Strength & Power Don’t Matter If You’re On The Sideline

***Gym Programme***

The most common goals when teams and athletes begin pre-season training are generally to re-emerge on the field fitter, stronger, faster and more powerful. These are obvious aims when entering the gym and would have very definite benefits to performance… if you’re on the pitch!!

The best strength & conditioning coaches always say your three main aims are to:

1. Not injure players in the weight room
2. Reduce the risk of injury when players are on the field/court
3. Improve overall fitness (stronger, faster, more powerful, etc)

The aims are ordered in terms of importance but often people focus on the third and neglect the first two.

Not injuring players in the weight room should be obvious yet we sometimes hear horror stories of injuries occurring as heavy weight is lifted with poor technique or inappropriate exercises are used before players are ready. This is a basic standard within the profession and should be adhered to at all costs, regardless of requests from over-eager athletes and management.

Studies of the NFL, NBA, and NHL have found one of the greatest predictors of success across a season to be player availability. Not the financial budget, the number of All-Stars or phenomenal fitness test scores but the number of players who are available for selection throughout the majority of the season. Surely this suggests that our main aim during the off-season is to leave players in a better position to resist injuries when they are playing and training?

So how do we build this into an actual off-season plan?

Each sport has a number of common injuries, especially non-contact injuries (contact injuries are like a whack of a hurl on the hand or a kick to the shin). Non-contact injuries are the area we really need to reduce from our time spent in the weight room. We can never truly prevent injuries but simply try to reduce the number of injuries while still allowing players as much time on the field as possible.

The most common non-contact injuries in GAA are hamstrings pulls, ACL ruptures and groin strains. We often hear of lads with ‘bad hamstrings’ or ‘dodgy groins’ but they are rarely born with this ‘condition’. They generally develop weaknesses and imbalances from incorrect movement or imbalanced training.

This article (and accompanying plan) will help coaches and individual players to implement an effective pre-season training plan and warm-ups to minimize the number of non-contact injuries suffered and maximize playing time. The key areas focused on will be:

• Address common weaknesses in players or playing groups.
• Incorporate simple exercises into a warm-up that will help maintain strength across a playing season.

A number of areas should be addressed during the off/pre-season (and be maintained during playing season) but if we dedicated specific time to each particular area then our sessions could last for multiple hours and take from other aspects of life. By focusing on a few key areas, we can include the majority of movements and develop most aspects of strength.

Instead of developing strength in individual muscles, we try to build strength in a range of movements. These can be divided into a couple of categories.

• Jumping – can include hopping, bounding, jumping for distance, jumping for height and, most importantly, landing on one or two legs.
• Throwing – can include overhead, sideways, forwards, backward, kneeling, standing, etc.,
• Upper Body – particular focus on both pushing and pulling movements. Delving into greater detail can include both horizontal and vertical pulling/pushing as well as using dumbbells for unilateral movements or barbells for bilateral movements.
• Lower Body – can be divided into three key movements: squat, hinge and lunge. Again, these can be further categorized into bilateral and unilateral movements.
• Core – Mainly divided into flexion and anti-flexion or rotation and anti-rotation exercises.

Including all exercises and categories in each gym session would be very time consuming and leave athletes fatigued about halfway through the session. Splitting exercises from each category into sessions throughout the week develops most movement categories and qualities while also allowing for an element of variety.

The gym session attached here is divided into three separate sessions. One focuses entirely on lower body, one on upper body and one is a combination. The third session is entirely optional and can be left out entirely or replaced with an aerobic session if that is more of a priority for some players. Each session mixes in some bilateral and some unilateral movements. Jumping/hopping exercises are included with lower body while throwing exercises are included with upper body. All jumping/throwing is included at the start as the fastest and most powerful exercises should be performed when athletes are at their freshest.

Two warm-up options have also been included. The corresponding numbers on each option focus on the same movement pattern/area of the body so can be interchanged for each other. These warm-ups can also be used once as part of a RAMP protocol when mixed in with hurling or football drills/games when you return to the pitch.

The suggested gym session is not designed specifically for any one person. Ideally, each person would follow a tailored plan to address their own specific needs, but this isn’t always possible. This programme is designed to help athletes follow something structured that allows for progression, will reduce the chances of injury while increasing strength and power.

All exercises written in yellow are a hyperlink to a video of the exercise. Feel free to ask for more guidance on pre/in-season strength work or to offer any feedback on the programme.

John                                                                fhsperformance@gmail.com