The World Sports Science Performance Workbook
Dear Athlete,
We have all seen the superstar athlete interviewed on television after making a game-winning play:
'How did you make that great play?' asks the reporter.
'I knew that the game depended on it. I gave it everything I had, and I made the play' is the frequent answer.
That is what we hear, but the athlete should have explained:
'I wanted to make the play so I made the extra effort to get into the acceleration position (with a straight body bent from the knees), pumped my arms pocket-to chin level, and I positioned my shoulders lower to the ground than my competitor to drive my body forward toward the target, I took the extra energy necessary to apply the Valsalva Technique to temporarily raise my blood pressure by an extra 100 points so I could get there faster than my competitor.'
Who wants the victory the most will win the game
Using the Valsalva Technique explains why some inferior teams still find ways to win championships. This natural technique is designed to assist the body to get into maximal effort so athletes will have the skills necessary to beat a faster athlete.
Speed is a skill and skills can be improved. So if you are at all interested in this and other performance boosting training techniques, read on. They can be found in The World Sports Science Performance Workbook.
The World Sports Science - Performance Workbook
The World Sports Science Performance Workbook is for all athletes looking for proven techniques to lift their performance to its ultimate competitive level.
The extract above, describing the Valsalva Acceleration Technique, is from the Workbook's module on speed training. There are eleven modules in all, each describing ways to boost performance. The speed-training module explains the science and biomechanics behind acceleration techniques.
We give training sessions that makes speed training accessible and fun for all and explore tried and tested ways to fast forward your sporting performance.
There are several easy acceleration techniques that can be taught in a few sessions that will increase the speed of many athletes. Techniques like:
- Ankle Dorsiflexion
- Pocket/Chin Arm Swings
- Acceleration Position
- The Valsalva Acceleration Technique
The Valsalva Acceleration Technique
The Valsalva Acceleration Technique is the grand prize of speed training. Its winning applications are endless:
- A 100 meter sprinter would have time to plan for four Valsalva Acceleration Techniques during the short ten second event
- A master sprinter can get in five before the finish
- The miler can place the Valsalva Acceleration Technique in the race strategy 100 meters before the finish line to power that extra kick
- The 400 meter sprinter can deploy this technique during the four handoff zones during the single lap around the track
- The baseball player can use the acceleration skill twice during the seven second trip to first base
- The football player can strategically use the Valsalva Technique to break on the ball for a surprise steal
Below we give further extracts from the eleven modules contained in The World Sports Science Performance Workbook. Each module provides evidence-based techniques based on studies and trials conducted by dedicated sports scientists. You receive 196 pages of comprehensive workouts designed to enhance your performance for your sport or event:
• Planning • Conditioning • Mobility • Endurance • Strength • Speed • Injury Prevention • Psychology • Ergogenic Aids • Evaluation Tests • Competition Preparation
These eleven modules possess the key to an exponential leap in performance. The guidance given can be applied to all sports.
"I coach and play at a national level, this has helped me be the best that i can be. Personally i am playing better than ever and coaching wise, i belive this represents the most up to-date info available"
Patrick O'Neill, Ireland
Why these results are not made public, we'll never know.
But here's how you can benefit!
Sports science research has made astonishing advances in the past ten years. Yet news of this still hasn't reached the average athlete!
This is astonishing when you consider that in other fields such as medicine or computing, similar breakthroughs would be splashed across the media everywhere.
Perhaps it's because sports writers are more interested in personalities than training methods. Perhaps it's because editors don't think the average reader is interested.
Whatever the reason, you can celebrate - and take full advantage of these newly discovered, proven techniques. All the hard work and expense of discovery has been completed, condensed and published in The World Sports Science Performance Workbook, now available at a special low rate.
Fitness, performance and training-efficiency
When we refer to 'hard work and expense' we're talking of all the effort of years of double-blind tests carried out on athletes and other willing humans. And the millions of dollars spent in universities and research foundations throughout the world to discover how the body functions under the pressure of competition.
That's a great deal of time, effort and money - all for the cause of furthering the fitness, performance and training-efficiency of athletes and sportspeople like you.
You, of course, won't have to pay anything like a million dollars. The money has already been paid and the results delivered. You'll find complete, detailed workouts in The World Sports Science Performance Workbook.
There are some further extracts from the Workbook below. When you look through them, you'll realize just how outdated most athletes and their coaches are when it comes to getting the best out of their training. Once you read our advice you'll want to know how to put it into practice:
Train the new way
Look at almost any training schedule and it will revolve around a seven-day cycle. This is because most athletes and coaches find it convenient to work in weekly blocks.
