A: This is actually a great question, and I am actually surprised that I’ve never answered it before in over five years of writing on this site.

For me, it all comes down to five factors in each athlete/client: strength training experience, injury history, goals, time to commit, and training session structure.

In someone with limited strength and conditioning, more of the session is going to be devoted to technique work on entry level strength exercises.  You don’t have to worry as much about lifting really heavy weights simply because beginners can make appreciable strength gains with as little as 40% of 1-rep max on exercises.  The more advanced an athlete becomes, the less time you spend on technique work, and the more work you do with strength development and corrective exercise.  Eventually, when an athlete has a lot of strength, you have to consider whether all the time and effort that would go in to adding 20 pounds to his squat would actually be better spent elsewhere – whether it’s with corrective work, power training at a lower percentage of 1-rep max, or in introducing new exercises.  Effectively, it always comes down to finding someone’s biggest window of adaptation and exploiting it.  That’s one reason why I tried to make the Show and Go program so versatile by including 2x/week, 3x/week, and 4x/week training options alongside five supplemental metabolic training protocols.

If we are talking about someone with a lengthy injury history, though, the rules get thrown out the window.  You are not only spending more time with corrective exercise, but also refining your strength exercise selection to work with this individual – so it might mean that you have to do more technique work to add in new strength exercises, regardless of that individual’s training experience.

One’s training goals impact the corrective/heavy lifting balance as well.  If I’m training someone who simply wants to improve quality of life or stay healthy in athletics, I can be a bit more cautious on the heavy lifting side of things and hold back.  However, if we are talking about someone who was put on this planet to get strong and wants to be the most badass guy in the gym, we have to lift some heavy weights to make that happen.  So, while the second scenario in many cases requires more corrective exercise, we’re talking about a population that is willing to take more risks in training to get to a goal that might not be at all interesting to a more “low key” population.  This does not, however, mean it’s okay to let strength-oriented people lift with atrocious technique.  Doing so makes you an unethical clown who is more likely to get sued – not a professional.

Time to commit is another important consideration that many folks overlook.  Very simply, if someone can only get in two exercise sessions a week, I’m not going to be spending a ton of time on corrective exercise with them.  You’re much more likely to die from being fat and having diabetes than you are from having a cranky rotator cuff.  I’ll gladly give these folks additional corrective exercise that they can do during their busy schedules (which are never as busy as they claim), but I won’t coddle them when they need to move.

The last factor, which is more about the training model than the athlete/client in question, is how one structures a training session.  At Cressey Performance, athletes start their sessions with foam rolling and then proceed to an 8-10 exercise dynamic warm-up.  For many folks – particularly young athletes – that is enough “corrective” work, and the remainder of the session can be devoted to technical instruction and increasing strength on exercises that are safe for them.  Those with more accumulated wear-and-tear on their bodies will need more corrective exercise beyond what they’ll get from strength training alone – so we add in fillers (e.g., extra mobility work) between sets, and some additional corrective work at the end of the session.  Since you have a limited amount of time with people, you may have to cut back on strength training or metabolic conditioning initially just so that you can get in this early corrective work to get them over the initial “hump.”  Trust me: it will set the stage for long-term success rather than “short-term gain, long-term pain.”

There are two final points I’d like to make.  First, in my experience, many experienced lifters/athletes have responded well to separating the heavy lifting from the corrective stuff.  When they show up to train, they may be really fired up and ready to go – so the last thing they’ll want is to do some scapular wall slides or spend five minutes getting some length in their rectus femoris.

These folks would be wise to do just enough warm-up work to prepare for their heavy training, and then add in some separate sessions to address movement inefficiencies – whether we’re talking additional foam rolling, massage, mobility drills, rotator cuff work, or something else.  They can also add it in on the end of the session after the hardest work is done.

