The past few weeks I have a made it a priority to put more explosive training in my everyday athletes' sessions. Too often I find myself sticking to weights and other strength-based exercises with this demographic. Depending on their goals, this may or may not be appropriate. A lot of my everyday athletes are less worried about hitting actual numbers in the weight room and more concerned with feeling and looking healthy.
Recently I have been using medicine balls a lot more with my everyday athletes, doing different throw, carry, and slam variations. I have also added in a lot more jumping, which means a lot more landing; cone drills; jump rope; and tactical-style exercises. Not only can these exercises be used as conditioning tools, but, when they are applied with power development in mind, they are also great for tuning up the Central Nervous System (CNS). This is important for a couple of reasons. First, when your CNS has been trained to function at a high level, you can execute movements with a greater level of precision. Basically, your body is able to move better. This is important for all athletes, but it carries a unique importance for everyday athletes because if they have the physical ability to move better then exercise will seem less like a chore and more like a game.
Secondly, if the CNS is functioning at a high level then the body functions better as a whole. Should injury occur, we are better-able to compensate through that with a highly-functioning CNS. While compensating patterns will eventually lead to further injury in the long run, in the short run they allow us to function in our daily lives while healing occurs. By implementing proper recovery techniques, such as MAT, compensating movement patterns can be limited as much as possible. However, when compensation is needed, such as if a client sleeps in a funny position and wakes up with a stiff shoulder, the ability to function throughout the day will be there if the CNS is able to recruit other muscles to produce the same movements.
The injury prevention role doesn't just stop with the CNS when it comes to explosive movements, either. There is also the fact that clients learn how to stop, land, and change direction. The vast majority of injuries occur during a deceleration phase of a movement. If clients can learn how to control their bodies well enough such that they can stop, land, and change direction without having to think about it, their chances of incurring a non-contact injury will decrease dramatically.
Charlie Cates is a human performance specialist and the owner of Self Made (http://selfmadefitness.com/) in Chicago, IL. He is a Certified Personal Trainer and Performance Enhancement Specialist through NASM and has worked with competitive and everyday athletes of all ages and ability levels, from 9-year-old kids to NFL MVP's. He can be reached via e-mail at charlie@selfmadefitness.com.
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