There are four main factors that are manipulated during the planning of training and the consolidation of stressors concept. They are:

Frequency: How often you are training and – more specifically – how often you are training your primary stressors.

Volume: Total workload of the training.

Intensity: What percentage of an exercise’s maximal output it is being performed at.

Specificity (Variation): How similar to the competitive exercise the exercises being performed are and how well they transfer to sporting performance.

During the short term, the manipulation of these four factors are very small in degree. As we move to the medium and longer terms, the changes become more drastic.

The medium term of training, for the purposes of this article, will be defined as the annual plan; depending on the athlete, this could also be a quadrennial. For powerlifting, an annual plan is a tougher idea to create, as meet schedules aren’t often known very far in advance or do not work toward a true National/World Championship (with the exception of the IPF). Since the annual plan for strength athletes is harder to define, we will look at consolidation of stressors in the training of football players but make sure to understand that these concepts can be similarly applied across many fields with a little aptitude and critical thinking.

A valuable tool in organizing training is to identify and classify training sessions into high, medium, and low intensity days. Doing this will better allow you to manage and manipulate your training frequency and build more recovery into your training as intensity increases.

The primary stressors I manipulate for the training of my football players are:

-Sprints (this includes all maximum speed movement drills)

-Jumps

-Throws

-Squat variations

-Bench variations

The secondary training includes:

-Aerobic capacity training

-Assistance lifting

Our offseason periods of training are divided into three main blocks of training in which the training schedule is consolidated to varying degrees. Those periods are work capacity, alactic power, and alactic capacity. Over the course of these three periods, training moves from more frequent and lower intensity training of the primary stressors and less specific training toward less frequent and higher intensity training of the primary stressors and more specific exercise selections. Let’s take a look block-by-block.

Work Capacity

This first block of the off-season training process is focused on building work capacity through frequent, high volume, moderate intensity relatively general training means.

Frequency during this period is high, with six weekly training sessions all featuring a few of the primary training means.

Because of the frequent nature of training at this point, total volume is inherently high.

With high frequency and high volume training, intensity must be kept down to avoid overtraining. There are several factors to consider with managing training intensity during this period of the year. First, the athletes are coming out of their season, so they are likely detrained to some degree in regards to strength, power, and speed; this will inherently reduce the intensity of their training. For example, if an athlete who previously ran a 4.6 40-yard dash, benched 315, and squatted 455 comes out of the season running  a 4.75, benching 295, and squatting 405, then even his maximum output at the moment won’t be as stressful because it is less than they have achieved before. Managing intensity of weightroom movements is as simple as assigning percentages to the lifts. Most of the work in this period is done in the 55-75% range. Managing intensity for sprint training, jumps, and throws requires a bit more creativity though.

Explosive training like sprints, jumps, and throws need to be trained at at least 90% intensity to have the desired effect, but frequent training of maximal speed and power qualities is very stressful to the body and nervous systems. We can solve this problem by choosing exercises that allow the athlete to perform 90%+ intensity work but reduce the maximum output capabilities and save the athletes from over-stressing themselves. For example, during this period, we will utilize more sled resisted or hill sprints instead of flat land sprints, as these sprinting variations will reduce the athlete’s velocity and chance for soft tissue injury (specifically hamstring pulls) but still have positive carryover to the athletes sprinting speed and special strength for running. Jumps are also often done uphill during this period as they reduce the force of gravity during the landing. Throwing intensity is tough to manipulate, so it is only kept down during this period through higher volumes of throws and the fatigue that comes with it.

Specificity during this time period is relatively low, as general speed training (running in a straight line or preset pattern cone drills) is primarily used, and we have yet to introduce special strength exercises like various sled drills.