Second, for many folks, maximal strength can be tremendously corrective.  Increasing strength in one area can reduce excessive stress in another area of the body.  An example of this would be using the box squat or deadlift to learn proper hip hinging techniques, which would increase posterior chain contribution and take some of the burden off the quads in someone with anterior knee pain.  Likewise, all other factors held constant, a stronger muscle is less likely to become degenerative.  You can read more along these lines in two older newsletter of mine on the Law of Repetitive Motion: Parts 1 and Part 2.

Obviously, there are many things to consider, but this should at least get you headed in the right direction in finding the right balance in your strength training program.

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“Assess and Correct may be the most comprehensive corrective exercise product on the market.  I feel this DVD is a must have for anyone looking to make positive changes in their athletes’ bodies – or their own.

The assessment section provides simple and detailed information for tests that can help anyone become more aware of their body’s limitations while the correction progressions offer forward thinking solutions that guarantee optimal performance.

Eric, Bill and Mike have done it again!”

Mike Irr
Head Strength & Conditioning Coach, Charlotte Bobcats

“Assess and Correct is the most useful physical evaluation tool I’ve ever seen. It’s like having instant access to the knowledge that Hartman, Robertson, and Cressey have gained through years of experience studying anatomy and human movement, and working with real people.

“But most important, it’s presented in a way that you can put it to use immediately. In fact, the design of the manual is genius because you’re given a series of simple tests to identify postural and movement problems, followed by smart exercise progressions–which you can tailor to a client’s ability—to correct any issues. So it’s a powerful tool that will help any coach create more effective training plans, customized to an individual’s true NEEDS. The upshot: Assess and Correct will make any fitness professional better at what he or she does.

“One other note: Because I’m a fitness journalist, the authors offered me a free manual for review (common in the industry), but I had already purchased it. When they tried to refund my money, I requested that they not. The reason: I found the material to be so valuable that I felt like I SHOULD paid for it. I’m not sure there’s any testimonial I could give that’s better than that.”

Adam Campbell
Fitness Director, Men’s Health

Click here to purchase Assess and Correcting: Breaking Barriers to Unlock Performance!

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1. I hear people saying all the time that they need to find a niche – and I’ve written in the past about how I found my own niche.  As Weingroff points out, we’re all working with the same platform and set of rules: how the body works.  A “niche” just comes about because we get good with working with those rules in specific populations to create a subspecialty.  I train baseball players using my unique methodology, but there are others out there getting results in this population with different modalities, too, because they’re performed correctly and these folks keep the original set of rules in mind.  Likewise, there are folks with similar thought processes as mine – and they’re getting results in populations outside of the baseball world.

The take-home message on this point is that if you want to be a specialist in your niche, you need to understand general principles first.

2. We’re always trying to find the “link” between terrible movement and pathology/diagnosis – and Charlie offered a good perspective in light of the joint-by-joint theory of movement (a central piece of his two-day presentation).  When mobile joints become stable, we get degenerative changes (arthritis) and poor recovery.  When stable joints become mobile, we end up with dislocations, positional faults, muscle strains, and disc herniations.  Want to prevent or address these issues?  Work backward along this line of logic with your corrective exercise strategy.

3. Speaking of the joint-by-joint approach, Charlie offered the most comprehensive approach I’ve seen.  Traditionally, this approach has been discussed largely in the context of the sagittal plane only, but it definitely has frontal and transverse plane implications as well.  Weingroff also went into more detail on the neck and foot than I’ve seen – as you have alternating mobile/stable joints within these entities, too.

4. Typically, a joint in this school of thought will only really have two direct impacts: the joint above it and the one below it.  The hip might impact the knee or lumbar spine, for instance.

The thoracic spine, however, has more far-reaching effects, though, and that’s likely why it’s such a crucial area of focus.  It affects four systems: the neck, ribs (respiration), scapula/clavicle, and the lumbar spine.  So, if you’re seeing a lot of “gross” dysfunction above the hips, it’s often the best place to start with your corrective exercise.

