Conditioning for Team Sports: Monitoring Load

So getting back to this idea that there is a better way to condition our athletes, besides these white knuckling feel like you're getting punched in the face and kicked in the gut workouts. Is there a better way?

I say yes, absolutely.

The first thing that must be done is accepting the idea that not all workouts should be that hard. Embracing a monitoring system (HRM, external load, etc) or at a bare minimum using the RPE system is an absolute must. The RPE scale is a rating of perceived exertion, which is the idea of rating the difficulty of a workout/training session on a scale of 1-10. You as the coach should have an idea of how hard do you want this to feel for the athletes on a scale of 1 to 10.

That's really, really important because, if you are wanting to give your athletes a stimulation day, which is going to be a little bit lighter, then we will want to hit at a 6 or 7 on a scale of 10. This isn’t too tough and should feel pretty good. It’s enough to improve fitness while not interfering with the ability for the athlete to recover. If after the session they come back and they're all reporting that the session was a 9 or 9.5 then you've missed your mark. If you absolutely destroyed them, because you’ve missed your mark, you don’t understand the fitness of your athletes and this is going to cause problems.

Now, with that said, if you are getting reports back showing a 9 or 9.5 and you say, you know what, I've done this workout 1000 times, this is a 6/6.5 at most on that scale. Your response should not be to tell them they're out of shape, they didn't do what they had to do, or they’ve got to just pick it up.

Your response has to be okay, what am I going to do to adjust this program to meet the needs of my athletes, because right now, they're not in the kind of shape that I want them to be in. You need to get them to the point that this workout does feel like a six or a seven. A lot of coaches take this attitude of, well, you know, I haven't been playing the sport for 20 years, and I can still do this. So what, you are not your athletes, and your athletes aren’t you. It is your job as the coach to make sure they are a proper fit.

Since you’re here: We have a small favor to ask! At SAPT, we are committed to sharing quality information that is both entertaining and compelling to help build better athletes. Please take a moment to share the articles on social media, engage us authors with questions and comments below, and link to articles when appropriate if you have a blog or participate on forums of related topics.

Thank you! SAPT

Feeding the Family: Low Carb Diet Magic?

So what's the deal with fast weight loss? We've seen for years the low carb diet promoters claiming you can lose a bunch of weight really quickly if you follow their diet plan.  The fact is, when somebody switches from a carbohydrate rich diet to a low carb diet, they do lose weight.

So let's talk about that.

What's happening is your body is losing water. For every gram of carbohydrate stored in your muscles, four grams of water are stored with it. When carbohydrates are no longer stored in the muscles, that water is no longer stored either. In the short term, this is the magic of these diets, this is why people can lose weight so quickly.

This is similar to the way wrestlers and other athletes in weight class sports lose weight, they just get their bodies to stop storing water. For something like this you don’t even need to change your carbohydrate intake too much unless you go to an extreme. You just basically overload yourself with a ton of water, and then start cutting back over a period of days, and you'll lose an enormous amount of weight.

I personally lost 10 pounds for the last powerlifting meet that I did and that was over a course of, I want to say, five days. The advantage here is that you are losing the weight quickly, so the body isn’t typically going to attack the muscle fibers.

Sheet pan salmon. Technically low-carb, but also just a super healthy dinner option.

Another key to the popularity of low carb diets or fat heavy diets tends to be the high fat and protein. These high levels of fat tend to be more satiating, so people aren’t hungry for a longer period of time. Much like with weight lifting and conditioning, I’ve personally tried every diet from here to the other side of the world that made any sense to me to see what it felt like. The best thing for me about the low carb diets were how tasty they were, because of how much fat there is in the diet.

However, nothing compares to a balanced carbohydrate rich diet for energy intake.

The point is there's no like magic to losing weight. At the end of the day, a low carb diet will give you a little bit of immediate motivation, because of the rapid weight loss. However, this may also happen if you just clean up your diet a little bit as well, even with keeping a lot of carbohydrates in. Just from cleaning things up but still eating a lot of carbohydrates, I'll lose a bunch of water that first week, you know, to the tune of four or five pounds. The truth is weight loss or gain is a calories in versus calories out game.

Having the discipline to control your caloric intake over a long period of time, is what always wins out in the long run. Having the discipline to make sure that you are eating a very nutrient dense diet with lots of colorful fruits and vegetables, lean proteins and whole food sources of carbohydrates will always win out in the long run for what's going to make you feel and perform at your best. Ketogenic and low carb diets are great and as I said, I've done them myself with quite a bit of success. But, I’ve also had quite a bit of success from a carbohydrate rich diet and much more energy.