I would classify all of the training days during this period as medium stress because, while there are primary stressors present on every day, their intensity is being controlled and kept moderate. This block’s training schedule is as follows:

Monday-Sprints/Jumps/Bench Press/Upper Body Assistance Work

Tuesday-Throws/Aerobic Capacity Training/Squat/Lower Body Assistance Work

Wednesday-Sprints/Jumps/Bench Press/Upper Body Assistance Work

Thursday-Throws/Aerobic Capacity Training/Squat/Lower Body Assistance Work

Friday-Sprints/Jumps/Bench Press/Upper Body Assistance Work

Saturday-Throws/Aerobic Capacity Training/Squat/Lower Body Assistance Work

Sunday-Off

Using this type of schedule of pairing explosive lower body work and upper body weights together may seem counterintuitive, but it is done strategically to further control intensity. If you sprint on Monday, you can’t squat as hard on Tuesday; and if you squat on Tuesday, you can’t sprint as hard on Wednesday. This allows us to put more focus on technique and volume of work rather than only on intensity.

Alactic Power

The alactic power phase of off-season is where the greatest gains in speed and strength will be made. To achieve this, higher intensity training must be implemented. This, of course, is more stressful to the body and will require greater recovery, so we must consolidate our most intensive training to fewer days per week.

The training schedule during this period is as follows:

Monday-Sprints/Jumps/Squat/Lower Body Assistance Work

Tuesday-Throws/Aerobic Capacity Training/Bench/Upper Body Assistance Work

Wednesday-Sprints/Multidirectional Speed/Jumps

Thursday-Aerobic Capacity Training/Restorative Work

Friday- Sprints/Jumps/Squat/Lower Body Assistance Work

Saturday- Throws/Aerobic Capacity Training/Bench/Upper Body Assistance Work

Sunday-Off

This schedule allows you to train at higher intensities while still being able to adequately recover between sessions. In terms of high, medium, and low stress, classifications are as follows:

Monday-High

Tuesday-Medium

Wednesday-Medium

Thursday-Low

Friday-High

Saturday-Medium

Sunday-Off

Some may think that Tuesday, Wednesday, and Saturday’s training could be considered high intensity because of the throwing and bench press work, but unless you have an athlete who is an exceptionally strong bencher or talented thrower, they will have a very hard time having a high stress day with those exercises.

You can already see how frequency and volume are reduced using this schedule, but intensity and specificity are increased in multiple ways.

At this point in the off-season, your athletes are getting stronger and faster. They are capable of higher outputs that will be more stressful to their muscular and nervous systems. For them to continue to progress, they now need greater overload, so speed work has moved from primarily drills and hill/sled sprints to flat land work and some “flying work”(submaximal lead in to maximal speed section to allow for greater velocities to be achieved). Jumps are adding intensity through increased contacts per effort (2-4 successive bounds vs 1-2 in work capacity block) and moving to flat land from hills for increased distance. In the weightroom, percentages are increased and the athletes are getting stronger, so all weights are just higher/more stressful.

Specificity of training is gradually increasing at this point; the introduction of flat land speed work over hill/sled work is certainly more similar to running in a game. Also, we will use various sled drills for linemen like heavy sled pushes and sled pushes into sprints. All speed training during this phase is focused on developing alactic power and must be done with complete rests. The multi-directional speed training on Wednesdays also lends itself to increased specificity as football is rarely a game played in straight lines.

Alactic Capacity

The third and final block of the off-season is dedicated to alactic capacity or the ability to reproduce high-level efforts with incomplete rest periods (aka, conditioning for football is the most intense and stressful part of the off-season’s training).

The schedule is as follows:

Monday-Sprint/Jump/Throw/Bench/Squat

Tuesday-Aerobic Capacity Training/Restorative Work

Wednesday-Sprint/Jump/Throw/Accessory Weights

Thursday-Aerobic Capacity Training/Restorative Work

Friday-Sprint/Jump/Throw/Squat/Bench

Saturday/Sunday-Off

There are two very high stress (Mon/Fri) days, one medium/high stress day (Wed) and two low days (Tues/Thurs), as well as two off days. It is necessary to build in this type of recovery to your training once you have consolidated your primary stressors to few super high intensity sessions.