5. Charlie goes to some great lengths in defense of the vertical shin (tibia) as compared to the angled shin during various tasks, most notably squatting.  He raises an interesting question in asking whether it’s really a good thing for both the femur and tibia to move simultaneously during the angled shin squat – as it essentially works in contrast to the joint by joint theory of movement he proposes.

Meanwhile, almost every day, we see folks whose knee pain disappears when we teach them to squat with a vertical shin – effectively letting the femur move as the tibia stays still.  The same goes for teaching folks to deadlift, do pull-throughs, or anything else that emphasizes “hips back” as opposed to “knees forward.”

Admittedly, Charlie says it much better than I do, though!  And, I should note that he emphasizes mastering the movement far more than simply loading it up – especially if we are talking about loading up a dysfunctional pattern (not a good idea).

I’ll be back with five more takeaways tomorrow, but in the meantime, check out Charlie Weingroff’s Rehab=Training, Training=Rehab at the introductory price HERE.

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Post tags: arthritis, Baseball Players, Baseball World, Corrective Exercise, Degenerative Changes, Disc Herniations, Dislocations, Exercise Strategy, Faults, General Principles, Home Message, Mobile Joints, Modalities, Muscle Strains, Niche, Pathology, Populations, Subspecialty, Takeaways, Thought Processes

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Template Design is a style of programming that has yet to truly catch on industry-wide, but is remarkably effective, especially when working with younger, sport-based populations.

Although I enjoy articles that are weighty in scientific specifics and complete in the depiction of the theories they are purporting, I also tend to benefit as much, often more, from less wordy commentaries that are pithy in nature.

So today, brevity wins.

In the current state of our industry (and I admit, this may be a terribly unpopular statement), we tend to over-scrutinize from a formal assessment perspective – the expense being common sense and practicality.

An explanation may be in order…

If a 13-year old presents, through formal assessment, with a “poor” forward lunge pattern, what does that really tell us?

Does he lack Glute strength or activation?

Are her hip flexors too tight to create a positive forward translation?

Is it a foot issue (that I dare say less than 1% of Fitness Professionals are truly qualified to ascertain)?

Is it a structural abnormality?

Now, the corrective exercise folk among us have all just raised their hands thirsty to share the knowledge of how to “fix” this barely teen – but let me ask another couple of questions first.

Does the kid just not know how to do a lunge?  Could the “poor” result be “fixed” with three minutes of proper coaching and cueing?

At 13, has peak height velocity (PHV) begun, rendering this young athlete’s mobility and coordination nearly non-existent?

Moreover, I’d be willing to bet that 90% or better of the 13 year olds who walk into your facility would “fail” this standard assessment:

• They’re growing and lack mobility

• They growing and lack coordination

• They sit all day and have inappropriate hip functionality as a result

• They’ve been introduced to improper “training” and lack posterior strength

A formal assessment can certainly show us gains, improvements and corrections when performed at regular intervals – and because of that, I am all for them.

But here’s what I’ve learned to be true about coaching young athletes in the trenches:

• You see them less than you’d like to and the “homework” you give them in the way of corrective exercise likely isn’t getting done – at very least not the way you’d want it done.
• Your time with them per session is finite, but there’s a whole-lot-o-stuff that needs to be addressed.
• Group and team training is almost always the way it goes – any sort of individualized attention must be created through a systematic approach to coaching and programming.
• Yes, we all preach to our young athletes the virtue of lessening the load and concentrating on form – but, in the high school weight room when you’re not around, but their peers are, guess who is loading the bar?

This is not a declaration to abandon assessments altogether, nor is it a manifesto encouraging you to throw your hands up in the air and announce the situation hopeless.

It’s a simple decree suggesting that your programming practice could aid a great deal in curbing this problem – and doing so not by what you discover “formally” through assessment, but what you know to be true about young athletes:

1. They sit all day long, which means:

a. They are kyphotic and lack thoracic mobility (and therefore proper scapular function)

b. They have tight, weak hips that also lack function

2. They don’t have proper strength and conditioning care outside of you, which means:
a.  ROM is compromised in all major joints
b.  Form and function of lift technique is entirely unfamiliar

Over the years, I have grown fond of referring to these issues as the “Likely Bunch” and have created a training template intended to meet of the aforementioned needs as a matter of principle rather than what an assessment tells me.

