Thought I would share this with all of you from my archives. Many of these numbers were presented by Vern Gambetta long ago so most of the credit goes to him on this one but I did add a few tests and numbers of my own. Click on the GRADING link below.
Shawn
I recently shot a ton of video clips of different exercises for a presentation that I will be doing in China for the Chinese Basketball Association. I am slowly adding them to our new You Tube page for our SB Coaches College followers to enjoy. Please check out our You Tube page frequently as I will be adding videos when time permits.
Enjoy!
http://www.youtube.com/user/sbcoachescollege
Shawn
Brijesh has done a tremendous job keeping our SB Coaches College fresh and relevant and it is my time to step up and give him a hand. I am seldom heard from but while I am in the midst of an NBA lockout it is time for e to get my feet wet in the world of blogging. Here is a recent interview that I did for The Art of Manliness web-site.
Once again we return to our So You Want My Job series, in which we interview men who are employed in desirable jobs and ask them about the reality of their work and for advice on how men can live their dream.
Are you a guy who loves athletics, working out, and learning about health and fitness? Did you always dream of playing professional sports, but weren’t blessed with the talent or body to compete at the highest levels? While you may not be able to play yourself, you do have a shot at becoming the guy who trains those world class athletes. Of course, as Shawn Windle, strength and conditioning coach for the Indiana Pacers explains, that shot is nearly as slim as being drafted by the NBA: this is an incredibly competitive career path. Do you have what it takes? Read on.
1. Tell us a little about yourself (Where are you from? How old are you? Describe your job and how long you’ve been at it, etc).
I am a 38 year old strength & conditioning coach for the Indiana Pacers, which for those of you that do not know, means I am responsible for the building and rebuilding of NBA bodies. I am responsible for the performance of nearly 60 million dollars of annual assets. My duties include the design and implementation of programs to improve strength, speed/agility, power, nutrition, recuperation, and rehabilitation.
I was born and raised in Auburn, Maine or as my friends like call it, Southern Canada. While building my resume, my wife and I have lived in Florida (Lehigh Senior High School), Massachusetts (Auburn High School), New York (Minor League Baseball), Connecticut (University of Connecticut), New Jersey (Rutgers University) and now here in Indiana. My career is at 15 years and counting, 6 of which have been with the Pacers.
2. Why did you want to become a strength coach? When did you know it was what you wanted to do?
I really stumbled upon this career path. I bounced around to a few colleges trying to find what was right for me, even being told by one to not return. It took being asked by a boss at a pool store to clean the floor with a handheld brush that was about eight inches long for the light bulb to really go off for me, and I decided that if I did not go back to college, scrubbing floors would be my lifelong vocation.
I began taking courses to improve my grade point average so that I could get back into college as a full-time student. I really enjoyed lifting weights in the typical meathead sort of way, and I loved athletics, so when I went on a college visit to the University of Maine at Presque Isle and the athletic training program director mentioned Strength & Conditioning as a related field, I was hooked. In my first class back in college (History of Physical Education) I listed being the head strength coach of an Olympic Team as my career goal. Although I have trained Olympic athletes, I have not been a strength coach for an Olympic team. Which is okay…the government doesn’t pay as well as the NBA. LOL!
3. If a man wants to become a strength coach how should he prepare? Should he go to college, and if so, what should he major in?
Although nearly anybody can be a personal trainer and there are many courses online to do so, to be a strength & conditioning coach, a 4 year college degree is the first step. Not all strength coaches have degrees in kinesiology, athletic training, or exercise science, but most do, and having a degree in one of those areas will help your chances of getting hired. There are numerous certifications that are either mandatory or highly recommended. The National Strength & Conditioning Association is one of the most prominent entry-level requirements to becoming a Certified Strength & Conditioning Specialist. The College Strength & Conditioning Coaches Association offers a certification process that is steadily gaining in popularity. Once those “baseline” requirements are met, there are numerous parallel certifications that employers look for. For example in addition to the NSCA certification, I am also certified by the National Academy of Sports Medicine as a Performance Enhancement Specialist and also as a Corrective Exercise Specialist, a USA Weightlifting Level One Club Coach, Certified Athletic Trainer by the National Athletic Trainers Association, Certified in CPR and AED, and finally in the Functional Movement Screen. Each certification obviously adds to your toolbox of knowledge but also improves your likelihood of landing a job. Many strength coaches also attend graduate school to seek a master’s degree since some jobs strongly encourage applicants to have an advanced degree. Coursework includes a heavy dose of science, and if that scares you, take a deep breath. I did not enjoy or do well at biology or chemistry because they seemed very abstract to me considering my career goals; however, when it came to exercise science, kinesiology, and motor learning, I found the movement sciences much more interesting and actually easier because I knew those courses would directly affect my future.
4. Once you have the necessary skills, how do you go about getting your foot in the door and landing your first job? How do you go from the bottom of the ladder to becoming a strength coach for a professional sports team?
Volunteering!!! Nobody wants to hear it, but you must be willing to work for free. I was fortunate in that I have received at least some form of payment throughout my career, but I know plenty of people that are professional interns. Jobs working with athletes are hard to find, jobs working with really good athletes are really hard to find, and working with elite athletes is nearly impossible. Many young coaches build their resumes by interning with well known strength coaches at well known universities to increase their visibility and to prove that they are capable of handling the stress of working in a pressure cooker. We have seen the stakes grow each year in college sports, and new coaches usually have 4-5 years to make a significant impact in the win column (2-3 years in professional sports); therefore, the will to win and prepare to win are extremely high on the priority list. Losses can be very tense times for everybody involved from the head coach all the way down to the interns. Higher profile jobs generally lead to other high profile jobs. A great deal of effort, determination, networking, and preparation help move you through the field just like any other profession. Most strength coaches I know have moved around the country quite a bit with the intention of building their resumes and sometimes because they are forced to move. If you are a strength coach in the NFL, you could have a short shelf life since many are directly linked to the head football coach. When that coach gets fired, many times the strength & conditioning staff is released as well. The ideal situation is to be hired by the owner or general manager since these positions do not experience as much turnover.
