Do fitness tests reflect speed on the ground
Recently I was asked whether the 20m test generally used as a speed test is reflected on the ground. To be honest most times yes. Some players just read it better so in games dont look as slow as their tests suggest. Watching Pearce from Port Adelaide run at a draft camp a few years ago one could see he would explode later. The 20m test obviously doesnt measure max speed and/or many other variables. But in reality if one strips the science away from it I have always found that players who test quick generally look quick on the ground. Agility as researched by Young and Shepherd is a complex mix of speed, acceleration, change of direction abilities and many other attributes, with the ability to see what is happening and process it a crtiical factor. So players such as Harvey from St Kilda may have just reasonable tests results ( don’t know his speed) but due to decision making and change of direction abilities can get on their bike and scoot away from supposedly quicker players. Players like Dustin Fletcher at Essendon tested very quick and with his tennis background and football ability has been the package deal. Of course in his prime a player like Saverio Rocca at Collingwood was the best over 5 metres, a reflection of his ability to power clean nearly 150 kgs and throw a discus 60m plus. Wanganeen was simply the quickest I have measured over 10m ( 1.54) and I saw him run 11.1 sec for 100m at Aberfeldies one day without blocks and untrained. Again the package deal and like Fletcher these two were fast twitch animals with not so good aerobic qualities. In fact that day he ran 11.1 and Michael Long ran 11.2 and I think Lachlan Ross 11.3 and the next one home was a guy called Mick Symons who ran 11.6 ( 2,75 for 20m in gates). So yes test in a straight line and then test change of direction but as Warren Young and Jeremy Shepherd found in their research on reactive agility , getting away from players requires quite a lot of variables to come together. Then put it together at game speed in enclosed areas. And get strong in the gym and powerful with plyos in both legs. Some quick players can run one or two repetitions but after a few repeat speed efforts “slow” guys run past them. This is why rotations have had a big effect in footy allowing the fast guys to come on and smash it and why limiting rotations coupled with the new rules from 2006 will even more bias aerobic “slower” players and possibly stunt the explosive bursts from “fast” guys as the game goes on and even maybe limit their careers.
Preston Athletics Club
I recently joined up the club again. Jeff Hawkins is the coach there and has done a great job in getting some really good juniors up and running. Very organized and motivational coach. It is amazing how many kids these unpaid coaches help. My father was a very successful coach at the club just like Gus Puopolo is at Ringwood. They produce champions but help all. And all these guys do it for nothing. And they all do a great job and in fact right up to the standard if not better than many professional strength and conditioning people around the place. Just no money in Athletics and thus little kudos unless one produces an Olympic Medallist. There is a nice synthetic track at the lake now and recently I saw Adam Basil training there so must be a good track. Unfortunately there is no fence so on nice days it can be a bit crowded with bikes and festivals.
Tennis Development in OZ
I have been involved with some juniors in tennis since the late 80’s. Obviously in Australia we have fallen back since many countries have jumped on the tennis bandwagon since money came into the sport. One issue that keeps coming up is the lack of comprehensive conditioning these kids in OZ get and the one sided development they get from tennis coaching. They often are so weak and sloppy. Fit yes but no conditioning. Often a bit of speed ladder work and a few kms and the odd push up is added. Often some kids miss the multilateral devleopment needs required for fitness because they specialize early. Some should be playing football and netball and swimming whilst developing their tennis skills. The double whammy that occurs is that coaching does not address specific fitness devleopment needs but moreso that it takes a long time to get to elite status unless one is a real superstar or child prodigy. So parents pouring money into kids at 12 might have to wait till they reach 23 before they crack the top 800 in the world. Rankings for men average 25 at any one time and 24 for females at others. There is a bit of change from year to year but I found that on average 22 year old females break into the top 100 each year and 27 year old girls fall out. Is that the crucial window? Can people wait that long and does tennis have systems to keep players bubbling till they are 21. Again I am not talking about superstars here. They play early and retire late. They are the exception. Rather I am referring to players like Molik who pushed their way into the top at the ages described. All just theories and interesting but food for thought. I have added some stats in this word doc. below and again they are there to show trends and may have small errors because I am not a statistician.
