Designing a strength and conditioning program
Issue: Volume 29 Number 1
Designing a strength and conditioning program can be a complex process. The purpose of this article is to explain the training principles that need to be followed when designing a program, different types of training for strength and when a program needs to be assessed and changed.
When developing an effective strength and conditioning program there are many factors to consider. Firstly, there needs to be an analysis of the sport. This is important as it enables the coach to determine what type of program is best for the demands of each sport.
This analysis would include looking at the following for each sport:
Energy systems used
There are three energy systems: the phosphagen system (five to ten seconds), anaerobic glycolysis (15 seconds to three minutes) and aerobic metabolism (oxidative; >3mins) (Baechle and Earle 2000).
Muscles used
Assess the muscles that are predominantly used in the sport. This will help in the design of a program as you know what areas need to be strengthened specific to the sport.
Joint actions
An example of this is the basketball rebound:
| JOINT | ACTION | MUSCLES |
| Hip | Extension | Glute medius & maximus, hamstrings |
| Knee | Extension | Quadriceps group |
| Ankle | Plantar flexion | Gastrocnemius, soleus |
Common injuries
Through awareness of the common injuries in the sport you are able to design a program that can hopefully prevent these injuries from happening.
Once you have analysed the sport, you need to anaylse the athlete so that you can design a program specific to each sport and each individual athlete. Analysis of the athlete would include looking at their:
Strengths and weaknesses
Awareness of an athlete’s strengths and weaknesses (both physically and within their sport) will enable a program to be devised to enhance strengths and turn any weaknesses into strengths.
Training experience/age
An athlete’s strength training experience will determine the program devised. If the athlete has minimal experience they will not have complex exercises in the program until they become more experienced. This way the athlete is less likely to suffer an injury through poor technique and/or lack of strength to perform the lift.
Past injuries and medical health
Awareness of any current or past injuries or health problems will enable you to design a program to assist a particular injury and hopefully prevent the injury from recurring.
Athlete’s goals
An athlete’s program is based around their goals.
In order to achieve improvements in a sport there are general training principles that need to be applied during training. Four important training principles that need to be applied in order to achieve the desired results from a strength and conditioning program are: specificity, overload, accommodation and individualisation.
Specificity
Specificity refers to the distinct adaptations to the physiological systems that arise from the training program (Baechle and Earle 2000). Training adaptations are highly specific. It is well known that strength training increases both muscle mass and strength, while endurance running induces positive change such as an increase in aerobic capacity. Because of adaptation specificity, the exercises and training in various sports are different (Zatsiorsky 1995).
Overload
Exercise overload must be applied to bring about positive changes in an athlete’s state. For a training adaptation to occur, a physiological system must be exercised at a level beyond that to which it is presently accustomed. During the training process, there are two ways to induce the adaptation. One is to increase the training load (intensity, volume) while continuing to employ the same drill; for example, a squat. The other is to change the drill, provided the exercise is new and the athlete is not accustomed to it. If overload is not used and an athlete is completing the same training load over a very long time, there will be no additional adaptations and the level of physical fitness will not substantially change. If the training load is too low, detraining occur (Zatsiorsky 1995)
Accommodation
If athletes employ the same exercises with the same training load over a long period of time, performance gains decrease. Because of accommodation, it is inefficient to use standard exercises or standard training loads over a long period of time. Training programs should be both variable to avoid accommodation and stable to satisfy the demand for specificity. In order to avoid or decrease the negative influence of accommodation, training programs are periodically modified. In principle, there are two ways to modify training programs:
- quantitative – changing loads (for instance, the total amount of weight lifted)
- qualitative – replacing the exercises (Zatsiorsky 1995)
Individualisation
All programs need to be individualised, as all people are different. The same exercises or training methods elicit a greater or smaller effect in various athletes (Zatsiorsky 1995).
A desired outcome through a strength and conditioning program can be achieved through all types of training in and out of the gym. Some different ways of training may include the use of:
- free weights
- machine weights
- body weight exercises
- swiss ball exercises
- medicine ball exercises
- sleds
- tractor tyres.
The program variables are a guide of how to program for each quality. Refer to the Table 1 for the different training variables. Tables 2 and 3 are examples of targeting a quality. For example, if an athlete wants to improve their power, you would not design a program with repetitions of 15.
QUALITY
REPS SETS INTENSITY REST
Max strength
1-6 3-4 85-100% 2-5mins
Power 1-5
3-6 90+% 2-5mins
Hypertrophy
8-12 3-6 65-80% 30-90secs
Strength
Endurance 15-50+ 2-4 40-70% 15-45secs
Circuit training 12-15 2-3 50-80% 15-60secs
Basic
Strength 8-12 2-4 65-85% 60secs
It is important once you have analysed the sport and individual athlete that you a design a program specific to their needs.
An example of a max strength/power program in the gym follows:
Exercise Sets/Reps Rest
Power Clean 2x5, 1x4, 1x3 2mins
Bench press 4x5 2mins
Sled runs 4x5m 2mins
Push press 5543 2mins
Chin-ups 4x5 2mins
An example of a strength/endurance program:
Exercise Sets/Reps Rest
Squats 3x15 30secs
Bench press 3x15 30secs
Leg press 3x15 30secs
One arm DB row 3x15 30secs
Db Shoulder press 3x15 30secs
References:
Baechle, TR and Earle, RW 2000. Essentials of strength training and conditioning
(2nd ed.), Human Kinetics: Champaign, IL.
Zatsiorsky, VM 1995. Science and practice of strength training, Human Kinetics: Champaign, IL.