5. How competitive is it to land a job as a strength coach at the top levels? What separates a candidate for a job from the other guys?
The numbers are stacked against you if you think you are going to fast track to professional sports. If my memory serves me right, there are over 20,000 members in the National Strength and Conditioning Association and last time I checked there are only 30 NBA teams and about the same in the NFL, NHL and MLB respectively. Do the math! My profession is like any other profession in the sense that you have some people in my position because they are the owner’s cousin, and you have some great strength coaches, and some down right head scratching bad ones. I think most things function on the bell curve, and I would say most professions follow that distribution from terrible to great. I feel like I prepared myself through education, certifications, and practical experience while meeting the right people along the way. Everything in life comes down to your relationships with people. I have seen a lot of great strength coaches never advance in their career because they didn’t understand relationships or refused to play a game that they felt involved too much ass kissing. If meeting people, being nice to them, and working hard is called ass kissing, then I puckered up long ago. If you treat people with respect and show a genuine interest in them, I call that being a man.
6. What is the best part of your job?
I wear shorts to work! Enough said! Seriously that is one of the many perks. If you like shorts, sneakers, socks, sweat suits, or virtually any athletic apparel, the NBA is for you. I have more “gear” than I know what to do with, and it is hard to pass it on to family and friends because at 6’ 6” and 250 pounds it is pretty hard to find people that wear my size. If you are a basketball junkie, you have a courtside seat to the best basketball players in the world for an 82 game regular season schedule. We travel on chartered planes that have outlets for our electronics (everybody is attached to something whether it’s an ipad or a laptop), and first class seating throughout the plane. In my position, I have had some great opportunities to go to concerts in suites, the Indy 500 in a suite and have met countless celebrities/athletes/actors. We stay in the top hotels in the country and every time you turn around there is food. Remember the freshman 15? Watch a rookie staff member relive his freshman year. It takes a lot of discipline to lay off all the food, and it can easily get out of hand.
Outside of the peripheral perks of the job, you also get to be part of a team. Not a cliché team, but an actual group of men working toward ONE goal. Living in close proximity of one another. It is a bond that many people will never grasp. Being a part of the process and helping each player reach his potential can be very rewarding. I see my role as a strength coach as more than just telling them to lift weights. These are pretty young guys and many do not have strong guidance. They have never been asked to grow up, so I like to talk to them about the importance of developing a daily routine and leadership. Great teams understand that none of what we do is really about basketball. It is about developing men. When you teach respect, discipline, accountability, and hard work, everything else falls into place.
7. What is the worst part of your job?
People see the lights and the glamour of the NBA, but what people don’t stop and consider is what we do when the final buzzer sounds. If we are on the road, we usually spend an hour in the locker room while media comes in and guys shower before we even leave the arena. Most games start at 7 pm and end at about 9:30 pm, meaning that we start making our way to the airport at 10:30 pm. The average time in most cities is 20 minutes to the airport, then add in another 30 minutes for the bags to get loaded and get airborne. Usually we get in the air about 11:30 pm if all goes according to plan. Sometimes things don’t run so smoothly like overtime, post game x-rays, stitches, the bus breaks down (oh yes I have seen it), and don’t forget we play mostly in the winter and that means de-icing which can add 20-45 minutes to our departure time. If we are going home, we get to sleep in our own beds, and those of us with kids can expect an early wake up call, so there are plenty of nights I get 3, maybe 4 hours of sleep because when my kids know that Daddy is home from a trip, they usually come in and jump on me bright and early. Sometimes we are on the road, and we get into a city like Denver at 3:00 am, unload the plane, and take the longest ride in the NBA to get downtown. The job can be physically and mentally draining. During the fall the only way we know what day it is depends on if we are watching college football, NFL football, or Monday Night Football. I also always know when it is Thursday because that is trash day at home.
I paint a bad picture, but those are some of the realities of working in the NBA. It is certainly not for everyone.
8. What’s the work/family/life balance like?
With all the travel and home games included I missed 110 dinners and bedtimes at home, causing my wife to function as a single parent from October until April. When I am in my house my phone stays on vibrate, and I only check it a couple of times during the night, only responding to emergencies. I want my kids to have my undivided attention since we have so little time together during the season. That means my wife gets whatever is left over and most times we are so exhausted at the end of the day that leaves our free time to be spent side by side, sound asleep. Family balance does not exist during the season. You do the best you can to make amends during the summer since we don’t work as many hours, and we get to sleep in our own bed almost every night.
9. What is the biggest misconception people have about your job?
I have heard a lot of people tell me that they would not want to deal with overpaid prima donnas all day long. Dealing with rich young men that don’t want to work. In six years I have really only worked with a couple of divas; the majority of the players are appreciative of everybody on staff and understand that each staff member is there to help them succeed. These guys did not make it to the NBA by simply being tall, and although that helps, it takes countless hours in a gym while nobody else is around working on their skills. Nobody sees these guys come to the arena 3-4 hours before a game. Or come back after the game when the crowd is gone to shoot extra shots. Of course not everybody works like this, but isn’t that why coaches have jobs? I view myself as more of a teacher than anything.
10. Any other advice, tips, commentary or anecdotes you’d like to share?
As a side note, this interview took me almost four weeks to complete. During that time I have visited current players in New York, Los Angeles (twice), and North Carolina in addition to helping with the draft process where we have injected, inspected, and detected nearly 50 draft eligible draft prospects in Indiana alone not to mention a week spent at the NBA Pre Draft Camp in Chicago where the evaluation process includes height, weight, wingspan, body fat, upper body strength, lower body power, speed, and agility. Welcome to the OFF-Season where you spend time with your family!