So these diets can be beneficial in the short term, but nothing beats a more balanced approach. This goes for how you look, feel, and perform.

Since you’re here: We have a small favor to ask! At SAPT, we are committed to sharing quality information that is both entertaining and compelling to help build better athletes. Please take a moment to share the articles on social media, engage us authors with questions and comments below, and link to articles when appropriate if you have a blog or participate on forums of related topics.

Thank you! SAPT

Conditioning for Team Sports: Common Faults in Conditioning

I want to talk about conditioning. In particular conditioning for athletes that are playing team sports. I’m going to be speaking from my own experiences with many sports, but most notably, basketball. This has been on my mind lately because, if conditioning is done correctly, that's one of the solutions to better performance that I’m supposed to deliver to my team.

But the big, BIG caveat with that is, most of my players in the WNBA are playing basketball year round, whereas in the NBA, those guys get a bit more time off. Rest is important for a team’s performance, as this allows the body to recover from a brutal season and gives us time to increase strength. See our earlier blog post on the importance of strength for why this is one of the most important times of year for my players.

When looking at training in the college setting, it is most common that the sports coach maintains some control of the training program depending on their experience. Typically these college coaches were on a successful team in the late 90s or early 2000s that may have won a conference championship or had a semi-successful NCAA Tournament run. Unsurprisingly,  that tends to mean they have a lot of experience with conditioning and not very much experience in the weight room.The conditioning while on this team was their coaches ran them into the ground and then ran them some more. This creates a positive association between extreme running based conditioning workouts and success. And the thing they all have in common is just the the unbelievable volume, and pounding on the athletes bodies, with very, very little rest.

And that's what I really want to focus on today: talking about is that a reasonable approach? Or is there a better way?

What all of these programs/coaches were asking for was the best of both worlds. Both worlds in that they want volume, because of the high mileage seen during the sports of soccer and lacrosse in particular, with basketball also having considerable mileage as well. But they also want to be fast, because there are all these bursts of speed within all this mileage on the field of play. So then they take those two concepts and say, well, we have to be fast, and we have to get a ton of mileage so logically, the only way to do that is to do those things every single day and combine them.

And this is where you get those 300 yards shuttles tests that you have to do 10 sets of in :60 with a brief recovery come from. Another favorite is the full field 110-yard sprint that must be completed in 16-17 seconds, you have a minute to jog back and rest then go again for around 10-12 sets.Those are just a few of the standard examples.

And the result is: a lot of overuse injuries. An inability of the athlete to recover. Not because these drills are difficult, but because they are unrealistic and we now know better ways to safely and effectively train athletes.This is problematic, because, if we have a pain point in one area of the body, the athlete starts to compensate, to try to lessen the pain as much as possible. Then a new pattern develops, a pattern that is weakening one area of the body, while over using a completely different part of the body. And that is how we effectively perpetuate this injury risk cycle.

These coaches do not typically have a notion of the effect different surfaces have on the injury risk of their athletes either. When coaches decide to condition athletes that are accustomed to being on grass or turf on a track, this can cause major problems. Field athletes are used to running on soft ground, in their cleats. They're not track athletes, they're not accustomed to that difference in joint stress. And these are things that you have to take into consideration. If you're going to do that with your team, or an athlete, or you want to do that yourself, you must respect the surface and you have to respect the volume that you're asking your athlete’s bodies to do.

One of the things that typically happens to these coaches when they want to start a conditioning program for their team is that they just throw them in the deep end. If this happens and the athlete struggles with the program, I recommend backing off a week from the real program and maybe reducing that workload, give it your best, and then see how you feel those next couple of days. This will give you a real sense on if you need to work yourself into the program or if you can just go ahead and get it started.

For example, if you do half the volume of the program, and you're crazy sore for two, three days afterwards, or you can't even really make it through at the times that you're supposed to hit, then that's a real clue that some things need to be adjusted for you. If you're overseeing athletes, you have got to make that adjustment, that is the smart, sensible thing to do. If you don’t you’re just begging for injuries down the road.

Since you’re here: We have a small favor to ask! At SAPT, we are committed to sharing quality information that is both entertaining and compelling to help build better athletes. Please take a moment to share the articles on social media, engage us authors with questions and comments below, and link to articles when appropriate if you have a blog or participate on forums of related topics.

Thank you! SAPT

Upcoming: Perseverance Series

Next week, we will start our perseverance series. The series will highlight different experiences that I've had over the last 15 years with the clients, athletes, and staff members and showcase that when the going got tough, they just kept going.

