Articles:

Athletes Can Make Gains in Performance During the Season

As a strength coach, I have run across countless coaches and athletes who in the weeks prior to the start of a season begin to ask, “How can we maintain the gains made in performance throughout the season?”

To me, the asking of this question or others like it, begins to send the wrong message to athletes. It says that once the season starts, you’re going to have a hard time maintaining all those gains you made in the off-season or pre-season. That once you start your practice and game schedule, your body will begin to lose it’s strength, speed or power that you worked so hard to get and the only hope you have of a good season is to possibly maintain what gains you have made in the weeks prior to the season.

Unfortunately, in sport there are still many coaches who take a maintenance approach to In-season training. They use methods and ideas of old, that once the season begins, lift a little, lift light with simple sets and reps, and hope you don’t get hurt. Simply stating that, “we need to back off now that the season has begun.”

However, the reality is this, gains in strength, speed and power can and still should be made In-season so that come the end of the season when play-offs and championships need to be won, they can be. I have worked with many athletes and teams who have made consistent gains all year long. When I was the Head Strength Coach for the USA Women’s Hockey team my athletes were tested quarterly by the Exercise Physiology staff at the US Olympic Committee. In my first season working with the team, players were a little skeptical at the notion that they could be better at the end of the season than they were at the start. Yet every year when it came time for testing, we had our greatest power output, strength, and vertical jump test scores at the end of the season. The team kept improving play on the ice while making greater gains in strength, lifting more at the end of the season than at the start of the off-season or pre-season. Everyone’s vertical jump and Wingate tests improved as well.

How is this possible? The key is proper program design and implementation. Never more critical is proper technique than In-season. Quality and speed of movement must be the key focus while training for improved performance In-season. There should never be a need for spotting, especially while training In-season. If a spot is needed, the focus is not to maximize power output.

Many of the training methods used in the Off-season or Pre-season should either be cut out or advanced to more neurologically stimulating activities while the athlete is In-season. Many of the lifts or drills that take place In-season are not performed at other times of the year. The sets and reps used In-season must be different as well and need to be closely monitored to ensure the athlete’s and team’s success. By controlling the volume and intensity levels of the athlete’s training, they will be able to peak in performance for more important games or matches. As an athlete’s training progresses throughout the season, they will become more powerful, lift more weight, and perform better in their sport at the end of the season.

Written by Kevin Ebel, October 2006
Published in the Stevens Point Journal, October 31, 2006

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