Total volume is relatively low during this time due to the low frequency, though the speed training volumes of the Mon/Wed/Fri sessions are rather high, as running is what they must be most prepared for as they enter practice periods soon. (They are doing things more similar to their competitive exercise as they get closer to the competition period.)

Specificity is also further increased as more attention is given to special exercises like sled pushes, sled explosions, and sled push and sprint. Also for speed training, we often use competitive simulations like 1 on 1s and various tag drills based on position.

Intensity in the weightroom is high, but volume is very low because of the stress/stimulus the field work presents. We will also use some exercises like bounce press or reverse band press to allow for an overload and more specific pressing action.

Consolidation of stressors in the medium term is a manipulation of frequency, volume, intensity, and variation over time. Structuring your training with these principals in mind will allow you to build in more recovery to the structure of your plan. While strength and speed qualities increase, recovery comes at more of a premium, and you need to facilitate more time for your athletes to recover. Creating an annual plan with these principals in mind will help guide your athlete’s development over the course of a long off-season.

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The first thing our incoming athletes do is go through a Functional Movement Screen and some performance testing. This will give us a pretty good idea where deficiencies are and what the common trends are. Common deficient areas are normally ankle mobility, T-spine mobility, lack of overall posterior strength, and lack of core strength. We will also do a video analysis of their linear and lateral running mechanics to identify any energy leaks or inefficient movement that we can help correct. Once we are done with the evaluation process, the athletes enter our Stage 0 program where we work on correcting their deficiencies and building up their work capacity. We also begin our lifting orientation process at this time. We begin with establishing our standards of what we expect every time they enter our facility. Attention to detail, tempo and intensity are a few. Stage 0 is all about becoming brilliant at the basics. Relative body strength exercises such as inverted rows, chin-ups, push-ups, etc. are emphasized. We will begin taking our athletes through our hinging, squatting and Olympic lifting progressions as well.

What advice do you have for a young coach/student who is interested in breaking into the college coaching scene?

Find coaches you respect in the profession and go visit them. Read everything you can about them and their program. Be very persistent and be a scavenger for knowledge. You must also be passionate about the profession. Find a niche within the field such as speed, corrective exercise, nutrition, etc. The college coaching profession is very competitive, so having a specialty is a good way to set yourself apart. When I hire I am looking to hire great people who will be excellent role models for our kids. They must be low ego and high output coaches who are great teachers.

What are some of the most impressive feats you have seen by your athletes through the years?

I’ve seen many but I’ll keep it to the last two years. I’ve seen Sammie Coates, one of our receivers who weighs 210lbs, do three strict chin-ups with 3 45lb plates hanging from his waist. Jay Prosch, a fullback of ours who is now with the Houston Texans, squatted 365lbs with 100lbs of chain and hit .80 m/s on the tendo. One afternoon I came out of my office onto the weight room floor to find Greg Robinson squatting 315lbs with 80lbs of chains and hitting .85m/s on the tendo. It wouldn’t have been so impressive had he not been wearing flip flops. He was actually waiting for the St. Louis Rams staff who were on their way to work him out. In no way am I advocating wearing flip flops and squatting obviously.

What is a piece of advice that Ryan Russell the coach in 2014 would like to go back and give Ryan Russell the player and Ryan Russell the coach in 2004?

I would tell myself to focus more on recovery. I trained two or three times a day, five or six days a week. I always thought more was better and never let myself recover. Another thing I would have done more as an athlete is open reactive change of direction work. Being an old track guy, I did a lot of running fast and leaning left and spent little time on change of direction. The linear speed training helped me get fast straight ahead, but did very little to help my change of direction. Seeing the impact this type of training has had on my athletes the past few years has been amazing.

What sets apart what Auburn football strength and conditioning does from other top programs in the country?