Rather than programming for the day, week or month, my standard Training Template for a high school athlete looks as follows:

1.       Tissue Quality – 10 minutes

2.       ROM/Torso/Activation – 10 minutes

3.       Movement Preparatory – 10 minutes

4.       Movement – 10 minutes

5.       Strength/Power Technique – 10 minutes

6.       Strength Execution – 10 minutes

7.       Warm-Down/Active Flexibility – 10 minutes

The “10-minute” time frame represents a maximum (with five minutes being the minimum).  This creates a 7-Step Programming Template that takes anywhere from 45 – 70 minutes to complete.

I have 30–50 exercises listed in my personal database for each category and select on a given day what each athlete will work on.

An example day may look like this:

1.       Foam Roll (Glutes, Hamstrings, Quads, ITB)

2.       Ankle Mobility, Hip Circuit, Side Planks, Supine Bridges

3.       Various Multi-Directional Movement Patterns (including skipping, hopping and deceleration)

4.       Lateral Deceleration into Transitions

5.       Front Squat Technique

6.       Hybrid Complex – Hang Clean, Front Squat, Push-Press, Overhead Lunge

7.       Static-Active Hamstrings/Quads

Within this template, I’m guaranteeing my young athletes get what they need from a developmental and preparatory standpoint each and every time they walk in my door.

Create a Training Template for yourself and see how much easier programming becomes.

Brian Grasso has trained more than 15,000 young athletes worldwide over the past decade. He is the Founder and CEO of the International Youth Conditioning Association – the only youth-based certification organization in the entire industry. For more information, visit www.IYCA.org.

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Post tags: 13 Year Olds, Abnormality, Brevity, Brian Grasso, Commentaries, Common Sense, Corrective Exercise, Cueing, Current State, Depiction, Fitness Professionals, Formal Assessment, How To Do A Lunge, Peak Height Velocity, Poor Result, Practicality, Specifics, Template Design, Three Minutes, Young Athletes

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1. Why Chicago?  Well, in case you’ve been living under a rock and haven’t heard, this weekend is the second Perform Better Summit of the year.  I’ll be giving two talks on Saturday. If you’re up in the air on which one to attend, I’d recommend my second one (lecture, not hands on).  With the room design (no concrete walls), we won’t be able to do much true medicine ball training so that the hands-on can parallel my lecture topic.  I’ll be talking about shoulder assessment and corrective exercise with a little medicine ball flavor in my hands-on instead. There are a ton of videos in the presentation, though, so you’ll be able to get the next best thing.

While I enjoy presenting at seminars, I don’t like to travel at all; sitting in airports and on planes is just not my thing.  However, when it’s Perform Better, the hassle of traveling just doesn’t seem to be present – because I know how awesome the “light at the end of the tunnel” is.   As a presenter, I don’t always get to check out as many of the other talks as I’d like because I’m tied up with speaking and answering questions, but I do get to experience a lot of interaction with audience members and other speakers between lectures, at breakfast/lunch/dinner, and on the town.  These, for me, are really as valuable as the presentations themselves.  Audience members ask some excellent questions that can drive blog content, and I’ve also added some valuable people from around the country to my network this way.  Chatting with presenters is great as well, because they always have some new project or business strategy that they’re working on that can get my mind working.  Chicago is also great because I can catch up with my buddy, Josh Bonhotal, who is a strength and conditioning coach for the Chicago Bulls.

