Best Laid Plans huh?

So my idea of posting everyday went pretty good until I took a month off. I really had to stop reading my blogs and journals because I spent this past month writing out our track teams workouts for the sprinters jumpers hurdlers and distance runners (probably would have been easier to say everyone except throws) Anyways when I am trying to plan things out I can't be taking information because then I try to use it and then that effects something which effects something else and I basically keep starting over and it gets way too confusing. Now that I am all set I can start posting again, I won't be naive to promise a once a day post but it will be a couple times a week for sure.

Anyways just to post a little information about what I have been doing the last month. The biggest thing I try to do is alternate Neuromuscular Days adn General Strength Days.
Neuromuscular activities are ones that occur at 90/95-100% intensity. If you run a 30 second 200 anything faster than 33 would be considered neuromuscular. These activities are designed to train the nervous system. In men they also cause a release of testosterone. The neuromuscular activities we use are Acceleration work, max speed and speed endurance, multi throws, multi jumps (intense), olympic lifts, power lifts technique work (intense).

General Strength Activities are those which occur at less then 90%, so if you are running 15 200s at 35 seconds and your fastest is 30 then that would be general strength. You may end up tired and at the end you can only run a 38 all out. That is still considered general, your body has fatigued but your nervous system isn't having to send signals to your body faster, so it isn't being trained. This is an important distinction. All out effort is not necessarily neuromuscular, it needs to be at least 90% of your fully recovered top speed.

General Strength activities cause the release of Growth Hormone(in men and women), which helps repair and rebuild damaged tissue. Sometimes we will put 2 of these days back to back if we really taxed the nervous system. We will rarely put 2 neuromuscular days back to back. General Strength Activities we have: Med Ball Exercise, Calisthenics, Body Building lifts, Extensive Running (70-80%) Intensive Running (80-90%), Stability work, core work, multi jumps (remedial)Technique Work (low intensity).

If all of our meets were on Saturday it would be alot easier to plan but Thursday meets and Saturday invites make things tough.

Interesting thing I read today

Eye Movement is connected to motion...

Looking up helps extension (with eyes not head)

Looking down helps flexion

Look up during bicep curls and down during bicep culrs, let me know if you noticed a difference... I can't wait to try out this eye movement thing. I tend to be skeptical about things that i have seen no scientific evidence of but this is free and easy to test.

RFESS

So in the strength and Conditioning world these days the current big firestorm is the question of how useful are squats? Some have made the argument that squats are a lower back exercise and not a leg exercise. Most people can come out of deep squats but it is the back that fails them when they start leaning forward. The big alternative is Rear Foot Elevated Split Squat. (RFESS) These are exactly as they sound you bring one foot back and keep one foot forward (split part) you put your back foot on a bench of elevation (Rear foot elevated part) and then squat. The crux of the argument is this:

If I can max lift 450lbs doing a regular squat, that means each leg is generating app 225 lbs of force. Well if it is true that the back is the weak point then maybe you have the leg strength to lift 500 lbs but your back will not allow you to. With a single leg squat (i.e. the RFESS) Now if you put 250 lbs on the bar your legs are getting their 500 lb work out but the back is only dealing with 250. Long Story short: This makes squats a quad/hamstring exercise again rather than a back workout.

Everyone is weighting in with their opinion and they all know a whole lot more than me but it is easy to see the logic in this. That being said I think squatting is a fundamental movement (everytime you sit down you squat, you don't just drop into your seat.) I am definitely going to experiment with the RFESS but I will keep the squats in our training too.

Knee Injuries

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/172417.php

I know i keep posting links from this same website but everyday I find something good that they put out. CHeck the date of this article it was put out today. I just want to say that a year ago I would have said this is BS because I have seen research that has shown that high impact activities actually increase bone mineral density and prevent degenerative diseases like osteoporosis. There is no way to know if the people did unhealthy high impact activities. Landing without bending legs, jumping from too high up. (I know i jumped off my roof a bunch and off fences and out of swings growing up) It never effected me...here is the part though were I explain why I phrased it "A year ago I would have called this BS" ...

The last year my right (jumping) knee has been killing me whenever I LJ, I can sprint on it, run on it, but that first LJ and it hurts, and it usually lasts 2-3 weeks. The last few months i have toned down my training and avoided jumping hopefully giving it time to heal (Im optimistic that it is an injury and not a degenerative condition) this article caught my eye today becasue this is not helping my optimism.

Hopefully all those roof jumps aren't coasting me now... I am not even 30 yet.

Just a quick thought

A lot of the time when I see athletes do interval or repeat work, they usually don't run their best until their second or third rep, almost never on their first rep. If this is the case, it is time to revisit your warm up, just getting a sweat going or doing a slow jog may not be the right move. I know everyone is scared of fatiguing the body before the event but maybe a warmup with some higher intensity is needed.

Great Philosophy

Positive Coaching by Jim Thompson

Just a great book. I read it a couple years ago and one of the things that always stuck for me was his 3 point philosophy.

1) Have Fun
2) Work Hard
3) Be a good sport

The genius of this is the fact that it is easy to have fun when you don't work hard. You can play games, joke around avoiding doing that unfun but necessary work. I think alot of coaches see fun and hard work as a trade off, you can do one or the other. I am not one of those people who is going to say it is fun to work hard. What I will say is I think it is possible to do both with the environment you set. I explain what we need to do, why it is important, then I lean on the personalities of the track team the people who love joking around. I encourage this to happen in between reps.

Similarly, when you don't care about the results it is easy to be a good sport. You don't mind calling a penalty against yourself, you help up your opponants, wish them good luck. When you work hard and invest alot into a competition it is hard to be a good sport.

I love the simplicity of this philosophy (could summarize in 8 words (have fun, work hard, be a good sport) as well interesting dynamic between each of these on each other. All three are easy to do but the challenge is to do them at the same time.

How do I sign up?

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/172374.php

Psychology research using rock band to see how people achieve flow states and wouldn't you know it. They recommend that optimal performance occurs when something is not to easy but not too hard.

"That has broad implications for teaching. It means that if we want students to enjoy or get a lot of satisfaction out of classes, we need to assign them challenging tasks but make sure that they have the skills necessary to meet the challenges of those tasks"

What is flow?

Flow is a state of mind that occurs when people become totally immersed in what they are doing and lose all sense of time. It's an intrinsically motivating state, which means that people are engaged in the task for the pure enjoyment of performing the task and not for some extrinsic reward.

What does the research show on achieving Flow?

Research has shown that the types of work that lead people to achieve flow have some common traits, including being goal directed, providing feedback and giving a sense of meaning to the worker. Moreover, flow occurs only when the person feels in control of the process.

I love when researchers use video games. Anyways I don't think they found anything too ground breaking here people like to be challenged only when they feel they have been given the necessary skills to meet the challenge. Next time you write a killer workout that worked great for you think about whether the athletes have been given the skills to meet the challenge. Ask athletes "What do you think?" get their feedback. It will help them feel invested in the process rather than just following orders.