I don’t know if anything really sets us apart. I know there are a lot of programs doing a really good job. I always tell our guys psychology trumps physiology. We can have the best program in the world and if they don’t buy in and work hard they aren’t going to get better. On the flip side, we could have the worst program in the world and if they give us all they’ve got they’re going to get better. Now I believe we have a good system in place but our guys work extremely hard as well. Attention to detail really matters around here, and our players know it pays to be a “detail guy.” I believe we do a nice job finding our guys limiting/deficient areas and correcting them, in essence helping them get out of their own way. They progress through a stage system where, if they do what they’re supposed to, they will progress through three or four different stages/programs throughout their careers. There are performance standards as well as screening standards that must be met to graduate into the next stage. At the end of the day our guys know that my staff and I are extremely passionate about their development, and that goes a really long way.

Everyone knows that to succeed in the SEC you’ve got to be fast, what are some of your favorite speed training drills/concepts?

We follow a non-competitive → competitive → pure competitive progression. Our last 3-4 week block will be purely competitive with our guys broken up into groups based of their 10yd dash times. It gets extremely competitive, and we are now having to film a lot of the drills to decipher winners and losers. We live by the quote “the best way to get really fast is to go outside and run really fast.” It’s simple but true. We have our guys broken up into 3 different stages as well for speed training. One of our favorite drills for acceleration is pairing heavy sled drags with electronically timed 10’s. Heavy sled drags are an awesome way to teach our athletes to feel the “lean” they will need for optimal acceleration. We will normally do 3x15yd drags with 3x10yd timed 10’s contrasting the two. With our stage III athletes we will do some French contrast training. A pairing we have used looks like this, A) Heavy sled push x10yds  B) sprinter stance start x10yds  C) chain sprint x20yds  D) assisted sprint  x20yds. Our athletes will go through this sequence three times. The gains we have seen in force production through these two methods have been impressive. The French Contrast Method has specifically helped many of our older athletes break through speed barriers late in their careers.

I want to say thanks to Chad and Juggernaut for the great job they do and the wealth of information they put out. We purchased the Juggernaut football manual and gained many valuable ideas when it comes to programming and implementation. Keep up the great work and thanks for the great product.

Ryan Russell has been the Director of Performance for Auburn University Football since 2012.

I rarely speak in absolutes.  Obviously no one situation, equation or outcome is universally applicable. People that do speak in absolutes usually don’t know what they think they know.

Hey Mike,

I am currently playing college football. I just had my second shoulder labral repair surgery. I heard that you had gone through the same or similar surgery. What advice could you give me to get back to and ready for next season after having two shoulder surgeries? What would your training look like? Thanks

There’s a lot that depends on your situation.  What kind of tear/repair was it? Where are you in your rehab?  Was it the same shoulder as before?   Was it the same injury as before?  Was it the same mechanism of injury as before?  Same doctor as before?  Same rehab?  You get what I’m saying?  There’s a lot to consider into answering your question fully.

So here’s my advice – find the common denominator and make your best attempt to strengthen that weak link.  Give me more specific information and I’ll give you more specific information back regarding your specific situation.

That being said…

You obviously either have really bad luck or really bad genetics… or both.

There’s a ton of lineman that I come across with chronically shitty shoulders.  A lot of it has to do with not just their positions, but their builds.  Why?

As time as has moved forward, football has evolved.  When the game first started, the biggest players (offensive lineman) were usually around 240lbs.  Now, linemen are 100lbs more than that.

The ideal build for a lineman: tall, long arms and a thicker build. 

Why?  Being tall stops players from being able to see the QB, it gives them more leverage and it’s intimidating as hell.  Having long arms gives them the ability to keep space between them and shorter, stockier, faster and stronger d-lineman.  By doing this, it enhances their height and leverage, making the combination of the two more effective.  Being thicker enhances their ability to absorb force, more cushin` for the pushin`, if you will.

The problem –

Because height & long arms are a priority, natural thickness is hard to come by.  And in my time at Defranco’s I’ve evaluated more sizes and shapes than most.  Here are the basic builds that we all know:

Succinctly put, you can be tall and skinny, short and thick or a combo of both.  And ideally, you want ecto height with an endo/meso build.  The ideal build for an O-lineman in today’s game is ecto height and limb length and endo thickness.  Unfortunately, most linemen I come across have ecto height & limb length have an endo stomach and if they’re lucky, they have a chest too.