Perseverance involves the repeated focus on details while keeping an eye always on the larger goal.

One of the things that has been, and continues to be, infinitely amazing to me is people's ability to continue to forge forward in the face of major roadblocks. Even when it seems like their goal is unreachable, they will continue onward. Sometimes it may seem like they're moving laterally, and not making progress. Other times, it may be clear that they've taken steps backwards. But in the end, all of these people we will highlight have continued with an eye towards the long term and have kept that perspective of what it is that they want to achieve.

I'm excited to offer up this series in these highlights because there are amazing things happening around all of us all the time. Sometimes you just have to look for it!

Please stay tuned.

Feeding the Family: Managing Added Sugar in Your Home

One of the toughest things to do as a parent is really keep control of the food that your kids are eating. Well, I know for our house, this has been one of the toughest things.

Both my husband and I work, and I'm the one that tends to take charge of what our family is eating. I’m the one doing the grocery shopping, and I’m generally the one prepping meals. What we have found is that when I'm away from the house, especially during times of the year when I’m working a lot, we tend to default to convenient foods for the kids instead of the healthiest ones. It took us a little while to realize that there were consequences to this pattern of eating.

These consequences became clear around seven months ago, when my eight year old started expressing body image issues.

“Water or milk?” The beverage choice my kids are given daily.

One of the best things to do with kids, especially around this age, is to only give them access to food choices that you - as the parent - are comfortable with them having, not telling them they can’t have certain foods. What I mean is, avoid labeling foods as good and bad. Avoid having to say no to choices too terribly often. I believe our job as parents is to make sure that they're having options that are appropriate based on what our perspective is. And my family got to a point where we were regularly giving the kids access to things that were not appropriate from my perspective.

When my daughter began expressing body image issues, the importance of nutrition to my family was solidified. I thought for certain one of her friends must have said something, as I knew she was not hearing disparaging body image comments at home. But it turned out this was a self assessment.

This made us look at some of the food habits that were going on at our house for the cause. We had known for a while that the sugar consumption in our house was more than I thought it should be. I say that because most families are consuming massive amounts of sugar every day and not even realizing it. Within my house, I thought I was very well aware of the sugar consumption.

Even after having several conversations with my husband and the kids about making good healthy choices, in my opinion we were still consuming too much sugar. Right around the time my daughter was dealing with these body image issues, I read a statistic from the World Health Organization(WHO) that said the maximum recommended added sugar intake for children to be four teaspoons per day. When I heard that, I thought, oh, wow, let me see where we are stacking up against this.

“Reducing free sugars intake to less than 10% of total daily energy intake was recommended by the WHO Study Group for the first time in 1989 and was further elaborated by a joint WHO/FAO Expert Consultation in 2002. This new updated WHO guideline calls for further reduction of free sugars intake to less than 5% of total energy intake if possible.”

— World Health Organization

We had already been working on choosing healthier food options, but I wanted to see the kind of added sugar intake we were working with anyway.  The next time as I was at the grocery store, I really looked at the packaging of certain things we usually have to see how much sugar was in them. Because I very rarely eat processed foods, I wasn’t tuning into this as much as I should have been. I’m okay with having some convenient processed foods around the house because of the kids, but it’s not necessarily something I’ll indulge in myself.

Back to the WHO statistics, 4 teaspoons of sugar is 16g of added sugar per day. Breakfast itself gave us 12/16g of added sugar recommended per day for children. This is because I was giving them a convenient option, the “uncrustable sandwich”. They love these for breakfast. It's easy, and they eat it every time. It's got a decent amount of protein on it’s own, and we also add a glass of milk to it as well. It has an appropriate amount of carbohydrates and an appropriate amount of fat. But again, when you look to the sugar specifically, it was like whoa, at breakfast, we're already getting three quarters of our sugar allowance for the day. So then I started looking at other things that I was giving them,  take bread as an example. This is an item I would take a look at in your household, because the results surprised me. The particular bread we use has 4 grams of added sugar per two slices. What the heck! So just the bread for their lunch sandwiches plus the uncrustable sandwich for breakfast already got us to the max added sugar intake the WHO recommends.

So what did I do? Well, I started looking in other places as well. After factoring in the other common foods/snack the kids normally have, the total started piling up big time, probably around 25-30g/day. Keep in mind my kids are not allowed to have sugary drinks, they are only typically drinking water or milk. So for many kids, their total added sugar intake may be much higher.