The planning of training is often done in a cyclical fashion. But it appears there is little reason for this, apart from habit. To cover all aspects of fitness and training in a week, you could find you are putting in either too many sessions, or not allowing sufficient recovery between them. The end result is that you may not perform all the sessions that you would like or need.
Use the guidelines in The World Sports Science Performance Workbook to plan your training sessions. Here are some examples for various sports:
Cross country running - developing strength and endurance
The high aerobic demands of cross-country running mean that you will have to include lots of steady running to develop a sound aerobic base, improve cardiac output, assist capillarisation (the oxygen carrying capacity of tiny blood vessels in the cardiovascular system) and train the body to convert chemical energy in the form of stored glycogen in the muscles and liver into the mechanical energy which stimulates the efficient, rotational movement of the arms and legs around the shoulder and hip axes.
However, aerobic endurance is not just acquired by steady running. It can be developed by running long repetitions at 5K/10K pace with short recoveries. You'll read why, if you run too fast during these aerobic intervals, you defeat the objective of the session by accumulating lactic acid and oxygen debt.
Oxygen debt and lactic acid reduce the contractile efficiency of the muscle groups responsible for motion and eventually result in the athlete slowing down and coming to a stop.
Another essential ingredient of your cross-country schedule is hill running. As well as benefiting the cardiovascular system, this develops leg strength and the muscular endurance necessary to keep going in races when clinging mud and steep inclines start to take their toll of energy reserves.
The World Sports Science Performance Workbook provides training schedules for all, from younger to elite runners. These include:
- Rest days and easy recovery running to allow the regeneration of mental and physical energy resources as well as consolidating training gains
- Pre-race preparation in the days, hours and minutes leading up to the event and, of course, what you do during it. Ten tips are given to help you get the very best out of yourself in competition.
The hallmark of a world-class swimmer
Swimming demands meticulous preparation for competition. In no other sport is the level of preparation, tapering for the big day and rigid control of training intensities, quite the same.
One aspect that contributes to this is the uniformity of conditions. Let's face it; you are all staring at a black line on the pool floor for length after length.
Planning the perfect peak, to coincide with the most important gala on the yearly calendar, is the hallmark of the world-class swimmer and coach.
There can be variety within the sport, however, depending quite simply on what stroke(s) are your best and you use in competition, as well as on what distance you travel on race day. This range of events means that a variety of forms of conditioning are needed to match the demands of the race event.
The key variables to play with are volume and intensity, while the influence of land work, especially strength training, will also sculpt your swimming fitness for a crescendo on the important race day.
The World Sports Science Performance Workbook shows what to include in those sessions, at what intensity, and how much rest should be given. These include:
- A quality warm-up and 'lead-in' set
- A recovery set and cool-down, depending in the length of the session, training cycle, etc.
- Flexibility work, before and after pool sessions, and in sessions in their own right
- Technique work, which is vital in a sport where hundredths of a second really count
- Work in the weight room to increase strength and power, a crucial factor in swimming success
We explain how to choose exercises that contribute to an increase in swimming velocity and why, if they are not specific to your sport, you should consider dropping them.
Rowing - correcting misconceptions and errors
There used to be a strong belief in rowing that you had to be a big, powerful, anaerobic beast to do well. Most successful rowers are, indeed, of a bigger, muscular build. But such athletes, although they train extremely hard, often do not train according to the demands of their sport.
Given that the race distance is 2000m, which typically takes about 6 to 7 minutes to complete, it is more accurate to think of rowing as a power endurance sport rather than a strength sport.
Although strength is needed to generate large force and propel the boat at high speed, the more significant factor is the length of time taken to compete. It has been shown physiologically that at least 70% of the energy requirement comes from aerobic metabolism. The remainder comes from anaerobic sources.
What's vital, therefore, is to condition the aerobic, or cardio respiratory system. Because however large and powerful a rower or crew, if they lack sufficient endurance they will never win!
Use the tested workouts in The World Sports Science Performance Workbook and move your performance up to a new level.
Preventing posture imbalance: the muscles of posture, which may not get well trained in the rowing action, also need toning to avoid imbalances. Many rowers perform strength training in circuit fashion but the value of such work has to be questioned.
If increase in strength is the goal, the load should be high, the reps low and the recovery sufficiently long. This is rarely the case in rowing training, where lots of repetitions from one exercise to the next, with little or no recovery, is far more usual.