Interestingly enough, most of the better high school linemen I come across tend to have more of an endo build.  Unfortunately, high level college and NFL standards believe their trial and error based research suggested that the ecto has more potential for development and success in the long run.

What I’ve noticed in my evaluations of the athletes at the gym is most ectomorphs that I’ve come across have a ton of laxity in their joints.  Laxity is looseness or instability in the joint.   It’s the same quality that big league pitchers possess that enables them to go through extreme ranges of motion with little acute trauma (considering the speed of movement and ROM).

Knowing a typical pitcher build, would you really put them up against a d-lineman?

Whose shoulders would hold up?

Now obviously, O-lineman now-a-days are not built like David Wells, however, they tend to have similar shoulders.   Because of the nature of their build, their shoulders/joints are capable of going through larger ranges of motion.

Why is this a problem for football but not for baseball? 

In baseball, laxity enhances the sport because the sport requires excessive ROM in order to excel.  The greater the ROM, the more time the arm has for acceleration and deceleration, which decreases the risk of injury (to an extent).  Not to mention, the forces, comparably speaking, are way more spread out during a throw than they are for a lineman blocking.  Excessive laxity in lineman becomes problematic because all the forces are accumulating in the same spot, play after play.  The lineman initiates contact force in his hands, and the body’s job is to transfer the force optimally to minimize damage.

Ex.

ForceàHands, wrists, elbows, shoulders, thorax, hips, knees, ankles, feet and then into the ground to create opposing forces to stop the opponent from reaching the QB.  Right?  That makes sense to me.

Each joint/section/area has a max & optimal force absorption/production.   What happens with linemen who are lax, the shoulders end up taking more force because they move more.  However, just because it’s able to take more force, it doesn’t mean it’s optimal for performance or longevity.  It may even be optimal for performance even, however, current statistics suggest that though it may be optimal for performance, it’s not optimal for shoulder health/career longevity.

What can we do to prevent or treat this issue with lineman? 

To understand and apply the answer, we must understand the variables.  The trauma involved with blocking occurs mostly to the posterior aspect of the shoulder.

Now, what happens to the shoulder during blocking is the posterior labrum and capsule become stressed from continual & excessive stretching.  And because they’re able to stretch more, it makes for more direct force on a smaller surface area.

As you can see, there’s more acute pressure occurring in the lax shoulder.  Over time, this can become problematic for a few reasons:

1. Chronic loading will accumulate over time.
2. As you play more, you will develop more awareness and efficiency, thus improving ability to generate more force.
3. As you play more, it’s assumed that the level of competition will also develop and produce more force that you will have to absorb.

As you can see, if there’s any room to give, at some point, something will give.

Majority of the time with lax shoulders, there’s an abundance of excessive stretching or subluxation that occurs.  Tears are usually a result of continual subluxations, which can lead to a dislocation.

Other Laxity Related Issues

When the shoulder moves excessively, though there may not be a tear, there is still trauma that occurs to the surrounding structures.   It’s not unusual for the humeral head to “bump” into surrounding muscles.  Doing this once or twice usually isn’t a big deal, the body is pretty resilient, doing this routinely, say, every day at practice or even once/week during games, or a few times a year over the course of a career can take a toll on the muscle.

This can cause the muscle to become dysfunctional or even cause a tear; particularly in muscles of the rotator cuff: supraspinatus, infraspinatus & teres minor.  Their responsibility is to stabilize the shoulder through various ranges of motion.  Any dysfunction in these muscles can compromise the structural integrity of the joint and inevitably lead to other detrimental issues.

Another thing the humeral head can disrupt during excessive ROM is nerve innervation.  As we know, nerves are pretty sensitive.  Any kind of tampering can lead to permanent damage.  Posterior subluxation can disrupt function of the suprascapular nerve, which will hinder the function of supraspinatus and infraspinatus.

And lastly, the shoulder can bump into other bones, which can lead to factures on the humeral head or the scapula.