All that said, I have to say that it is kind of nice to see my schedule as empty for the rest of the summer.  With the new house, wedding planning, and our busiest month at Cressey Performance at-hand, it’ll be nice to focus my efforts here both personally and professionally.  I try to keep the summers reasonably free so that we can take weekend trips up to Maine to visit my parents a few times a month.  Additionally, with a few of our minor league guys on the cusp of call-ups to the big leagues, I want to make sure that I can hop on a plane at a moment’s notice to be there to support them and share in the excitement wherever they wind up making those MLB debuts.

Anyway, if you’re in attendance in Chicago, please be sure to introduce yourself.

2.Those of you who can’t make it would probably like this article as the next best thing: Medicine Ball Madness.

3. Oh, I should say that it looks like my second presentation coincides with the U.S. vs. Ghana World Cup game.  Skip me, if you have to; I’d probably skip me, if I was in your shoes.

Check out this great article from Ryan Andrews at Precision Nutrition: Cattle Feedlot: Behind the Scenes.

4. Many of you might recall how much I abhor Comcast.  Well, I’m happy to report that we officially kicked them to the curb about two weeks ago by making the switch to Verizon for our internet and cable – and I have to say that it was an awesome decision.  The price, service, speed, and product offering don’t just beat Comcast; they beat it like a red-headed rented mule.  If you’re thinking about making the switch, I highly recommend it.

Incidentally, I had to chuckle when I saw that MSN Money had released its list of the 2010 Customer Service Hall of Shame, and Comcast was in third place.  Meanwhile, Sprint – which I had dropped for my cell phone service after seven years (also to go with Verizon) was listed as #4.  I guess you could say that I was getting rid of the dead wood around here last month!

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The good news, however, is that Mike Reinold and I covered this topic (and many others) in great detail in our Optimal Shoulder Performance DVD set.  We’ll be making the final revisions in the next few days, and it should be available within 2-3 weeks.  If you want to be among the first notified of the awesome one-week only pre-sale price, definitely subscribe to my free newsletter HERE.

2. If you’re looking to have some fun and help CP athlete Kevin Youkilis raise some money for a great cause, check out the “Facial Hair Frenzy” fundraiser at Youk’s Hits for Kids.  For each dollar you donate, you get one vote for which facial hair style – Goatee, Mustache, Clean Shaven, or Fu Manchu – Youk rocks on opening day.

Just click on “Mirror Mirror on the Wall” at Youk’s Hits for Kids.

3. All my “guinea pigs” for my new project are completing Phase 1 today/tomorrow, and will be embarking on phase 2 on Monday.  The feedback has been great thus far, and I’m pretty excited for the June/July release of the comprehensive program (which, unfortunately, still remains unnamed).  The beginning of each new phase means that I have to do about 45-50 exercise demonstrations, and that fun 90-minute task was yesterday.

4. In What I Learned in 2009, I alluded to the fact that we’re doing more ground-to-standing transitions in our training, and mentioned that Rollover Get-up and Go Starts were one of those drills.  Unfortunately, the video was accidentally omitted from the article, so I thought I’d feature it here.  Thanks to Blue Jays prospect Tim Collins for the demonstration.

5. We’re picking out the color schemes for all the rooms in our new house this week, and I have to be honest here.  While I’m unbelievably excited about moving into a new house, I am likely going to jab a hot poker in my eyes if I have to stare at a color sample for another 20 minutes to determine the difference between “nantucket fog” and “james river gray.”  The humor in all of this is that my fiancee is an optometrist and has come right out and said that she believes me to be partially color blind – which means that I shouldn’t even be allowed to have an opinion on the matter in the first place!

Up next, picking out a refrigerator and mailbox.  And here I was thinking that I’d get a mini-vacation now that the baseball season was underway!

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Post tags: Athlete, Corrective Exercise, Exercise Demonstrations, Facial Hair, Frenzy, Fundraiser, Goatee, Guinea Pigs, Hair Style, Kevin Youkilis, Mirror Mirror On The Wall, Mustache, Opening Day, Personal Trainers, Phase 1, Phase 2, Reinold, Skill Sets, Today Tomorrow, Undergraduate Curricula

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