Top 10 Speed Training Myths Revealed

Every day someone asks me a question about training speed. So here are those questions heard most frequently as well as the answers to them.

1. Static stretching prepares you for competition/practice.
Static stretching actually reduces power output. Athletes should prepare for practice by doing a dynamic warm up that progresses from basic, low intensity movements to faster, more explosive movements as the muscles loosen up. The goal is to simulate movements that athletes will be using in practice or a game. What happens when you try to stretch a cold rubber band? You can think about your muscles the same way.

2. Strength training makes females too bulky
Many of the female athletes we train have this popular mindset. However, look at some elite female athletes like Mia Hamm or Lisa Leslie. They certainly train with weights, but no one would accuse them of having manly physiques. Strength training will improve performance and reduce injury if done correctly.

3. You can’t train speed.
For some reason, the popular belief is that you’re born with a certain amount of “speed” and you can’t improve it. Nothing could be further from the truth. Most young athletes are so physically weak and mechanically out of tune that significant improvements in speed can be made often just by working on technique and form. Athletes at any age and any level can improve speed when implementing a complete speed training program designed to improve and develop the entire athlete. {Use the link http://www.completespeedtraining.com/ for the words “speed training” in the last sentence.}

4. Training slow makes you fast.
I don’t think coaches directly think this way but their training techniques imply otherwise. This is especially true in sports that involve a higher aerobic element such as soccer, field hockey, or lacrosse. I see kids out running mileage and doing long, slow intervals of several minutes of continuous running. This will get them in shape. However, in games, I see kids jogging, jogging and then sprinting at full speed for 20–30 yards. Then they run, jog, and sprint for 20–30 more yards. If you want kids to improve their acceleration and top speed so that they can get to the ball faster or get back on defense, you have to train by running at full speed in practice.

5. You must train hard every day.
The workout itself is only a piece of the training puzzle. It’s the time between intense workouts—the recovery—where athletes make their improvements. Generally, it takes 36–48 hours to recover from high intensity training. If athletes are doing too much too often, they become overtrained. Coaches can expect to see an increase in injuries, complaints about being sore more often, decreased performance, and higher levels of fatigue earlier in games. It’s always better to under train an athlete than overtrain. Err on the side of caution to get maximal results.

6. Strength training will stunt a young athlete’s growth.
This is another myth held over from a different time. On a daily basis, kids as young as seven years old are playing organized sports year round. They’re tackling, getting tackled, sliding, and falling. These loads on the body can have a much greater physical impact than a well-designed strength training program. Though we don’t usually begin training with weights with prepubescent athletes, they can benefit from body weight exercises such as push-ups, lunges, and sit-ups. This will increase muscular efficiency, speed up recovery, and improve coordination and overall speed.

7. The harder the workout, the better the result.
Some athletes (and coaches) have this mentality that if a workout doesn’t reduce them to complete exhaustion and/or make them vomit, it wasn’t an effective workout. I can tell you that those who have this mentality probably see many injuries and frustrating performances. The purpose of a workout is to stimulate an adaptation by the body. If the body is forced to do too much work in a given time period, it will break down. The skill in coaching is to stimulate the adaptation in the body without reaching a point of diminishing returns.

8. Interval training is the same as speed training.
Repeatedly running 100s, 200s, etc. won’t improve top speeds. Even running repeat 40s with short recovery periods won’t improve acceleration and top speed. Speed work is defined as 2–8 seconds of maximal intensity running with full recovery. That means there should be at least two minutes of light dynamic movement between each effort. This goes against the experience of some coaches but is the only way to improve speed. An athlete must be able to focus on proper form and maintain intensity in order to get faster. If they don’t recover properly from each interval, they won’t be able to replicate proper mechanics with consistency and they can’t improve.

9. Flexibility won’t help you get faster.
Both coaches and athletes spend so much time on the skills of their sport, speed training, and conditioning, they often forget a fundamental component of success—flexibility. After practice or a game, the muscles are warm and loose. This is the time to work on increasing flexibility. So many athletes suffer injuries or compete below their capacity because poor flexibility inhibits their range of motion and speed. We see this in the hips and hip flexors where the stride lengths of athletes appear conspicuously short. Most often we see this in male athletes who will lift weights, train hard, and then skip out on their cool down and flexibility work.