Why training is often lost in the past: it has to be remembered why these traditional circuit-training sessions were first introduced a couple of decades ago. During bad light or weather, circuit training was the next best alternative because it gave a good aerobic workout by keeping the pulse raised for a sustained period.
Nowadays ergometers are available -- so the customary circuit session has less value. It is also fair to say that they may well replace running and cycling, two forms of cross-training that have remained popular from pre-ergometer days.
It's time to rethink the philosophy behind some of these training sessions. By keeping workouts specific and effective, as provided in The World Sports Science Performance Handbook, you'll move your performance up to a new level.
The nine crucial elements of conditioning
One of the most-heard and potentially dangerous misconceptions in the sports world is that you can get in shape by just playing or taking part in your chosen sport.
However, if you want the utmost efficiency, consistent improvement, and balanced abilities you must participate in year round conditioning programs.
The World Sports Science Performance Workbook module on conditioning is applicable to most sports:
- Brad Walker explains the content, format and benefits of circuit training
- John Shepherd provides advice on how agility drills can be used to enhance an athlete's performance
- Walt Reynolds reviews the workouts that can boost fitness, speed, endurance and correct weaknesses
The bottom line in sports conditioning and fitness training is adaptive body stress. Sportsmen and women must put their bodies under a certain amount of stress to increase physical capabilities. Exercise scientists have identified nine elements that comprise the definition of fitness and they are:
- Strength
- Power
- Agility
- Balance
- Flexibility
- Local Muscle Endurance
- Cardiovascular Endurance
- Strength Endurance
- Co-ordination
The World Sports Science Performance Workbook explains how to simultaneously improve mobility, strength and stamina with circuit training routines which are largely responsible for the success of many of world champion athletes including Miles Stewart (World Champion Triathlete), Mick Doohan (World 500cc Motorcycle Champion), and countless others from sports as diverse as roller-skating, squash, and cycling.
How circuit training works
Circuit training is one of the best ways to condition your entire body and mind. It prepares the body in a very even, all round manner and aids in the prevention of injury.
Circuit training is flexible: the various types provided in The World Sports Science Performance Workbook are totally customizable to your specific requirements:
- Timed circuit
- Competition Circuit
- Repetition Circuit
- Sport specific or running circuit
Because circuit training is a fantastic form of exercise, people tend to push themselves harder than they normally would. This tends to result in sore muscles and joints and an increased likelihood of injury. The World Sports Science Performance Workbook gives two precautions to avoid this happening.
How agility training helps in most sports
In sport, agility is an amalgam of balance, speed, strength, flexibility and coordination.
The 'science' of agility (and speed and power) training has made rapid strides recently, especially in terms of its accessibility to the mainstream sporting world. It's all about patterning and conditioning a heightened physical, neural, sport specific response.
At first glance, agility training may not seem to be applicable to many sports. After all, quick-as-a-flash agility is not a pre-requisite for triathlon cross country skiers or marathon running. Here, however, is how agility training helped a sample group of cross-country skiers:
- Increased their speed by a total of 0.3 seconds over the slalom test
- Improved their speed and agility on the hurdle test by 1.4 seconds
- Increased flexion and extension of the thoracic (upper) spine by 9°
- Improved lateral flexion 0.07mm
Marathon runners can benefit too. Of course, marathon runners do not have to dart sideways, backwards and forwards with lightning speed over the course of their 26-mile effort, so could they have anything to gain from agility training?
The answer is yes. Research indicates that runners' leg muscles may not actually be that efficient at returning energy to the running surface. In fact, at certain speeds these muscles may be working at only 50% efficiency because of the 'natural' energy return effectiveness of the foot arch and Achilles tendon.
As we explain in The World Sports Science Performance Workbook, unless you target these running muscles with specific power conditioning drills, your ability to drive up running speed can be compromised.
The Plyometric exercises provided in The World Sports Science Performance Workbook enable muscles to generate huge amounts of force in a split second when a concentric (shortening) muscular contraction immediately follows an eccentric (lengthening) contraction of the same muscle. These agility and power moves result in a more economical and powerful running stride, regardless of running distance.
Our exercises also 'pre-habilitate' against injury, providing a further reason why endurance runners (and those involved in running based sports) should perform agility training.
In summary, if you or those you coach want to become faster, more elusive, more efficient and more dynamic in their movements, it is advisable to incorporate the specific drills provided in into regular training routines.
