressive the flame burns out so quick that in a team sport setting it is pretty much useless (although it might be ideal in a setting suck as track and field or swimming where they need to just blow through one single event as hard as possible and then they get a ton of rest). In fact, with this athlete, we may actually \u2013 in the processes of dampening their flame \u2013 turn their nervous system down a bit. For this individual we may\u00a0have to be open to the idea that having them at 95% –\u00a0but being able to repeat that 95% over the course of the entire game –\u00a0is more optimal then having them at their 100% \u2013 even though it is very impressive –\u00a0which they can only display once every 2-3 minutes. This can be a difficult thing for the athlete to understand and teaching them to\u00a0turn down the volume\u00a0<\/em>on their nervous system a little bit and pace things out will take time and patience on the part of both the coach and the athlete.<\/p>\n

In the second example, we actually have to teach the athlete how to\u00a0turn the volume up<\/em>\u00a0on their nervous system. We want to throw some gas on that flame and try and get it to burn a bit brighter. These athletes will need less emphasis on their aerobic capacity development and more emphasis on intense efforts.<\/p>\n

Again, it is important to emphasize that\u00a0a lot\u00a0of this will be specific to the sport and position the athlete plays on the field. For example, the special teams\u00a0return specialist on your football team may not need to have as much aerobic capacity as your wide receiver who plays almost every down and is on the field for longer periods of time and needs to be able to repeat their highly explosive efforts play after play (alactic-aerobic ability).<\/p>\n

Sounds Simple\u2026.Right?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Obviously this sounds simple and many have talked about similar concepts before; however, it isn\u2019t as easy as it looks. Tweaking someone\u2019s physiology and their unique physiological make up takes time and you will need to sit down and think very specifically about their program design and what you are attempting to get out of it.<\/p>\n

It isn\u2019t as easy as just training everything \u2013 speed, power, strength, energy systems, etc \u2013 on each training day or doing a little bit more strength work or doing a few more tempo runs. It takes some thought and (maybe) some creativity when it comes to developing the program.<\/p>\n

These are certainly hard questions to ask and often leave me with even more questions than answers. However, they are important questions to ask because in the long run they will make our program design better and ensure that we are extracting the highest potential out of an athlete without just doing something very general and hoping for the best.<\/p>\n

I don\u2019t have all the answers (or even some of the answers). Right now, we are just playing with a lot of concepts and ideas on how to go about developing an individualized training program to specifically tweak someone\u2019s physiology.\u00a0Sam Leahey<\/a>\u00a0has come out to Phoenix to spend the summer with me and we have been sitting down and going over my document of training methods and having long discussions about how some of\u00a0the methods fit into a program, where they fit, and how we can use these methods to create certain adaptations \u2013 physiological adaptations, hormonal adaptations, structural adaptations, etc. Some of these methods and the training programs that we have been using look nothing like the traditional training programs you may see if you walked into a sports training facility and this is mainly because we have established\u00a0specific goals or themes that we are trying to emphasize on certain days of the week or in certain phases of training.<\/p>\n

It is still a learning process and not everything works out as planned but the idea is that we are trying to push the envelope a little bit. Additionally, it is important to keep in mind that\u00a0just because something did not work for one individual does not mean that it won\u2019t work for the next guy or girl that walks through the door. There is no telling how any one person will respond to a certain training stimulus and because we all have some individual qualities we all will have individual responses.<\/p>\n

The goal is to hopefully look back five years from now and have a much greater understanding of what it takes to tweak someone\u2019s physiology. Right now we are just trying to keep our minds open to many ideas and concepts.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

One of the hot topics over the past year or so has been energy system development and the idea of developing a sport specific work capacity to further enhance an individual\u2019s athletic potential. Taking this a step further, a common theme in many of the discussions I have been having with some of my friends\/colleagues […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-740","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-strength-and-conditioning"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/optimumsportsperformance.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/740","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/optimumsportsperformance.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/optimumsportsperformance.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/optimumsportsperformance.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/optimumsportsperformance.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=740"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/optimumsportsperformance.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/740\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":741,"href":"https:\/\/optimumsportsperformance.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/740\/revisions\/741"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/optimumsportsperformance.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=740"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/optimumsportsperformance.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=740"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/optimumsportsperformance.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=740"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}