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AFM Magazine


Speed Report – Weight Training for Speed in a High School Environment - Part II

by: Dale Baskett
Football Speed Specialist
© More from this issue

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The Squat

The next area of emphasis for speed development in the weight room is a staple in every coach’s strength program. It is the squat and its different variations. The squat is an exercise that builds tremendous leg and core strength which are both needed to apply force into the ground in order to generate speed and power. The overhead squat, back squat, and front squat form the base of our core lower body exercises.

We will squat twice per week with one session being heavy and one session being light and dynamic. On our light and dynamic day, we will squat with tremendous speed. I am not concerned with the amount of weight on the bar. I am only concerned with how fast we move it. I will not let our athletes train heavier than 60% for a top set on our light days. We constantly stress a fast, dynamic, controlled movement on the dynamic squat day. One of the biggest mistakes a coach can make is to squat too heavy too often. Squatting heavy before a speed training session can be very detrimental to your speed development.

The athlete should not be feeling sore before a speed training session. We train on a three-day total body split with two days for speed/agility movement. Monday is a total body emphasis, Wednesday is an upper body emphasis, and Friday is our lower body emphasis. The exercise listed number 1 is the most important and heaviest lift of that day (See our training set-up chart).


We use this training set-up due to the limited amount of time we have with our athletes. I only have 30 minutes to train my athletes each day so it is important that we make the most out of each rep of each session. We always super set the upper and lower body exercise for the day due to our time constraints. We train speed and agility on Tuesday and Thursday. Our workout is set-up to squat heavy on the last day of the week. This allows us to get quality speed development during those sessions. Our athletes are not trying to recover from a heavy squat workout during a speed training session.

Training squats heavy multiple times in a weekly cycle will not only adversely effect speed training, but it will also hurt strength levels. This will limit the athlete’s ability to apply force to the ground. Great care should be taken to make sure that athletes are not being overtrained through poor periodization and planning with the squats. There has to be recovery time in between strength and speed sessions in order to maximize the training effect on your players.

Single Leg and Plyometric Training

Movement in sports mainly occurs on one leg, so it makes sense that single leg training should be a significant part of any coach’s strength training program for speed. We incorporate several single leg strength exercises such as the box-step up, Bulgarian split squat, multi-directional lunges, single leg rdl’s, and single leg plyometrics into our training program. We focus on great technique, proper movement patterns, and developing strength in our single leg training. We usually do our single leg training on the heavy upper body emphasis day. We like to alternate box step ups, Bulgarian split squats, and the lunge series on a rotational cycle. This allows us to constantly train heavy and avoid plateaus in our periodization cycle. We want to stress that we never sacrifice technique for weight. We stress to our athletes that we want the heaviest amount of weight you can lift with perfect technique This is another way in which we try to establish proper movement patterns with our athletes.

Plyometric training is another area in which we work to enhance our speed. Our Olympic lifts serve as our main plyometric exercise, but we do incorporate other plyometric movements once we feel our athletes have a proper foundation to progress. I would advise being conservative with plyometric training. Many high school athletes are not physically prepared for the added rigors of plyometric training. We begin with double leg exercises such as hops and progress to single leg exercises such as bounding and single leg bounds. It is very important to have a carefully planned plyometric program with high school athletes in order to help prevent injury.

Posterior Chain Training

Training the posterior chain is essential to maximizing the speed of your athletes. The posterior chain is largely made up of four muscle groups: the glutes, the hams, the calves, and the spinal erectors. For years, coaches have spent too much time on the front side of the body while neglecting one of the most important aspects of speed development. We can train the posterior chain through proper deep squats and the Olympic lifts, but we also use a variety of other exercises to make sure we have balance in our training. We work our way up in these exercises from a beginner to an advanced level. Here are some examples of our posterior chain training program:

Beginner:
1.     Supine Bridges
2.    Stability Ball Leg Curls
3.     Bird Dogs
4.    Curl Ups
5.     Bridges and Planks

Intermediate:
1.     Single Leg Supine Bridges
2.     Single Leg Stability Ball Leg Curls
3.     Sweeping Bird Dogs (Not letting the knee and hand touch the ground throughout the rep)
4.    Kettle Bell Swings
5.    Kettle Bell Goblet Squats

Advanced:
1.    Plyometric Bird Dogs (A very fast controlled raise of the arm and leg of the bird dog)
2.    Good Mornings
3.    Hyperextensions (Very controlled - making sure we are not over extending)
4.    Glute Ham Raises
5.    Russian Leans
6.    RDLs
7.    Single Leg RDLs
8.    Back Squat and Front Squat
9.    The Clean and The Snatch p

(Dale Baskett and Coach Eaves have worked together for three seasons)

About the Author: Fred Eaves is the strength and conditioning coach at Battle Ground Academy in Franklin, Tennessee. He has 16 years of experience that includes coaching at LSU, Tennessee, and Tennessee-Chattanooga. Eaves has been the strength and conditioning coach for three Tennessee state champions.

          
(Next month – the focus is on the Squat as an Olympic movement that will help the speed of your players).

About the Author: Fred Eaves is the strength and conditioning coach at Battle Ground Academy in Franklin, Tennessee. He has 16 years of experience that includes coaching at LSU, Tennessee, and Tennessee-Chattanooga. Eaves has been the strength and conditioning coach for three Tennessee state champions.






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