10. Lift your knees.
When parents and coaches want their kids to run faster or when the kids are beginning to fatigue, I hear many yell at the kids, “Lift your knees. Get your knees up.” This is one of the most backward cues that we can give to athletes. The way to run faster is to apply more force to the ground. Every action has an equal and opposite reaction so the more force that you apply to the ground, the more the ground will give back. So when we cue athletes to lift their knees, we’re doing two things incorrectly. One, we’re telling them to use their hip flexors to lift instead of their glutes and hamstrings to drive down. Just think about the size of your hip flexor versus the size of your glutes and hamstrings. Now which muscles do you think can create more force and therefore more speed? Second, we’re cueing them to do a movement that is in opposition to what generates speed. If an athlete learns at age seven to lift his knees when he needs a burst of speed, the improper cue will be hardwired into his brain. To unlearn that as a teenager and to do the opposite and drive down will delay the athlete’s progress. He or she will have a difficult time coordinating an entirely new way of running and will potentially have to take a step or two backward. That’s why it’s critical to learn proper form early and get an advantage over those who still aren’t getting the best instruction. So cue athletes to step over the opposite knee and drive the foot down into the ground with the foot landing underneath the hip.

The Top Five Mistakes Made by Basketball Players

There is a cornucopia of training information for almost every athletic endeavor that you can imagine partaking in. This information can be found online, in books, and from seminars. You don’t have to go very far to learn about training for your sport. Whether that’s football, mixed martial arts, bodybuilding, powerlifting, track and field, soccer, baseball, hockey, or anything else, the information is out there and can be obtained fairly easily.

Unfortunately though, for many basketball players and coaches, there isn’t much information readily available specific to basketball. Sure, much of the “other” information is fairly general and applicable to many sports, including basketball. But that’s not good enough. There’s a lot of information—most of it pretty bad—on training for the vertical jump, but the vertical jump is a small part of becoming a better basketball athlete. An important part but a part nonetheless. (If this is something you’re interested in, check out Kelly Baggett’s, Vertical Jump Bible. It’s the best, bar none.)

So, if you’re a player or a coach interested in improvement, start reading, researching, and experimenting. But first get your feet wet with this list—the five most common training mistakes that I see in basketball players today.

Basketball players play too much basketball.

You might read that and think I’m crazy, but I’m not. Basketball players play the game, whether it’s five on five, three on three, or one on one, every day for hours on end. And I’m sorry to break this to you, but there is such a thing as diminishing returns.Because they play so much, players are constantly in an overreached state. What does that mean? It means their performance will consistently be sub-par, and their motivation will wane. Something they used to love to do sucks now because they often don’t play as well as they used to or normally do. Playing becomes a chore, not the fun activity it used to be. How often should they be playing? I recommend two to three times a week at most. For most athletes, twice a week is optimal.

Basketball players don’t practice enough.

Right along with playing too much, they don’t work on their skills enough. We’ve all heard about how the Europeans spend hours every day training their skills. While I don’t think it’s nearly as big of a deal as some make it out to be, there is something to be learned here. Time needs to be spent perfecting skills such as shooting, passing, dribbling, and man-to-man defense. As these skills continue to improve, those improvements should transfer over to games. Then, voila! You’re looking at a better basketball player.How should you balance playing with practicing? Like I said, I think most players would see the most benefit from playing two to three times a week and practicing two to three times a week on the days that they’re not playing. Combined, basketball players should be playing/practicing no more than five times a week.

Basketball players are weak.

When I say weak, I mean weak. There are definitely some players out there who are strong, and it definitely helps their game. (They’re really easy to spot, too. Just look for the fastest guy who jumps the highest.) How does strength help? Well, strength is the foundation on which all other athletic attributes are built. There are several important attributes that I’m referring to, but the two big ones you might be very familiar with—speed and explosiveness—absolutely fall under the “determined by strength” category. Get stronger and you’ll be running faster and jumping higher. Not only that, but you’ll also improve your body’s resistance to injury and its ability to recover. What’s the lesson here? Get stronger!

Basketball players have jacked up ankles.