This caused me to double down on my efforts to get these other processed/packaged foods out of our house. You will find added sugars in meat products, chicken nuggets, pizza, pasta sauce, ketchup, it is all kinds of places that you would not think it needs to be. And it truly does not need to be there. But it reduces the cost and makes it slightly more palatable, training us to continue to just get that sugar fix. This is how the companies that make these products keep us coming back for more.

And it's so tough to get rid of. So I just wanted to bring this to light, because this was something that I felt like we can always do better with. We could all have more salads or fresh vegetables, more fruits, whatever it might be. I did not at the time think that we would be massively over that sugar total. I'm sure we were easily doubling it. And I think at this point, you know, on certain days, we still double it. But I do my best to minimize the food that's in the house that has added sugars. And the kids and I have conversations about these things because I want them to understand. It's not just NO, this is bad. It's okay, we ate something earlier that had a lot of sugar in it, and they begin to understand why that's not good and why it's not good for them to have too much in a day. They understand why they feel differently when they’ve had a really sweet dessert.

My daughter in particular loves the uncrustables and breads, while my son is more interested in a variety of breakfasts. So for her, we still leave the uncrustables and breads in there for her because that’s what she likes. However, they don’t get dessert type foods with their lunch, it's just fresh fruit, veggies, applesauce, or even pretzels/tortilla chips because there is no added sugar.

And as we talked about, I'm sticking with the bread that they like, even with the extra teaspoon of added sugar. So that's where we are right now. The result was that my daughter started feeling better about how she looked. She does/did have a little bit of a child’s tummy that goes away as they grow and get taller, but hers was probably more than she wanted. She may or may not have lost excess body fat, but you know, most importantly, she's much happier with herself at this point. Starting to help her understand that what goes in your mouth is fuel was helpful in this regard. Excess sugar does affect your mental/physical state, both in how you look and how you feel/perform. You may feel a little foggy throughout the day, or your stomach may be a little more bloated than normal when you eat more sugar than you need. This is something you can add to the conversation with your kids, to help them realize why they want to make these healthy choices.

Changing what your kids eat is as simple as what you buy and keep in the house. It really is.

People come up with all kinds of excuses on why they can't make changes, or they want a formal assessment on why their child is overweight. Well, I hate to break it to you, but you're the one that is responsible for that as the parent. The parents set the example, the parent purchases the food, it's the parents responsibility.

I took it as my responsibility to get things a little bit more aligned to what our values are and what I think is important for my children's health and growth. These are all personal decisions. But when we went in and looked at what was actually in our house, it was like holy smokes, we gotta get some of this stuff out. This can't be in here.

So take a look, it's a fun little challenge. See what you think your kids are actually getting in, see what you're getting. Try and get close to the WHO recommendation. And just be ready to be blown away.

Conditioning for Team Sports: Strength as the Foundation

In our multipart Team Sport Conditioning series, Sarah Walls goes in-depth on the various factors impacting team sports' fitness and conditioning.

My career began and grew in the college strength and conditioning setting, where I was very fortunate with the strength coaches that I worked with and under. The structures and procedures I use today as well as my coaching philosophy were taught to me by these coaches, and I believe that is a big part of what has moved my career forward. I am thankful everyday for the mentors I had early on in my career, what I learned from them has helped me become the coach I am today.

I monitor everything that happens during a single heartbeat. It’s that important.

One of the things I quickly learned from these mentors was that strength is the foundation for performance on any level and of any type. No matter the sport and the dominant motor ability, strength is the base that affects all other qualities. This can be taken to the extremes of endurance by looking at cross country or marathon runners, where likely the most successful ones are stronger in the very specific ways they need to be stronger. Obviously strength is not the dominant motor ability in the case of a largely aerobic sport, but once those dominant qualities are evened out like they are at the top level, it is the stronger athlete who wins.

The same can be said for team sports as well.

If we are to believe that strength is the foundation of any performance training program, then you have to make sure that your athletes are strong in appropriate ways for the sport. Louie Simmons says “It does no good to be strong in the wrong exercises.” Applied to more endurance based sports we could say it does no good to be strong in a way that does not benefit sport performance.

Supporting the development of strength in all athletes, regardless of the sport, doesn't mean that we're trying to build everybody into powerlifters or olympic weightlifters. We are, in fact, trying to make them pretty darn strong, just not to the extremes.  So with that said, there's still a lot of room to develop an enormous amount of strength that is appropriate for the sport. The bottom line is make yourself of your athletes as strong as you can, without it negatively affecting the sport performance.