My good friend, Adam Feit, recently sent me his notes from the Michigan State
Strength and Conditioning Clinic that was held on February 12. There are some really
good information in here that can help us all. Enjoy!
1st Presentation: Christine Bradd- MSU Team Dietician- Spartan Nutrition
· High(er) protein diets are fine for your health, as long as you don’t have any current kidney issues AND you are drinking enough water.
· Look at your athletes’ plates of food. It should have sections of ¼ protein, ¼ fruit/vegetable, and ½ carbohydrate.
o Portions need to be regulated based on the activity performed (women’s golf vs. football practice).
· High fat diets cause athletes to tank 1 hour into practice/competition
· Mixed diets cause athletes to tank 2 hours into practice/competition
· High(er) carbohydrate diets last until 4 hours.
· If athletes do not eat enough carbohydrates in their diet, the body will burn muscle tissue for energy.
· If your stomach growls, guess what? You’re hungry and your body is burning muscle.
· Implement the POWER HOUR
o 1 hour pre/post activity- 30-50g of carbohydrates/ 10-20g of protein
· Peanut butter and jelly sandwiches with low fat chocolate milk are perfect.
· Need your athletes to gain weight but they won’t eat? Try milk chugging contests after they eat to sneak in additional calories.
· When you are over tired, you tend to eat more.
· Easy way to gain weight:
o Eat trail mix on the hour, every hour.
· If you exercise for less than 60 minutes, all you need is water.
· Hydration is crucial. Use the PEE CHART
o Color chart displaying urine colors and levels of dehydration.
o Preferred (1)
o Perfectly pale (2)
o Pleasing (3)
o Pushing it (4)
o Poor (5)
o Pitiful (6)
o Pathetic (7)
· For every pound lost after practice, drink 24 oz of fluid.
· Why do athletes love supplements? They are glamorous!
· Use drugfreesport.com for a great resource to prevent your athletes from making a mistake in their eligibility.
· Stress fractures are caused by excessive stress AND low calorie diets.
· Remind your coaches, trainers and administrators that when working with female athletes, seeing a number on a scale DOES NOT trigger an eating disorder! An outside stressor causes it; fight with boyfriend, school, and pressure from fellow teammates, society and media.
· Nutrition will not make a great athlete, but it will certainly break one!
· Ever wonder why it’s so hard to get an inner city athlete to try eating REAL FOOD on a daily basis? It’s because, chances are, they’ve eaten fast food multiple times per day for a majority of their life.
o You try eating fast food 3-4 times per day. Isn’t it gross? That’s what they think. Oatmeal, real eggs, whole grains is GROSS to them.
2nd Presentation: Ted Lambrinides- University of Kentucky- Organization and Implementation Considerations for the High School Coach
· Success on the field isn’t determined by the strength coach…it’s called genetics…ever hear of it?
· Difference between Kentucky and other schools in the SEC? Watch signing day. Alabama and Florida recruits are shopping at Nordstrom and Macys. Kentucky have Wal-mart’s.
· If you’re a young coach, you need to work on your interview skills. You may only have 30 minutes to sell yourself to a head coach. So you better be working on it.
· When starting out, you should know the following:
o Rules of your weight room, music policies, behavior policies, cussing rules, assistant coaches and their personal workouts (don’t do that in here, that’s silly, and you won’t do silly movements in my weight room (Kim Wood).
o You have to know why you are doing what you are doing!
· The biggest change in athletes since 20 years ago is neck size and grip strength. Period!
· Proper programs don’t need an additional section for “pre-hab.” Proper program design PREVENTS INJURIES.
· If athletes don’t study their playbook or watch film, there is nothing we can do to help them win a championship.
· Remember how your program will be judged?
· Organize and execute everything to perfection.
o Every rep, every set. Organize your master schedule effectively.
· New sport assignment? Look at the sport. Watch what happens. What muscles do they properly use and what are the common injuries?
· Remember that athletes these days have way more responsibilities than they did 30 years ago. There are study tables, training tables, success coaches, part time jobs, work studies, etc.
· If you’ve got a staff of graduate assistants, are they using the same coaching cues as you? If they had to run the program in your absence, would they coach like were supposed to?
· How do you get stronger? Maximum effort! Reps and sets will take care of themselves.
· Make your athletes accountable by writing in their reps or weight used. We are doing them a disservice by doing it for them.
· Don’t allow standing around. Make them do something!
· You get what you emphasize in your program. Want bigger necks, glutes or biceps? Then emphasize them in your program!
· Don’t you love when sports coaches ask you if their athletes are getting stronger? What else do you think they are doing with us? Playing checkers?
· A good strength coach has the confidence to tell a sport coach “Don’t blame me for your recruiting mistakes!”
· Neck should be measured for progress. (Mike Gittleson disagrees). It’s about the strength of the cylinder, not the size.
· If you are doing manual resistance neck training, be careful with neck flexion.
· If you can’t fire your glutes, something is wrong (you are injured somewhere).
o Protective mechanism in place.
· Read not to believe, but to weigh and consider.
· To prevent lawsuits in your program, you must coach/demonstrate correct AND incorrect methods. Trust us…you will be held liable if something goes wrong and an athlete gets hurts under your supervision.
· You need to have documentation and research of why you do certain movements and volume arrangements. (Think of what it going to happen to Iowa right now…why is 100 rep squats a good idea?) Is there research to back that up?
· Remember the Borg scale? Why is it on a scale of 6 (easy) to 20 (extremely hard)?
o Put a 0 after the score and you get the current approximate heart rate.
