At Force Fitness we work to develop all aspects of athleticism with the hundreds of athletes we see each week. Speed, strength, power, reaction, lateral movement, balance, and even injury prevention all go into this equation to create better, more resilient athletes.

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.

As the strength coach for Ponderosa High School in Parker, CO, I was challenged in the spring by our head football coach to help him achieve his summer goals for the team. They were:

Almost every sport requires athletes to move unilaterally – emphasizing one leg, arm, or side of the body more than the other. Most running, jumping (takeoff and landing), and throwing is unilateral. It’s rare for any athlete to generate motion bilaterally using both arms, legs, and sides of their body equally. And when they do, it’s not for very long and usually precedes a transition back to unilateral movement.

And yet in the gym, there can be a temptation to focus most - if not all - of the training we program for our athletes on bilateral exercises.

Bodybuilding training principles can be a valuable asset to a strength and conditioning coach. Often, bodybuilding programming can receive a bad rap. It is generally thought to involve more isolated (non-compound) exercise and lack sport-specificity.

The evolution of strength training over the years can be seen by what the average coach does, but are we heading in the right direction? With so many variables and so many leading authorities using different approaches, how do we make the right choices for our athletes - especially when it comes to leg training?

Science is important, but many coaches have made surprising decisions to use the research differently based on their experience. In this article, both the science and logical, empirical experience are outlined in a straightforward way. It doesn’t matter if you are a new coach at small college or an elite coach at a national training center, a lot of brilliant minds are sharing great points on training.

As a coach, it’s easy to be comfortable with sets, reps, work-to-rest ratios, and 1RM percentages. These are all nice, tidy numbers that are easy to keep track of. They’re a necessary requirement for designing, executing, and monitoring programs.

Like any training modality, the two paths of training and teaching are necessary to fully exploit the benefits of plyometrics. With so many different exercises and development levels to work with, sometimes plyometric training is dumbed down to make this easier to administer, which is boring the advanced athletes. On the other hand, workouts that are too advanced can injure athletes and discourage them from doing plyometrics in the long run. 

I have revised what I do from learning from other coaches, but sometimes you have to look at your program and simply judge what can be done better.

Here are six lessons I have learned the hard way, and some I have learned from just knowing which coaches provide the best advice.

But First...Before You Start Adding Plyometrics...

As a coach, you probably spend an awful lot of time and effort tinkering with the details of each workout. Whether it’s tweaking sets and reps, figuring out optimal lift percentages, or messing with rest periods, there are an almost infinite number of ways to alter, and hopefully improve, the quality and impact of each session.

“Anything works” when you are dealing with novice athletes.

You can do 5-3-1, Starting Strength, 1x20, Triphasic, Husker Power, APRE, and the list goes on. There are also plenty of vertical jump programs and 40-yard dash workouts that will deliver good results for those who haven’t done much serious training.