How do we attempt prevent or fix these problems?

So if the problem is the humeral head posterior subluxation, then we need to strengthen muscles that aid in the preventing that movement; particularly muscles that aid in protraction & pushing: pec major/minor & serratus anterior.  However, it is paramount to understand what type of loading must be prepared for sport engagement.

Majority of forces linemen deal with are related to absorption (eccentric) and overcoming (isometric).  So, to train protractors to be able to handle eccentric forces and improve their ability to reverse the force would be beneficial.

Protraction Enhancing Exercises for Absorption:

Eccentric (Negative) Bench variations

Eccentric (Negative) Serratus Punch variations

Pushup Depth Jumps (Jumping down)

http://youtu.be/L38ajZquUw0

Receiving Chest Pass

Protraction Enhancing Exercises for Starting Strength:

Isometric (Static) Bench variations

Isometric (Static) Serratus Punch variations

Pushup Landings (Stick Landing in various positions)

Receiving Chest Pass and sticking the position

Protraction Enhancing Exercises for Reversal Strength:

Dynamic (Ballistic or Reactive) Bench variations

Dynamic Stabilizations Serratus Punch variations

Reactive Pushup Jump (Clap pushups or Depth Jumps)

http://youtu.be/50W-fSEUPgQ

http://youtu.be/B7HkbgcCK0g

http://youtu.be/aw_bF428Ehk

http://youtu.be/5E3RJkBl-h0

Receiving Chest Pass and Throwing it

Summing Up:

Essentially, if you’re a prototypical lineman (ectomorph), chances are that you’re going to be battling the drawbacks of laxity throughout your career.  Make sure you keep your pecs and serratus strong and stable to combat this issue.  I hope this was able to shed some light on your situation.

Dr. Quinn Henoch shows you the cause and how to fix the dreaded ‘butt wink’ to help you perform better and stay healthier.

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1. Football First

There is one thing that no football player can be great without…PRACTICE! You can run the fastest 40, do the most bench reps, have the biggest power clean or do anything else great but if you aren’t mastering your craft in films, meetings and practice then you won’t be great. I’m not a football coach, so I’m not going to go into things too much here, but coming from a strength coach, know that the most important part of your training is on the field, not the weightroom.

2. Weights Follow Speed

To steal one of my favorite axioms from Coach Charlie Francis, ‘weights follow speed’ isn’t just a reference to the chronological order of your training but also priorities and hierarchy of stimulus. Football is a dynamic game and you have to be able to move quickly, regardless of position. True max speed sprinting is the most powerful stimulus for the athlete, putting upwards of 5x the athlete’s bodyweight force into each step. A great sprinting session, one where you are at or near PR times, can and should call for a reduction in either volume or intensity of lower body weights. The body has a finite amount of stress it can recover from and more doesn’t always mean better. Sprint training with full recoveries, should be part of all players programs and of course it will vary by position, but understand the speed AND strength gains it will yield and the high priority it should have in your training.

3. Fix Your Movement

Mobility training is certainly a hot topic in the fitness and sports training community these days and there is a reason why, because it works! More than just stretching and mobilizing, a well designed movement program will improve your ability to express power efficiently, as well as keeping you healthy. Mobility/stability deficiencies are a sure fire way to inhibit your strength and speed, as well as eventually leading to injury. I know movement work is boring, I don’t like doing it, but suck it up and take 10-15 minutes per day for some breathing drills and self myofascial release and you will be moving and feeling better and your performance will reflect it.

4. Jumps and Throws for Maximum Power

Football is a power sport and if you want to succeed, you need to be able to generate great force in a small area. Jumps and throws (medicine balls, weights, shots, sandbags, etc) will force you to learn how to turn on as many motor units as possible in as short a time as possible to maximize velocity. Jumps aren’t just for the legs other, upper body jumps aka explosive pushup variations (clapping, onto boxes, off boxes, etc) will bring some more pop to your punch. Throws are a great tool to build explosive power through multiple planes of movement.