· You better know what to do if you’ve got sickle cell trait athletes on your team. They ARE allowed to use their perceived exertion as a crutch. Failure to do so could result in death (and a lawsuit).
· Great coaches understand not everyone can squat or deadlift or bench or clean. Make adjustments based on their injury history and training age.
· Athletes who will help you win DON’T have the best lifting mechanics.
· Remember attention medications cause athletes not to eat.
· It’s always better to provide food (training table), not more money.
· What does an athlete do with more money? He/she buys new iPods, shoes, and goes to the club. Do you really think he/she is buying food?
o Think about the corner crack addict? If you give him/her money for food, are they REALLY going to buy food? (Same principle with our kids).
· Make sure you go over your program with your athletic trainer and head coach.
· Never take a day for granted. Remember, every day you wake up is a day closer to you getting fired. What are you doing to stay on top? You better be reading and developing!
· In the end, just remember this: If you ain’t his guy, you ain’t his guy. ‘Nuff said.
· Genetics article was presented by Coach Mannie.
o “When the sperm meets the egg.”
§ Athletes are elite athletes because they have specific genetic make-up that WE CANNOT CHANGE.
3rd Presentation: Bob Rogucki- Baltimore Ravens- Organizing Your Training Seasons
· Presentation was performed in the weight room as a packet was handed out on their training splits.
· 5 major areas of training for a Baltimore Raven Football Players:
o Neck (neck, traps)
o Hips and Legs (buttocks, quadriceps, hamstrings)
o Mid-section (abdominals, hip flexors, adductors, low back)
o Torso (shoulder, upper back, chest)
o Arms (biceps, triceps, forearms, hands)
· Program organization
o Train Monday-Thursday (Upper-Lower-Upper-Lower). Players want the weekends off.
o Repetitions (always start the off-season with 12, 10, 
o Workload
o Intensity
o Sets
o Rest Interval
o Frequency
o Order of Exercise
o Exercise Selection
· Demonstration was very simple including the following:
o Squats, glute ham and RDL variations, bench press, row and chin-up variations, leg press and leg curl/extension demonstrations
4th Presentation: Rock Oliver- University of Kentucky- Agility and Conditioning (on field demonstration)
· Our job is to prepare our athletes for competition.
· Take a look at your football program. How many different types of jungle animals do you have?
o Lions, tigers, hyenas, or a farm of donkeys?
· Don’t you love it when coaches blame strength coaches for a high pad level?
o Why don’t you (sport coach) coach their pad level BETTER?
o Aren’t you hired to make them a better football player?
· Whatever you do, do it well ~ Kim Wood
· Why do so many of you coaches do pre-programmed generalized cone agility drills?
· Is that helping your offensive lineman who needs to be in shape to push resistance?
· Is that back pedal drill helping that same offensive lineman
· Do yourself a favor and meet with your position coaches to get what THEY want. Understand how they coach it. Watch the position. See what happens.
· Implement position specific agility in your summer conditioning program.
· Alternate between run and pass sets to get your team into peak football shape.
o Go off of an auditory command. Implement penalties. Have a finish and switch up the start.
· Metabolic “skill specific” conditioning keeps the athletes engaged and gets them in the right shape!
· How do you get better? Muscle memory…doing something 7,799 times over and over again.
5th Presentation: Mike Gittleson with weight room demonstration by Dave Andrews (University of Cincinnati)- A Logical Approach to a Combative Sport
· Extensive review of the importance of training the head and neck
· Various demonstrations and rules on training the head and neck through manual resistance, dumbbells, bands and neck machines.
· Also had a lower body demonstration with a Rogers Athletic piece and manual resistance.
· Many of the exercises and policies reviewed can be find on Coach Gittleson’s informative blog (http://info.rogersathletic.com/get-strong/)
· Biggest point taken from presentation:
o We talk about “protecting the athlete”, but we don’t train the head and neck. This has become a national issue! Coaches want to know how they fit all that neck training into their program. Mike wants to know how you fit squats and bench presses in? Training the head and neck takes priority. Find a way to fit all the OTHER stuff in AFTER you take care of what’s important.
Final Presentation: Kim Wood- NFL Legendary Strength Coach- The Basics
· Very thorough and detailed review of why training the head and neck is important
· Our job is to improve performance AND decrease/minimize the risk of injury.
· Training athletes this day in age ain’t what it used to be.
· Things have gotten out of hand. Everything is too fancy.
· Stick to the basics. If you train someone the right way, they won’t last more than 15-20 minutes.
o Focus on 6-7 movements and that’s it!
Final notes:
· Michigan State University has an unbelievable facility. Full facility with anything imaginable (with walk-out access to the indoor). Coach Mannie and his staff was very professional, friendly and helpful throughout the entire day. Registration was very easy and plenty of beverages and snacks were provided throughout the entire day.
· There were numerous college and NFL coaching staffs there, as well as a host of high schools and personal trainers. Easily over 100 people were in attendance. Coach Mannie said it has gotten bigger every year (this was the 4th annual clinic).
· Dr. Ken Leistner did an outstanding job as the returning Emcee. This living legend in the iron game is a historian like no other. If you want to learn how it all started, spend a few minutes with this man. His uncensored and uncut dialogue will really leave an impression you as you learn to appreciate how it was done over 30 years ago and what we as young(er) coaches are able to accomplish because of these great pioneers.
· Biggest emphasis this year was training the head and neck. Every coach made repetitive references to this statement.
· Whatever you do, do it well!
In-season training may be the most confusing and misunderstood component of the year long training cycle. Everybody knows that it is important and must be done but getting better at your particular sport should be the main goal during the season.