Mobility, flexibility and stretching - correcting the errors
Most coaches, athletes and sports medicine personnel use stretching methods as part of the training routine for athletes. However, most of the theoretical and practical factors in stretching are often incorrectly applied.
In any movement there are two groups of muscles at work:
- The protagonistic muscles which cause the movement to take place
- The antagonistic muscles which oppose the movement and determine the amount of mobility
An athlete will find it difficult, if not impossible, to learn a new technique if their mobility is poor. The coach might mistakenly put the lack of progress down to a lack of strength or poor coordination, when in fact the athlete is not capable of assuming a required position due to a lack of mobility. A good level of mobility is also essential for the development of specific conditioning (i.e. the application of strength or speed in a particular event).
Achieving optimum mobility with active mobility exercises
So what's the best way to achieve optimum mobility?
Flexibility is defined as the static maximum 'range of motion' (ROM) available about a joint. If you want to improve your ability to actively move through a full ROM, then active and ballistic mobility exercises and not static stretching, is the answer.
Why static stretching often doesn't work: although static stretching as part of a warm-up is very common, research and logic suggests that static stretches will do little to help prevent injuries or improve muscle function before an activity.
Instead, active mobility exercises, those that take the muscles dynamically through the full ROM, starting slowly and building up to sports-specific speeds, are more appropriate, both pre-exercise and generally to develop active ROM for sports performance and protect against injury.
You'll find the new warm-up routines in The World Sports Science Performance Workbook will 'fire up' your nervous system and increase the strength of your muscles for handling more dynamic contractions.
Developing the four types of endurance
A good base of endurance and strength is important before the specific speed and strength requirements of the athlete's sport or event can be developed, if you wish to avoid injury. The objective of endurance training is to develop the energy production system(s) to meet the demands of the sport or event.
The World Sports Science Performance Workbook provides exercises and guidelines for developing the four types of endurance:
- Aerobic
- Anaerobic
- Speed
- Strength
Strength training - making it count
Strength and conditioning experts around the world all agree that for time spent in the gym to have a positive impact on your sports performance, you must ensure the exercises you perform, and the way you perform them, are related to your sporting movements in competition.
The nature of strength, however, is difficult to define.
This is exacerbated by coaches who are too busy to delve deeply into detailed information on strength training, and who are generally happy to accept what a few inexperienced advisors put forward.
This can be ultimately damaging to the athlete since an incorrect bias to one type of strength instead of to another can completely distort the physical capabilities of that athlete. 'Strength' training can be your major path to success, but it can also be a quick road to disaster.
The World Sports Science Performance Workbook explains the basics of physiology and how this operates for each event.
Different events need different 'strengths', and different 'strengths' need different training methods. A selection of exercises is provided to develop the various kinds of 'strengths', applicable to most sports:
- Strength endurance - the ability to move a light resistance for an extended period of time
- Absolute dynamic strength - the maximum force that a muscle can generate and apply to create movement
- Absolute static strength - the maximum force that a muscle can generate and apply without producing movement
- Reactive strength - the maximum force that muscles can apply in response to a force in the opposite direction
- Power - which most people confuse with 'strength', but is actually the absolute dynamic strength multiplied by the speed it can be applied
Performance - the bottom line
Each sport has its own specific demands and a good training plan will focus on those. If yours doesn't, it's time to move up a grade. Your performance will never be fully realized if you rely on a hotchpotch of ideas collected over the years from out-dated books and other sources such as well-meaning friends and colleagues.
To move up a grade you need to bring your training bang-up-to-date. You'll find good coaching advice will achieve four vital things:
- Provide you with sports-specific workouts, and for team sports, position-specific workouts
- Reduce the time you spend on training by cutting out unnecessary workouts
- Balance your exercises to ensure certain muscle groups aren't ignored
- Focus on working up to your highest competitive level
Special discount offer
The examples we give above are only a small selection of the comprehensive advice contained in the 196-page World Sports Science Performance Workbook. Take out a trial order to test our advice in full. We guarantee results will begin to come through as soon as you get working (or your money back).
When you click through to the application page, you will see we are offering you The World Sports Science Performance Workbook at a special reduced price. This is because you are a registered user of one of our websites.
The World Sports Science Performance Workbook is fully indexed and cross-referenced so you can access your specific exercises immediately.
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"My clients found that they had quicker and stronger increases in their training. A great source of information for both my clients and my own personal training."
Dan Coughlan, Personal Trainer, Ontario, Canada.