The “Athletic Position” the Squat and Volleyball
Young Volleyball Players should learn the basics of proper movement ASAP. So simply learning how to do a bodyweight squat and understanding what good posture is seems simple but is often overlooked. The obvious aim is to land or explode from what is called the “Athletic Position”. Knees in line with feet and head up/shoulder back and butt out and soft resilient landings. So lots and lots of repetitions of proper basic bodyweight squats and proper coaching and feedback is needed.
Females in particular collapse inwards and so technique and strength has to be devleoped hand in hand. Thus if one travels OZ and screens lots of good female volleyballers for example and tells them to lunge and squat and side lunge and so on , one sees the good, the bad and the indifferent. Knees collapsing inwards, bodyweights teetering on the balls of their feet and toes or total collapses of the upper body in a lunge, weak backs etc. So a critical step is first to master the basics of movement and then progress to correct landing techniques.
And even in good players a step backwards is often needed. No use trying to get 16 year old girls to do power cleans with weak backs and no core and collapsing knees. Often though players have weaknesses or range of motion problems that need addressing to allow proper techniques.
Teach kids to squat, lunge, side lunge, stepups and so on and coach them. Get them to balance on one leg and hit good postures and do basic core work. Basic stuff that one sees every day but is not covered in many young athletes. No rocket science here. Then check their landing on one and two legs and see what happens. At the end all movements have to be practiced and learnt at the same speeds as in a game but no use constructing a building without the foundations.
So many players can play Ok and look Okish on court but when analyzed closely that 5 to 10% is missing. We see this a lot in young tennis players in OZ. Great players and their parents have spent their mortgage on tennis lessons but these kids often have poor movement skills or strength and ROM deficits and these issues have hurt the development of the sport of tennis in my opinion.
A simple article with a good shot of bodyweight squats is on this site.
http://www.senecapt.com/_articles/ACL_Prevention.htm
Research by Dr. Hewitt in preventative research for ACL injuries in female basketball athletes and other sports is very interesting. He has promoted the development of a how to jump and land protocol . This research and plyometric based program produced a dramatic reduction in ACL injuries. But before these jump and landing programs are done, in my opinion basic skills have to be learnt and core and strength needs must be addressed.
- Certainly in his most recent research ( 2007) where specific “jump” training was used he alludes to the need to do more specific training on high risk players. Thus drawing from this type of research on ACL’s and looking at general development my opinion is that the basic movement skills must be mastered in many “at risk” players or “poorly conditioned players” before plyometrics and advanced power methods are used a lot.
So keep it simple and make sure basic skills are taught ASAP.Differential neuromuscular training effects on ACL injury risk factors in”high-risk” versus “low-risk” athletes.
Green Gully Soccer
I have been very lucky to work at Green Gully since August 2006 under Ian Dobson who is a great coach and calls a spade a spade. It is a very professional club and gets criticized by many because it is in fact that, professional. It sent all its players to the AIS for a camp in February to expose the boys to an elite environment. Great stuff. This state league is a very tough competition with lots of very good players. And the more boys coming through because of the soccer boom means it becomes even tougher day by day as they mature. Given there are not many A League Clubs and they have small lists and notwithstanding some good players are overseas there are still heaps of quality ( AFL standard) soccer players floating around in this league given the large pool of soccer players in OZ have to play somewhere. Hopefully in time the standard of facilities improves because some are ok ( Bob Jane / Whittlesea and GGSC) but overall it is quite pathetic given the standing of soccer in OZ. We played at one ground and changed in small construction style rooms with one dirty plugged up toilet! A few clubs like Green Gully service the players very well , but in general the poor facilities and the lack of medical services and general backup has simply shocked me given the standard of players involved. The soccer and coaching and competition is great but the infrastructure is often archaic. The TAC system needs to examined closely also by Soccer because the pathways are all over the place for young players and the AFL know this in my opinion and thus are probably banking on this weakness in the soccer development pathways. If I said anything else I would be lying. The sport is booming and I love it. Now is the time to make it attractive to kids and parents by getting some of these things right. I saw the transtion from the Windy Hill / Moorabin days and only the “pie munchers” and “head butters” would want to go back to those days. I think! It would of course be tough to cut the ethnic roots of some of these clubs because that is why they exist but this second tier needs to head in a non ethnic and business based direction otherwise in my opinion it wont have broad community appeal at the senior level as distinct from the large numbers playing junior soccer. Hope it does because I am hooked now to the game.