Between high-top basketball shoes, ankle braces, and zero ankle mobility work, basketball players have some of the stiffest and most injury prone ankles that you can find. The problem lies mainly within the three things I mentioned above—footwear, ankle braces, and a lack of mobility.With those three culprits working together, its no wonder every basketball player has ankle issues. What can you do to help prevent ankle issues? First, get a pair of lower top basketball shoes. They’ll feel strange at first, but that’s because your ankle actually has to do some work now whereas before it was doing almost nothing while the shoe took care of everything. As with anything new, work your way into them slowly.Second, unless you’re just coming back from an ankle injury, it might be a good idea to toss the ankle brace for the same reasons that you should toss the high-top shoes. Again, work into it slowly as you gradually become more comfortable with it. Then, start working on your ankle mobility. It would take a few pages to describe everything you should be doing, so start by moving your ankle through all the ranges of motion and work from there. Finally, do some dynamic strengthening movements to improve on your balance, proprioception, and quickness simultaneously. I like two- and one-footed speed line jumps for sets of 20–30 and pogo jumps for sets of ten.

Basketball players don’t work on recovery.

With all this playing, practicing, weight training, and injury prevention work, you’re going to have to do something to help tolerate all of it, which falls under the category of recovery work. Something that always blows my mind is that most people don’t know that the positive things that come with training happen when you’re not training. That’s what recovery is. You basically damage your body while training and then “relax” temporarily for 24–48 hours (or however long you have between sessions) where your body repairs the damage and, in an attempt to better handle the stress it knows is coming in the near future, overshoots where it was before the initial training session and builds itself back a little stronger and a little better.What can you do to assist the recovery process? Make sure you’re eating a proper diet, especially after workouts, and perform some static or dynamic stretching. You can also ice sore areas, do some foam rolling and massaging, take a nap, or practice contrast therapy (if you’re really brave) to name a few. Don’t ignore this one. It’s integral to the training process!

A bonus tip!
Basketball players are weak!

Yeah, I already said it, but I didn’t say it loud enough! Above all else, if you want to become a better athlete, get stronger. If you’re a beginner, lots of body weight work will suffice. If you’re a little older and/or a little more advanced, get your butt in the weight room and find the squat rack!

The Problem with Crossfit for Athletes

This is post is from a friend of mine in California that has his own sports specific training center. I asked him to try CrossFit and tell me what he thinks about it and if he feels it could be used solely for training an athlete. This is his response.

Crossfit gyms are popping up across the world. I think they are great for the general population who are looking for something more than a commercial gym experience, but it greatly concerns me that now many athletes are turning to CrossFit for their performance training. CrossFit’s website states, “Our specialty is not specializing. Combat, survival, many sports and life reward this kind of fitness and, on average, punish the specialist.” The statement that many sports punish the specialist could not be further from the truth. Elite athletes must be elite in their necessary skill set. This skill set may encompass many traits. For example, a linebacker in football must possess maximal strength, explosive strength, speed, agility and some level of aerobic lactic conditioning. These skills though are not needed in equal proportion, so why would he train them all equally? Cross fit aims to do just this, which is not sound or economical for the athlete.

Another issue that arises with CrossFit when used to train athletes is the lack of specificity and transfer of training. There are specific movement patterns that athletes must master for their sport, CrossFit and their “Workout of the Day” neglects this. Greg Glassman, the creator of CrossFit wrote in a CrossFit Journal article, “We’re asked for workouts for baseball, karate, swimming, dance, boxing, but they all get the same thing: CrossFit.” Whatever sport you play requires specific skills, probably different skills than the athlete from a different sport, who is performing the same workout next to you requires, so why are you doing the same training?
The programming-or lack thereof- exhibited in CrossFit workouts are also troublesome when trying to apply them to athlete’s training. Some prominent strength coaches chimed with the following thoughts about CrossFit for athletes. Alwyn Cosgrove, owner of Results Fitness in Santa Clarita, CA said, "a recent CrossFit workout was 30 reps of snatches with 135 pounds. A snatch is an explosive exercise designed to train power development. Thirty reps is endurance. You don't use an explosive exercise to train endurance; there are more effective and safer choices. Another one was 30 muscle-ups. And if you can't do muscle-ups, do 120 pull-ups and 120 dips. It's just random; it makes no sense. Two days later the program was five sets of five in the push jerk with max loads. That's not looking too healthy for the shoulder joint if you just did 120 dips 48 hours ago." Mike Boyle, a prominent Boston-based strength coach and combine preparation specialist added, "I think high-rep Olympic lifting is dangerous. Be careful with CrossFit." Finally Charles Poliquin, owner of the Poliquin Performance Center and trainer of over 100 Olympic athletes across various disciplines stated, “"If you try to do everything in your workout, you get nothing. CrossFit is different, and maybe even fun for some people, but it's not very effective. No athlete has ever gotten good training like that."