That being said, I think in-season training might be one of the most important time of the year to train. Sure the off-season and pre-season are important, but the goal should be to be at your physical peak for the end of the regular season and post-season tournaments. To attain that peak means that the correct steps must be laid down prior to the conclusion of the season.
My philosophy of in-season training might be quite different than others but I believe it to be extremely simple and easy to implement.
DO THE OPPOSITE OF THE SPORT
Huh? What does that mean? Shouldn’t we be doing things specific to make them better at their sport?
I strongly disagree that we should be doing the similar patterns on the sport – this can lead to overuse type injuries that we are trying to prevent against. We want to keep the athletes as healthy as possible so they can be at their physical peak for the end of the season.
Most team sports have the following similarities in-season:
1. High Volume of Activity
2. Low Loads being used – typically just their bodyweight
3. Low Amplitude of movement – never experience full joint range of motion during most sporting activities.
So according to my statement above of DO THE OPPOSITE OF THE SPORT we have the following guidelines of in-season training:
1. Low volume of in-season strength training
2. High Loads to stimulate higher threshold motor unit activation for strength maintenance and/or gains
3. High amplitude of movements to restore and enhance joint mobility.
These guidelines help to direct how I write training programs and progress them throughout the season so we are ready to peak near the end of the year.
Other common sense guidelines that can be used are the following:
1. If your sport is inherently anaerobic, train the aerobic system for extra conditioning
2. If your sport involves a lot of impact (running, jumping) – don’t run and jump them extra.
3. If your sport has a dominance of the anterior chain, train the posterior chain to balance things out.
4. If your sport has a tendency towards kyphotic postures, hammer thoracic spine extension.
5. If your sport has a tendency to lose mobility in a certain area (i.e. ankles, hips), address those issues.
6. If your sports practice structure doesn’t include much conditioning, then this must be included to conditioning levels do not decrease in-season.
By now, I think you can get the point of how in-season training can be accomplished.
These are extremely general guidelines but simple and tends to make a lot of sense.
Hopefully they can help you and feel free to share what your thoughts are.
B
What is the key to success?
A recent question was sent out through email to a group of fellow coaches from my friend, Ray Eady. It was a very thought provoking question that delivered some very good responses. Check them out below and ask yourself how do you measure success:
Question:
How do you measure the success of a strength and conditioning program? Is it measured in wins, loses, injury rates, athlete’s experience, compliance and satisfaction by the coaching staff, etc.? In the NBA, strength and conditioning coaches are measured on the basis of games missed due to injury. Therefore, if players are not missing games due to injury but the respective team finishes the season with a losing record is this still considered successful? Thoughts?
Ray Eady
Strength and Conditioning Coach
University of Wisconsin
Good question. This is a problem seen for many years and will continue for many years in our profession.
I feel that some of the measurement is due to the administration, organization , coaches and how they view it.
Obviously , wins and losses are a big key to how people in charge will respond. Keeping players on the court, field playing and developing well in the areas necessary for success is a huge part of the job. Pressure placed on coaches by upper level management for not enough wins eventually will trickle down to the strength program. This is regardless of any success with a lack of injuries, athletes experience , compliance , and coaching staff’s happiness.
I hope this answers it somewhat , it is a very open question.
Ronald Thompson
Strength and Conditioning Coach
University of Purdue
How do I measure success? Injury rates and performance indicators such as vertical, 10 yard, 4 jump, etc.
How do sport coaches measure success? I think that depends. Some only care about wins/losses. Some just care about bench/squat/clean numbers. If we are lucky, they understand our field a little more “globally” and realize the best thing we can do for our athletes is improve their chances of staying on the court/field.
Devan McConnell
Strength and Conditioning Coach
Stanford University
Devan,
If performance indicators improve and injury rates decrease but the team still performs poorly in the win/lose column is that still considered successful?
Granted, as strength coaches, we can’t control many variables: recruiting, game strategy, etc. etc. but should we still take some accountability for wins and loses?
Ray Eady
How do I measure success by keeping our guys healthy and how many games did players miss – that is a quantitative approach. I also see success from a qualitative standpoint in what kind of impact does our program have on them from a mental stand point:
I.e. Are we making athletes more confident because of their improved strength, body comp, conditioning, power, etc.
Are we making athletes better by improving their mental state and teaching them how to remain positive and not show defeat and frustration during difficult tasks?
Are we making athletes better by asking them to themselves and their teammates accountable?
Are we making athletes better because they start to care more about their bodies inside and outside the weight room (attentive to nutrition, recovery, extra workouts, etc.)?
These are all things that make my program successful – as well as the feedback that I get from the athletes about what we are doing – if I see them buy into what we are doing, then I know I’m being successful.
How do sport coaches measure success – they see performance numbers increase, they see that they are healthy, they see improvement on the field/court/ice, etc.
I don’t think we have a direct result in wins/losses but we do have an indirect effect:
1. are the athletes able to with stand the rigors of the sport (conditioning, strength, power, etc)
2. are the athletes resilient enough to bounce back from difficult practices (mobility, flexibility, stability, recovery)
3. are the athletes confident in their preparation that they won’t crumble under the pressure of competition (mental toughness, discipline, accountability)
Unfortunately if teams lose but stay healthy there might be a trickle down effect to the strength coach, b/c everybody is quick to point the finger during difficult times but in reality we don’t have any technical or tactical effect upon the game itself – our job is done prior to the ball being tipped.
Brijesh Patel
Strength and Conditioning Coach
Quinnipiac University
I don’t think I can say it better than B did.
If performance indicators increase and injuries decrease, I believe we have done our job. As B stated, their may be trickle down if we lose, but we really don’t have direct influence over those stats, so while I do take it personally, in the end we can’t claim victories nor SHOULD we be held over the fire for losses. Not real world obviously.
