Foundations Of Athletic Training

If you want to be a better athlete, there are four foundational areas in which you should improve: strength, agility, conditioning and explosiveness. All of them can be taught, but they must be taught strictly and intelligently. An integrated program will allow you not only to get the most out of each area, but also to use each area as a stepping stone to greater athletic performance. Consult your physician before beginning any exercise program.

Strength

Strength training does not mean just getting stronger at the skills needed for your sport, but also developing whole body strength and power. A solid routine based around the compound lifts, which exercise multiple muscles of the body at the same time, will strengthen your muscles and connective tissues, and increase your bone density, all of which will help protect you from injury. Exercises such as the squat, deadlift, hang clean and military press are the first steps in building a strong foundation.

Conditioning

Your ability to train is often limited by your ability to continue training. It does not matter how hard you train if you run out of gas on game day. Improvements in your conditioning are not just a matter of increasing cardiovascular health, and in fact, this is rarely the limiting factor. Muscular endurance and recovery ability need to be maximized, and they are both trainable quantities. If your sport requires bursts of effort followed by inactivity or recovery periods, train accordingly, with interval sprints followed by recovery walks, or rope jumping in a similar manner. Sled dragging will promote muscular endurance without compromising your recovery ability.

Speed and Agility

Running against a resistance parachute is a great way to build speed, and so is improving your running technique, which is an area that's often overlooked. Running hills will help you build the ability to strike properly with the forefoot while running, as well as increase your running power. Agility drills are limited only by your imagination. Set up cones in any pattern and learn to quickly change direction while running through them, and change patterns often. Ladder drills can be used for a variety of agility exercises, with different movements and foot-strike patterns as you work your way up and down the ladder.

Explosive Power

This ability often sets top athletes apart from second-tier athletes, and like all other skills, it too is trainable. Weightlifting, otherwise known as Olympic lifting, is one of the primary ways of building explosive power. The snatch and the clean and jerk are the lifts with the highest power production of any lifts ever measured, and learning to do them properly will go a long way in teaching you how to generate power in nearly any manner. Plyometrics, or rebound training, can also help build burst speed and explosive power, as they directly train the stretch reflex as well as provide exceptional conditioning work.