The workouts discussed above and other CrossFit “WOD’s” are certainly challenging, but a hard workout and a training session that will maximize your athletic performance are certainly not the same thing. For a speed/power athlete, why waste your energy developing your aerobic capacity to an unnecessary level? For an endurance athlete, why waste your time developing your explosive power and maximal strength to an unnecessary level?
CrossFit workouts have merits, they are challenging and combine many good methods. Athlete’s though need to focus specifically on the skills that will help them succeed at their sport and CrossFit fails to do this. If your goals are to be competent at everything, then CrossFit is for you; if your goal is to excel at your sport, than I suggest you find a training method focused on developing the skills you need.

Chad Smith, Juggernaut Training Systems LLC
23541 Ridge Route, Suite C. Laguna Hills, CA 92653 (949)215-7378

Do You Know What the 7 Primal Movements Are?

We are always talking about eating Primal like, but do you train Primal like? Technology, research, exercise prescription and doctor advancement has come a long way in the last 20 years but we still have an alarming rate of orthopedic injuries still occurring. Do you screen your clients to the 7 Primal Movements or do you just screen them for movements that you are going to use?

The concept of the “Primal Movement Patterns” was developed by Paul Chek, who while developing his exercise philosophy, identified 7 specific groups of movements. These movements mimic the actions done in ancient times.Chek’s philosophy moves away from the conventional approach to exercise and focuses on stimulating the body, and the mind in an environment similar to nature.

1-Squatting: Involves bending at the knees and the hips, while keeping the back straight, and lifting a weight from the ground or pushing a weight that is placed on the back or chest. Imagine your primal ancestors squatting down and lifting a heavy rock to dig for grubs, or using the legs and hips to lift a heavy log up onto a primal structure. Exercise examples: Barbell or Dumbbell Squat, Squat to Press.

2-Bending involves flexing and extending at the waist, preferably in a standing position. Often this type of movement would have been combined with a squatting, lifting, or rotating motion, such as hoisting a heavy rock out of a field. Exercise examples: Medicine Ball Overhead or Side Throw, Deadlifts.

3-Lunging: Involves stepping forward with just one leg, and bending that leg down. This motion would have been used for either traversing terrain (i.e., carrying hunted game over a log), or stepping into a throw (such as hoisting a spear). Exercise examples: Walking Lunge, Barbell or Dumbbell Weighted Lunge, Medicine Ball Lunge with Twist.

4-Pushing: Involves using the arms, chest, and shoulders to force a weight out and away or up from the body, an action that might have been used, for example, when herding animals, pushing a plow, or hoisting a weight overhead. Exercise examples: Standing Cable Press, Push-up, and Standing Dumbbell Shoulder Press.

5-Pulling: Involves using the arms, chest, and shoulders, as well as the legs, to drag or pull a weight towards the body. This type of motion would have been used to pull heavy game animals, row a watercraft, pull a bow, or quickly pull onto a tree branch for safety. Exercise examples: Standing High, Mid, and Low Cable Rows, Pull-ups.

6-Twisting: Involves turning and rotating with the torso to apply a force, and would have usually been combined with most of the other primal movement patterns for actions such as pulling, pushing, or lunging. For instance, a twist combine with a lunge and push would comprise a throwing motion, such as hoisting an object like a spear or heavy rock. Exercise examples: Medicine Ball Throws, Cable Torso Twists, Medicine Ball Woodchops.

7-Gait: Involves moving over terrain, whether walking, jogging, or sprinting. This action would often have been interspersed with other movement patterns, such as walking to track a wild animal, sprinting to hunt it down, then twisting, lunging, and pushing to throw or thrust a weapon. Exercise examples: Sprint to Medicine Ball Throw, Dumbbell Lift and Press to Power Skip.

So next time you screen a client or get a new client see what their Primal Movement is like and you might see more chinks in their armor than a regular baseline assessment might show.

17 Reasons Your not Losing Weight from CF Asia...

This is an awesome post that CrossFit Asia has on their Lean Up Challenge website. Enjoy and thanks CF Asia crew.


Effective, healthy weight loss isn’t only due to the simplistic calories in, calories out paradigm. Nor is it solely reliant on diet and exercise. It’s everything – it’s all the various signals our body receives from the environment that affect how our genes express themselves and thrive. How we approach the subject matters, too. Our mood, our methods, our temperament. Our conscious decisions and our willpower. It’s setting good habits and expunging bad ones. Most of all, it comes down to keeping our genes happy by providing an environment that approximates evolutionary precedent.