I will add 2 aspects to my evaluation of a successful program:
1. FMS scores improve. I am a big believer in this screen, and though it could be seen as the same as injury rates decreasing, I do get fired up for my athletes when they improve their scores.
2. As B alluded too, how much have our athletes changed for the positive and grown as people when they leave. At then end of the day, very few of them will make money playing their sport, and even if they do, if they leave a more responsible, confident, “better” human being than when they arrived, and my program had anything to do with that, I view my time with them as successful.
Devan McConnell
When a high school athlete signs their letter of intent, their #1 goal is to play [and play immediately and long-term]. Simple! They choose that “specific” collegiate program because that program gives them the BEST opportunity to achieve that goal. Therefore, success [for me] is helping that player [who signs that letter of intent] achieve the physical and mental tools needed to compete in the sport they LOVE. Basically, creating a POSITIVE experience and environment for the athlete when they are in a strength training [conditioning] session and using that environment as a catalyst for on field, court, or ice success.
Of course, in order to achieve that positive experience and/or environment we must keep our players healthy [first and foremost]. Nothing is more discouraging for a player than not being able to play [THE SPORT THEY LOVE] because of an injury. Positive experience/environment also means helping that athlete achieve the physical attributes that are needed to excel in the sport and giving them the motivation and confidence needed to be successful on AND OFF the playing field. In a nutshell, that is all I can control.
I agree, I don’t think we have a direct result in wins/loses; however, our yearly interaction with the players can definitely influence how they compete. We can all agree, outside of the coaching staff, we spend the most time with the players than any other person within the athletic department. Therefore, if our interactions [and environment] with the players are not positive, I believe it can have some influence on wins/loses.
In the end, the best testimonial must come from the athletes. Athletes with positive experiences that are achieving positive results is a key indicator of success.
Ray Eady
Everyone has great points, the big elephant in the room is that at the collegiate level everyone has a different answer to this question. “Everyone” being the sport coaches, administration, athletes, and strength and conditioning coaches. Regardless of how success is viewed it should be generally agreed upon by all major parties involved. I’m constantly amazed at how sport coaches and administration do not understand what our profession as speed, strength, and conditioning coaches is supposed to do for athletes. That may be a whole other discussion though.
Amanda Kephart
Head Sports Performance Coach
Akron General Health and Wellness- North
This article isn’t going to drastically change the way you train your athletes. What it will do though is give you an intern’s perspective from the weight room; and it will get you to talk. Whether you start up a conversation with your colleagues, an intern, your athletes, your grandparents, or even your pet guinea pig that your sister somehow managed to persuade your parents into buying (not that I’d know anything about that), it doesn’t matter- someone’s going to get better.
Connecting the dots- looking at Northeastern University’s AT and S&C departments
I want to preface this section by saying that I clearly haven’t ventured around to every collegiate training center and taken a look at the interactions between the athletic trainers and the strength and conditioning coaches. However, from what I’ve read and seen in few different settings, it’s a pretty safe bet to say that the two sides aren’t just lacking in knowledge about each other, but also an appreciation. As a strength coach, you definitely don’t have to know the various tests, modalities, and rehab techniques that athletic trainers practice on a daily basis. And as an athletic trainer, you don’t have to know Eastern European block periodization concepts as well as you know how to use those funny looking electrode thingies with the sticky patches that make my biceps twitch. Yet having at least an appreciation for what your colleagues do can only benefit your athletes, and the program, in the long run.
I don’t want anyone to get the idea that I’m just saying this about Northeastern because Coach Art Horne gave me copious amounts of protein powder this summer (I’m back in Wisconsin now so unless he plans on shipping those tubs, I’m out of luck). However, the direction that Northeastern is going will allow both groups to better cater to their athletes.
How many times have you seen departments provide in-services for each other on topics that both groups can relate to? Without putting down the staff here at Wisconsin, I can say not very often. The most recent topic at Northeastern was “Treating and Training the Ice Hockey Athlete,” in which Coach Dan Boothby discussed programming and exercise selection, while AT Steve Clark spoke about FAI, surgical outcomes, and rehab. Creating a common language between the two departments also helps athletes from wondering why they’ve performed a “bird-dog” in the athletic training room, a “kneeling superman” in the weight room, and an “opposite-arm-opposite-leg-reach-with-anti-rotational-core-stability” during physical therapy. A common language doesn’t have to stop with exercises though, co-writing a nutrition manual helps fill a much-needed gap in the market.
Lots of kettlebells, two coaches, two athletes, one awful (awesome?) circuit.
While I’m clearly not in a position to pass judgment, as I haven’t been there myself, I can say that as an intern, being in an environment where I was able to pester athletic trainers and strength coaches with questions on a day-to-day basis was a privilege.
So what have you done to make not just your department, but also the system, operate more efficiently?
A future PT getting it done in the weight room.
There’s more than one approach to assessing your athletes
I’m not just talking about the various movement screens and clinical evaluations that people have come up with throughout the years. While many of those are great tools, finding out what type of athletes you’re dealing with can have a profound effect on how you go about programming.
This past summer I had the privilege of interning under Professor Larry Cahalin- a cardiopulmonary physical therapist at Northeastern who presented at the Boston Sports Medicine and Performance Group Symposium. Despite the fact that his mind functions on a completely different level than mine, I was able to learn a lot from him- both from our talks, and the secondary data analysis we performed on his inspiratory muscle training (IMT) study with the Northeastern men’s hockey team. While the vast majority of studies and practical applications with IMT have focused on people with various diseases, a few individuals within this field have begun to look at the effects an organized training regime can have on healthy athletes.
Here’s a past study that Professor Cahalin was involved in: IMT Research Paper.
IMT- not that easy… check out the 10th video down: http://ptjournal.apta.org/misc/videos.dtl.
