I have written about this topic every fall for the last six years. I still feel just as strongly about in-season training as I did six years ago when I started this facility.
A lot of times in the strength and conditioning world, especially in youth athletes, we see them dedicate themselves to a certain respective season and they only focus on that.
I am a big fan of kids playing multiple sports and doing so for as long as possible until they are “forced” to specialize. That topic deserves another blog post altogether, so we won’t go into great detail. But only playing your sport will not make you better at it or help you stay healthy playing it.
I try not to speak in absolutes as there are gray areas in all walks of life, but I will make a bold statement in saying that strength training for your sport is almost as important as playing the sport itself, especially when the goal is performance, longevity, and remaining injury-free.
The concept of strength training, especially for youth athletes, is exponentially important as their developing bodies need to get stronger. The way our society is today, kids are not getting stronger. In fact, kids are weaker than ever before…
Their bodies are continually developing, and it’s important to add in a strength training component because their neurological system is like a sponge and it’s going to soak this stuff up. They will adapt fast. Their muscle mass will increase, strength will increase rapidly, bone mineral density will increase, and resiliency is being built daily when they are training properly.
Decreased chance of injury
This one is pretty simple and straightforward.Your body takes a beating when you play sports, and it is important to maintain that tissue laxity and density through the season as it will significantly decrease your chance of getting hurt. More specifically, it will decrease the chance of you getting one of those pesky non-contact injuries as well.
Side note – this is something I really like to do with our in-season programs. I know it’s called “strength and conditioning,” but the truth is, for in-season, we scrap the conditioning part and we’ll replace it with more mobility. We have to remember that guys and gals don’t get hurt in-season just because they lose strength. They also get hurt because they lose their mobility. All that eccentric stress leads to significant losses in mobility, and all that standing around that these athletes do allows them to miss out on basic movement patterns like squatting and lunging.
Solidify your off-season work
What really grinds my gears is watching an athlete train their butt off for months leading up to the season and then never touch another weight until their season is done.
The cool thing about strength is that it lingers. Surprisingly, you do not need to do a lot to get really strong, and you do not need to do a lot to maintain it. That is why our in-season programs are short and sweet. Volume is significantly decreased with no new exercises and intensity stays relatively high and constant throughout the remainder of the season.
If you train for three straight months and then take two months off, you’re pretty much starting back at ground zero. Then all that off-season work that you put in and all that money you spent is now gone… When we re-assess our athletes as they’re coming back into the gym post-season, we can tell who did their in-season program and who didn’t. You should be just as strong, or even stronger, than before we shipped you out.
The moral of this story?
Train during the season. It will save you a lot of time and money in the long run.
Short and sweet
In-season programs are vastly different than off-season programs.
It is critical that we preserve the physical qualities that we worked very hard to obtain in the off-season.
There needs to be periods of varying intensity and volume during your in-season program, and this, of course, depends on the athlete and how much time they’re playing. But overall, we need to keep things short and sweet.
If we jack up the volume and have our athletes stay in the gym for an hour to an hour and a half, we have to remember this level of fatigue and soreness can take multiple days to recover from, especially if you’re dealing with athletes that have a lot of travel or a high concentration of games on a weekly basis.
So a lot of this is going to be dependent on the athlete and the sport that they play.
Most of our in-season programs can be done in 40 minutes or less, with only one to two sets of each exercise.
We check in with our athletes on a regular basis to make sure that they are feeling good and if they need to make any changes during the week as well. Because we need to make sure that we’re monitoring their fatigue so that they are doing the most important thing well, which is playing their sport.
Your program should emphasize these things:
- We do some bounding and agility drills in the beginning of all off-season sessions to keep those fast-twitch muscles primed for performance and to ensure maximum speed.
- Stick to compound exercises throughout the session
- Limit all eccentric work. This will cause a great degree of soreness, and you don’t want to be sore trying to run around the field.
- Do not introduce anything new to your training program as this will elicit high levels of soreness as well.
- Keep your volume relatively low. I choose 1-3 sets, and the majority of them are going to be just two sets.
- A week or two out of the month should be heavy. In other words, towards the end of our in-season programs with our football players, they will be lifting at about 85% of their 1RM.
- 2-3 times per week is all you need to maintain strength without interfering with any sports-specific skills that you’re trying to develop and recovery as well.
Final thoughts
The goal of in-season training is to maintain your strength, power, and agility without compromising your ability to perform at whatever level you are playing. By focusing on these qualities and keeping your strength training sessions efficient, culminating with maintaining your flexibility, athletes can stay strong and competitive with minimizing the risk of injury. The other cool thing that we found is that our younger athletes will actually get stronger during the season as well.
Remember, the key to in-season training is efficiency. We need to stay strong, but we don’t want to overload the athlete because you need to be able to be peaked and ready for competition. Being smart about this will keep your body ready and able to perform when it matters the most.
In-season is important, but you have to start somewhere. To have a successful in-season program, you have to start in the off-season. If you need help getting started before your next sports season, make sure you book a consultation here! getjdfit.com
