‘Tis the season once again. The pre-season that is!

Professional sports leagues across the globe look at youth talent in many different ways. Sometimes development programs appear very sophisticated and detailed, while in other cases they seem a lot simpler. At rugby and soccer clubs around the world, kids start in under-7, under-9, or under-11 junior teams and either rise through the ranks in the academy system or get snapped up at increasingly young ages by larger clubs offering the promise of a professional career.

In these sports, physical qualities are important. But in successful countries they’re always secondary to the technical and tactical adeptness youth coaches and scouts look for. They’re typically assessing young talent in the most real-world scenario in sports: the game itself.

So, to a large degree, what they’re seeing is what they’re getting, with technical, tactical, physical, and psychological elements being simultaneously expressed through skills on the pitch as players on both teams try to stick to their coaches’ game plans while dealing with the inevitable randomness and chaos of the game as it arises in a dynamic, ever-evolving system.

This is the third installment in a three-part series covering High School Football Off-Season training. 

In the 1999 hit film, “Any Given Sunday,” Al Pacino’s character gives a classic pre-game motivational talk about how success is achieved “inch by inch.”

“When we add up all those inches, we know that’s gonna make the [bleeping] difference between winning and losing.”

Extolling the virtues of personal sacrifice, determination, commitment, teamwork and extra effort, it’s a stirring speech, for sure. It makes for great theater, but as you reflect on the 2016 season and start thinking about the 2017 campaign, is this notion of “inch by inch” relevant to your athletes?

Football season is officially upon us and if you're a football coach there’s really only one night that matters to you: Friday.

Here's how to maximize your training leading up to Kick Off.

School is back in session and we are back on the field for football season!  Our athletes are back in our weight rooms and as coaches we believe our athletes could be in better shape and should have worked out more during the summer.  So what do we do? We make them work out hard and try to catch up for what they missed out during summer training.

Every muscle contraction in the body is the result of a molecule called adenosine triphosphate (ATP). When the ATP is combined with water it splits apart and produces energy.  ATP is broken down during a muscle contraction into adenosine diphosphate (ADP). However, ATP must be replenished for work to continue so another chemical reaction adds phosphate back to ADP to make ATP.

“Let’s just get 1% better today!” Coach Harbaugh would enthusiastically exclaim as our team lined up before practice.

We would line up 8 columns, each with 10 or so guys in a column. Coach Harbaugh used to make sure that the columns were straight lines, and that we looked pro right from the start. “It’s the little things gentlemen. I can tell if a team is disciplined by how straight their warmup lines are.”

We all know things like deadlifts and Olympic lifts are great general posterior chain builders, so I’m going to leave those movements for now in favor of some more over-arching philosophy. 

Game Day! The best day of the week for athletes around the world. You're excited, anxious and ready to hit the field and put it all on the line for your team.

Regardless of the sport, the body and mind are taxed when put under the stressors of competition and game day.

You might be a triathlete, football player or golfer - when it comes to recovery, our bodies operate the same: the body needs rest or a return to homeostasis, fuel (food) and hydration, namely electrolyte replacement.