What Professor Cahalin, and many of his colleagues believe, is that the power curve generated from the test of incremental respiratory endurance (TIRE) can not only provide important information directly related to the test (which in the long run will allow norms to be developed for a variety of sports), but is also a good indicator of fatigue curves and by association, muscle fiber breakup within the body. For instance, power athletes with an abundance of fast twitch muscle fibers (sprinters, throwers, track cyclists, running backs, etc.) will demonstrate a quick peak in power, while endurance athletes show a much flatter curve. While examining the initial data, one athlete’s numbers on the Northeastern men’s hockey team leaned heavily towards the power athlete (high type II fiber percentage) make-up. While skill alone may help a high-school hockey player make it to the college scene, a healthy dose of favorable genetics is useful in taking collegiate athletes to the next level. After making a quick guess that this individual’s TIRE results also meant a successful career thus far, I decided to double check. Score one for Mike- his collegiate hockey career had been more than successful and he was most likely headed for the NHL. On the other hand, after testing the cross-country team, it was interesting to see how many demonstrated fatigue curves similar to that of a power athlete. It doesn’t necessarily mean that they need to quit running and join an Olympic lifting club, just that their coach may be interested in checking out their 400m times.
The Wingate test- a common measurement of an athlete’s anaerobic power, has also shown similar results, and the research is there to prove it (Bar-Or 1980;. The next step is making the statistical correlation between the two tests and having coaches buy into it.
Turn your athletes into coaches
When coaching a large group of athletes, you either need to hammer technique from day one, or ensure that they aren’t just responding to cues- your athletes are taking what you say into the next set and even next week’s training. Or do both.
While having two assistant strength coaches, a GA, and three undergraduate interns is always nice, most coaches don’t have this privilege. So how do you find another set of eyes? Look a few lines up. When athletes know what they’re doing, know why they’re doing it, and it makes sense to them, they can start coaching each other. At this point they’ve reached the third level of understanding- consciously competent. This is preceded by unconsciously incompetent and consciously incompetent, and followed by unconsciously competent. Not only are athletes spotting each other, but it makes your life less stressful as you’re not watching fifteen different athletes box squat their 3RM.
This also sets up a system of accountability. Athletes know when someone is not pulling (or pushing) their own weight. Having athletes coach each other also provides a system that your freshman can walk right into. Not only do they come into a training atmosphere in which their upperclassmen teammates are focused and gettin’ at it, but time is spent with them in a smaller group setting and the fundamentals can be worked on.
The human body doesn’t operate in extremes
One of the most basic, yet difficult concepts for me to wrap my head around has been the idea that the body is rarely in an all or nothing state. Yes there is the all or nothing principal when it comes to motor unit activation, but when we’re looking at biomechanics, it’s difficult to find extremes. Coach Horne likes using Boston and LA as a metaphor. We’re not on either coast, but maybe somewhere around Chicago. For those that are geographically challenged (I’m right there with you- I had no idea what the capital of South Dakota was for the longest time), let’s get some real world examples going.
This summer I ignorantly blurted out that I thought, with all my infinite wisdom, that all crew athletes were destined for herniated disks due to constant flexion and extension of the lumbar spine. A little extreme? Maybe, but I like to live life on the edge. Anyway, one of the Northeastern basketball players, who used to row for his high school team, explained that he was actually taught the hip hinge from day one and that most of the movement came from his hips and his thoracic spine. The hip hinge? In a non-weight room setting? Blasphemy. After talking to Eric Gahan, an athletic trainer at BU, I realized that this type of technique was actually becoming much more popular with coaches as AT’s, PT’s, S&C coaches, and physicians stepped in with their input.
So what’s my point? We already know that repeated and/or prolonged lumbar flexion and lumbar hyperextension aren’t the greatest things for your back. It’s almost cliché at this point to cite the work that McGill’s has done in this field. However, despite the fact that crew athletes might be moving into flexion, do they ever truly reach it? What is a neutral spinal alignment? Is it the athlete’s “natural” posture? There are environmental and genetic factors that need to be considered as well. A neutral lumbar spine means you’re not in Boston or LA, just somewhere in-between.
Let’s look at one more example.
This past summer, Charlie Weingroff spoke at the BSMPG Symposium about lower extremity performance. One of the many points I took away from his talk was what happens to the patella tendon in a box squat when the tibia is kept vertical (namely the difference between “roll” and “glide” of the femur). This summer, Coach Horne took the vertical tibia concept and applied it to the vast majority of men’s basketball single legged training. While this probably took a lot of stress off their knees, I immediately went with my “all or nothing” principle and took this idea back to Wisconsin and was shocked when Coach Jim Snider (men’s and women’s hockey strength coach) didn’t agree that athletes needed to maintain a vertical tibia in single legged movements. Yes, that was probably the first time two coaches have ever disagreed…
After talking the idea over for a good hour and half, we came to the conclusion that we had neglected the fact that Coach Horne and Coach Snider train two different populations. Basketball athletes are notorious for poor ankle mobility and knee pain. Hockey athletes on the other hand demonstrate a fair amount of anterior translation of the tibiofemoral joint within the skating stride. On top of that, very few of Coach Snider’s athletes actually have knee pain. While the concept of keeping a vertical tibia is extremely useful, trying to apply it to every situation doesn’t make sense.
Maybe the most important concept that I learned this summer was that in order to get work done, it’s imperative that at least three cups of coffee are downed before noon (at least according to Art). On that note, thank you to all the coaches and researchers that have helped me get better over the years.
References
Bar-Or, Dotan, Inbar, Rothstein, Karlsson, and Tesch. “Anaerobic Capacity and Muscle Fiber Type Distribution in Man.” International Journal of Sports Medicine (1980): 82-85. Web. <https://www.thieme-connect.com/ejournals/abstract/sportsmed/doi/10.1055/s-2008-1034636>.