1. You think you’re eating healthy, but aren’t.
Does your diet consist of a massive amount of “products”? Low-carb or not, you want to eat real food. Flagons of diet soda, plates of pure fiber in the shape of noodles, and loaves of 1g net carb “bread” do not a Primal diet make. You’re just feeding an addiction and consuming empty calories – sound familiar? Disregard the labels and look inside for what you know to be true: this crap isn’t food, and you shouldn’t be eating it. It’s about way more than just low-carb.

2. You’re under too much stress.
The stress response system is subconscious; it responds to stimuli and nothing else. Emotional stress, physical stress, financial stress, relationship stress – I hesitate to even make these distinctions, because the body does not differentiate between sources of stress. They all cause the body to produce cortisol, the fight-or-flight hormone that catabolizes muscle, worsens insulin resistance, and promotes the storage of fat. For 200,000 years, stress meant a life or death situation. It was intense and infrequent, and the cortisol release was arresting and extreme enough to improve the chances of survival. Today, our body responds to a stack of paperwork the same way. Traffic jams are like rival war bands. A nagging boss is like a rampaging mastodon, only on a daily basis. Take a step back from your life and take stock of your stress levels – they may be holding you back.

3. You need to watch your carb intake.
Carbs are key, as always, especially when you’ve got weight to lose. Veer closer to the bottom of the curve, taking care to avoid all processed food (hidden sugars). You might also try skipping fruit.

4. You’re adding muscle.
I always tell people not to get hung up on the scales so much. Those things are useful – don’t get me wrong – but they never tell the whole story, like whether or not you’re adding lean mass. The PB will spur fat loss, but it also promotes muscle gain and better bone density. If you’re feeling good but failing to see any improvements register on the scale’s measurements, it’s most likely extra muscle and stronger bone from resistance training. You wouldn’t know that just from the bathroom scale. If you absolutely need objective records of your progress, get a body fat percentage test (although these might not even tell the whole story) or try measuring your waist.

5. You’re not active enough.
Are you Moving Frequently at a Slow Pace for three to five hours every week? Remember: the near-daily low-level (between 55-75% max heart rate) movement should be the bedrock of your fitness regimen. It’s easy to do (because every bit of movement counts) and it doesn’t dip into your glycogen reserves (making it a pure fat burner, not a sugar burner). If you’re on the low end of the spectrum, crank it up toward five weekly hours and beyond.

6. You’re lapsing into Chronic Cardio.
Of course, you can go too far with the low-level movement – you can begin to lapse into Chronic Cardio. When you stay above 75% of your maximum heart rate for extended periods of time, you’re burning glycogen. Your body in turn craves even more sugar to replenish the lost stores, so you polish off a heap of carbs, preferably simple and fast-acting. You can continue down this route if you wish – I did, for a couple decades – but you’ll gain weight, lose muscle, release more cortisol, and compromise any progress you might have made.

7. You still haven’t tried IF.
Results vary, but if you’ve seemingly tried everything else, intermittent fasting can be a great tool to break through a weight loss plateau. Make sure you’ve fully transitioned onto a Primal eating plan and start small. Skip breakfast and eat a late lunch. If that feels okay, skip breakfast and lunch the next time. Just take it slow and pay attention to your hunger. Eventually, try exercising in a fasted state to maximize the metabolic advantage. If all goes well, your hunger won’t necessarily disappear, but it’ll change. A successful IF tames hunger, makes it less insistent and demanding.

8. You’re eating too much.
Low-carb isn’t magic. It reins in wild hunger and tames insulin, but calories do still matter – especially once you approach your ideal weight. In fact, those last few pounds often don’t respond to the same stuff that worked so well to get you to this point. Eating nut butter by the spoonful and hunks of cheese without regard for caloric content may have gotten you this far, but you’ve got to tighten things up if things aren’t working. And that’s the real test, isn’t it? There is a metabolic advantage to eating according to the PB, but if the weight isn’t coming off, something’s up – and calories may need to come down.

9. You haven’t overcome bad habits or developed good ones.
Be brutally honest with yourself. Do you engage in bad habits? If so, identify them. Make tentative, loose plans to disengage from their clutches, and tell people close to you. Make it public, so you can’t back out without losing face. You’ve also got to develop good ones. Follow roughly similar guidelines as when kicking a bad habit – identification, planning, publication – and you’ll be on your way.

10. You haven’t purged and Primalized your pantry.
Out of sight, out of mind; out of reach, out of mouth. Keep the crappy junk food out of your pantry, if not out of your house altogether. Go down the list and toss the stuff that doesn’t apply. As for the rest of your kitchen, check out the fridge interiors and grocery lists of some other Primal folks for inspiration.

11. You’ve reached a healthy homeostasis.
It may be that your body has reached its “ideal” weight – its effective, genetic set point. Reaching this level is generally painless and effortless, but it won’t necessarily correspond to your desired level of leanness. Women, especially, tend to achieve healthy homeostasis at higher body fat levels. Breaking through plateaus can be hard enough, but plateaus ordained by the body itself can be nearly impossible. It’s probably going to take some serious tinkering with carbs, calories, activity levels, sleep, and stress. If everything else is on point and accounted for, you may be looking at healthy homeostasis. Then, the question becomes: do you want to mess with a good thing?

12. You’re low on willpower.
Willpower is like a muscle. It must be used or it will atrophy. You’ve also got to provide fuel for your will – little victories to start out. Go for a walk if you can’t muster the will for the gym. Take note that willpower, or lack thereof, might actually be an indicator of your body’s needs. If you truly can’t muster up the will for the gym, it may be that your body needs to recover. When that’s the case, overtraining is a bigger danger than lack of will.

13. You’re full of excuses.
If you find yourself having mini self-contained internal arguments throughout the day (and you lose), or (even worse) lying to yourself about what you’re eating and doing, you’re probably also full of excuses. Read this, maybe twice, then follow up with this.

14. You haven’t actually gone Primal!
We get a good number of new readers on a regular basis, and not all of them take instantly to the Primal concepts. And yet they come back. They read the archives, the comments. Something draws them near, while at the same time keeping them at arm’s length. Why is that? What’s stopping them? If that describes you, what are you waiting for? Take the plunge. Go Primal for 30 days and see how you like it. I assure you; the many enthusiastic community members are here because it works.

15. You’re not getting enough sleep.
Chronic levels of sleep deprivation cause the release of cortisol, our old fat-storing friend. The biggest spike in (fat-burning, anabolic) growth hormone plasma levels occurs in deep sleep. And a recent sleep study showed that truncated sleep patterns are linked to weight gain. Get seven to eight hours of sleep a night.

16. You haven’t given it enough time.
The Primal Blueprint is a fat loss hack, undoubtedly, but it isn’t always a shortcut. Some people get instant results from dropping carbs, grains, sugar, and vegetable oils, while others have to take a month to get acclimated and only then does the weight begin to slide off. Either way, though, this is a lifestyle. You’re in it for the long run. Approach it with the right mindset and you won’t get discouraged.

17. You’re eating too much dairy.
Some people just react poorly to dairy. We see this time and time again listed in the forums; dairy just seems to cause major stalls in fat loss for a good number of folks. There are a couple speculative reasons for this. One, folks coming from a strict paleo background may not be acclimated to the more relaxed Primal stance on dairy. Reintroducing any food into the diet after a period of restriction can have unintended consequences on body composition. Two, dairy is insulinogenic, which is why it’s a popular post-workout refueling tool for athletes. Does a non-strength training PBer need to drink a few glasses of milk every day? Probably (definitely) not.

Bonus Reason: Sprinting is not part of your fitness routine.
I’ve found that many assume that they’re getting everything they need from their workouts from plenty of low level aerobic activity and a couple of strength training sessions each week. Sprinting is often overlooked, but it’s one of the Primal Blueprint Laws for a reason. Nothing shreds you up faster than sprinting. I’d ease into sprints if you’ve never done them or are extremely out of shape or overweight. That is, I recommend you have some measure of fitness aptitude before you jump into a routine. But once you’re ready do 6-8 all out sprints (with short breaks between) once a week to break a weight loss plateau when all other attempts have failed.

Agility Drills for various sports.

Basketball Agility Drills

Agility Drill #1 - Super Shuttle
1. Starting underneath the basket with your back to the court.2. Shuffle backwards with hands in a defensive ready position to point A.3. Sprint backwards from A to B focusing on minimizing the time to change direction. 4. Side step facing the court from B to Start position (again keep hands in defensive position).5. Jump to touch the net or backboard.6. Repeat the back shuffle from Start to C.7. Sprint forwards from C to D.8. Side step with back to court to Start position.9. Jump to touch the net or backboard.10. Repeat for 6-8 repetitions with at 60-90 seconds rest between.