Mike Boykin is currently an undergraduate student at the University of Wisconsin-Madison where he is pursuing a degree in Kinesiology with a focus in Exercise and Movement Science. With an unending drive to further his education, Mike has interned under physical therapists, athletic trainers, and strength and conditioning coaches. Feel free to contact him at boykin@wisc.edu.
It’s about that time when most collegiate strength coaches who don’t work with football are starting to plan programs for the upcoming school year. When starting out to write a training program there are a number of factors that must be considered and questions that you must ask yourself.
Below is a list from the late Dr. Yuri Verkhoshansky
- where are we in the training calendar,
- what is the technical-tactical nature of the position,
- what are we philosophically committed to,
- what geometric position does his body initiate movement from at the snap,
- what directions might he initiate movement in and in what way might he change his direction,
- what muscles are involved,
- what is the speed of contraction,
- what amplitudes of movement are involved in the work,
- where in the amplitude are the greatest forces generated,
- what percentage of his technical-tactical responsibility necessitates that he overcomes or resists external resistance,
- what is the magnitude of resistance he must overcome or resist against,
- what are the geometric positions of his body when he overcomes or resists against external load,
- over what distances does he cover on average,
- what role do speed, reactive/elastic ability, power, strength, and joint mobility play in the execution of his competition maneuvers,
- how many snaps does he average per game,
- how long is the average play,
- how much time transpires between most plays,
- how might I construct drills to be performed under alactic and aerobic conditions,
- how will I sequence the change and introduction of training stimuli into the training load,
- how will I utilize the time available during the off-season,
- what will the contents of the training blocks consist of,
- how will regulate the sequence and nature of the bioenergetic training,
- how will I regulate the sequence and nature of the biomotor training,
- how will I structure individual training sessions and consecutive days and weeks of training,
- and the list goes on…
Some of those questions may apply to your sport, while some may not, but you should get the idea. Writing a training program is so much more than putting a grouping of exercises together with some sets and reps. How are you organizing them to gain a training effect? How must rest are you giving between sets? How is the week planned out? etc.
The next time you sit down to plan a strength and conditioning program what kind of questions are you asking yourself?
My good friend Kevin Neeld has just put together an OUTSTANDING resource for all hockey coaches, hockey strength and conditioning coaches and athletic trainers that work with hockey. He has put a great lineup of audio interviews from some of the best in business….and the best thing is that they will be free starting June 1st.
So be sure to sign up at the link below to remind you when the interviews start playing.
One. Two. Three. Q! Every session starts and ends with it. It has been ingrained into the culture of the Quinnipiac University’s athletics along with a demand for perfection, accountability, and the establishment of swagger. Teammates and coaches, alike, gather at the beginning and conclusion of each training session with one goal in mind: to get better. The team huddle serves not only as direction for that day’s training session, but also allows for the tone and environment to be set. With hands held high, the team breaks with the same intensity as in team competitions and with the same pride as wearing the Bobcat uniform. Beyond all the sets and reps, this is the one moment in the athlete’s strength and conditioning program that best exemplifies my internship experience with Brijesh Patel, the head strength and conditioning coach at Quinnipiac University.
The huddle signifies the atmosphere B has created in his short time at Quinnipiac University. It portrays the true meaning of team. The tight circle shows the necessary camaraderie and their dependence on one another to be successful. It mirrors the constant encouragement from B and teammates towards one another in every workout. Each training session is approached with a sense of urgency and constant communication among teammates. It can best be described as organized chaos. While B constructs the workouts, it is up to the athletes to create and control their own environments. It is their world. When on the court, ice, track or field, the athletes only have each other to rely upon. Their reliance and trust in one another begins here.
A championship mentality is established from the moment of your arrival. Everything is done with a purpose. It is always stressed to not just go through the motions and movements. The small details are emphasized and expected, but in the grand scheme of all that goes on at QU, the big picture is never lost. Sure, injury reduction and performance enhancement are the goals of any successful strength and conditioning program, but what separates the program B has implemented is its aspirations to make better individuals. When the athletes leave upon their graduation, success depends more on the growth of their character and approach towards life, not on their maxes in the bench press or their body fat percentage.
B truly leads by example from pushing himself out of his comfort zone in his own workouts to holding himself to exceptionally high standards. He sweats just as hard, if not harder than his athletes. B practices what he preaches from accountability to approaching all situations with the four “E’s” (excitement, enthusiasm, energy, and effort). He is always trying to better himself, whether physically or mentally. Therefore, he demands the same from every individual that surrounds him, from his athletes to assistant strength and conditioning coach to his interns.
After the huddle breaks, each player leaves the weight room knowing they’ve improved. They recognize this feeling of accomplishment by touching a sign that says “I got better today”. In this experience, I have grown not only as a strength and conditioning coach, but also as a person. Each day, I try to get better just like the athletes. Through drive, determination, and desire, I am building my confidence in order to establish my own swagger. The Quinnipiac culture is becoming ingrained within me. One. Two. Three. Hard Work!
“Coaches who can outline plays on a black board are a dime a dozen. The ones who win get inside their player and motivate.”
Vince Lombardi
Two up and coming strength and conditioning coaches, and brothers, Eric and Ryan Johnson, are in the process of completing their undergraduate degrees in Exercise Science at Sacred Heart University. With experience playing and coaching football, the two brothers felt it was necessary to stay close to the sport through what they loved most; the grind of training. Matching a growing amount of knowledge with backgrounds in rehabilitation, injury prevention, nutrition, speed, agility, and strength training, Eric and Ryan Johnson created a way for players all of levels to become elite athletes. Contact us at info@sonsofstrength.com.