Agility Drill #2 - Weave In Weave Out
1. Place 4 markers out in a straight line approximately 3 yards apart (see right).2. In between each set of markers place another marker only 3 yards to the left.3. Sprint to marker A and then side step/shuffle to marker B leading with the left leg.4. Side shuffle to marker C this time leading with the right leg.5. Repeat to the finish.6. Walk back to the start and repeat for up to 6-8 repetitions.

Football Agility Exercises

Drill #3 Sprint Lateral Shuffle Set up a series of markers similar to the diagram below. Starting at the first marker sprint to the second marker and side step to the third marker. Continue until the end. Rest and repeat in the other direction so side steps lead with opposite foot.

Lateral Feet Drill

The ladder agility drills require more practise and greater coordination. Be sure to give yourself several dummy runs before attempting at speed.
Start with both feet outside of the first square and to the left
Step into the first square with your left foot first, immediately followed by your right foot... in a 1-2 motion
Step to the right, outside the first square again with your left foot fist, followed by your right
Now step diagonally left into the second square, with the left foot leading always keeping the same 1-2 motion
Now step out to the left-hand side of the second square and repeat for the full length of the ladder
If you perform several sets of this drill start at different sides of the ladder so your lead foot changes each time

These are just of the many agility drills that you can use for sports specific agility training. Just remember that agility is moving in one direction and being able to decelerate and quickly re-accelerate in the opposite direction.

A Debate on Agility.....

So in my many years of sports, training, and coaching their has been a silent debate over what is agility and how to train it. After some extensive research I think I might be able to define what agility is and how it pertains to human performance in training and sport.

Wikipedia defines agility as: the ability to change the body's position efficiently, and requires the integration of isolated movement skills using a combination of balance, coordination, speed, reflexes, strength, endurance and stamina.

CrossFit defines agility as: the ability to minimize transition time from one movement pattern to another.

I've come to define agility as: the ability to change direction without the loss of speed, strength, or power. The ability to perform fluid changes of movement with the whole body in relation to speed, strength , and power. The ability to move well in any direction in a rapid fashion using speed, strength, and power.

So now that we have defined agility how can we train it so we become more agile in training or sport?

Bio motor Characteristics

1. Relative body strength- most important- If the athlete is not strong enough for their body weight, it is impossible for him/her to be agile.

2. Speed- whether it be lateral or straight line.

3. Motor Coordination(timing)

4. Balance(stability)

5. Motor Programs(technique)

Approach to Agility Training

1. Acceleration


2. Deceleration


3. Stopping


4. Re-acceleration


5. Conditioning


6. Injury Prevention

Pre-conditioning for Agility Training

1. Base of Support: Base of support(BOS)is critical for balance, stability, and proper change of direction. Trainers must be able to identify weaknesses in clients BOS stance during training.


2. Center of Gravity: Keep the center of gravity(COG) closer to the base of support to increase stability and the opportunity to change direction. Trainer must be able to assess the relationship of the COG and BOS during athletes change of direction technique.


3. Muscle Force Vectors: The direction of the muscle force vectors(MFV) will influence the direction and quality of change of direction movements. The trainer must address the relationship between COG, BOS, and the MFV during agility training.

The Formula for Agility Training

1. Acceleration: is the increase in speed in any direction. This movement involves concentric contraction. COG must move away from BOS in direction of movement. This action will set the muscle force vectors in the correct alignment.


2. Deceleration: is the decrease of speed in any direction. This movement involves the eccentric contraction. COG must move closer to and behind the BOS in the direction of movement. This action will allow for the proper force reductions contractions to occur.


3. Stopping: is a brief absences of movement in any direction. Involves the isometric contraction. COG is stopped in a position over the BOS that sets up the re-acceleration. This action will allow the proper balance and change of direction to occur.


4. Conditioning: Agility training is an excellent anaerobic condition tool. Trainers must control quality and proper rest periods during training. This will allow athletes to develop their hearts, lungs, mitochondria, and capillaries over time.


5. Injury Prevention: athletes must develop adequate bio motor requirements for agility training( relative body strength, speed, timing, stability, and technique). Trainers can not progress to levels of training that the athlete are not prepared for.

Tomorrow I will cover some drills that will increase your agility in sport and training. These drills will cover acceleration, deceleration, and overall conditioning.