David Wheadon
Great to see David Wheadon being used at Geelong this year. David was pivotal at Essendon 1993 and in the development of players at EFC after that and taught me heaps about sport and football and is a great guy. He was very innovative and not a “footy head” and certainly sometimes these qulaities or traits are not the best ones to have in AFL and for that matter a lot of team sports. Forward thinking and not just a week to week man. David is more a student of elite sport than just football in some ways. He is a great teacher of decision making and I am sure he has imparted his knowhow to the players at GFC. They do seem very direct and making good decisions which also obviously comes with experience. Great to see him doing well in a big club and one getting results and also in his hometown.
How Michael Bertolacci lost 15 kilos in 4 months
Michael Bertolacci ( my son) has a new found hobby which is running with his running partner Bailey our dog. They go off at 9pm most nights for a 6 to 10km run. Michael has not done much sport and has concentrated on more cerebral pursuits but whilst in Sydney working for Google he started running at nights around Sydney University. In the space of 3 months he lost nearly 15 kilos. He started with about 2km of jog walk and by the end of his 3 month stay in Sydney had upped that to 6km. Given the abundance of food at Google he had to discipline himself and since then doesnt eat “crap” much and also keeps a mental ledger to use his words of how much he has eaten. He now has progressed to 10km runs and Bailey doesnt know where it will all end. Bailey is a fast twitch athlete/dog who is 50kgs and is more suited to intermittent pursuits such as chasing cats at high speed. So hopefully soon Michael will add Interval training and Speed Work to his sessions for Baileys sake. But back to Michael and certainly it is a good example of very simple lifestyle and exercise modifications that have worked for him. And he has worked it out all on his own which really indicates that all this stuff is not rocket science but simply a lifestyle decision and hard work.
AFL and Hamstring Rehabilitation
Hamstring Rehabilitation in the AFL
Given my association in the AFL and also track and field I have learnt a lot about hamstring injury prevention and rehabilitation. I was also lucky enough to coach sprinters who put huge stress on their hamstrings. Now I am involved with soccer where the rate of hamstring injury is lower.
At Geelong Football Club in particular I had a very low rate of injury from 1998 to 2006 and kept games lost at less than half the rate of the average in the AFL which is approximately 20/22 games lost per year.
In the early 90’s I often consulted the AIS and Craig Purdam and Peter Stanton on this topic. Especially because at Essendon we had Dean Wallis who had chronic injuries. The only solution in the end with Dean was lots of fast running and eccentric weight training. This was 1990 and looking back we should have also done more specific core stability work. An athlete like Dean who is explosive needed fast technically efficient running, eccentric weight training and core stability work.
Luck or management with low soft tissue rates? Definitely management with a process in place. I was employed in 1998 ( Gary Ayres) to assist the club in injury management more than anything. And what was the mainstay of that process? Simply the most important variable is running fast in pre-season as soon as possible whether in skills or running to achieve specific adaptations without breaking people down. Alan McConnell ( now AIS) had already organised indoor and outdoor small games in the PXMAS block and these games played at 100% intensity coupled with specific running and conditioning meant that there were very few soft tissue injuries in 98/99.
But after addressing sports specific running needs I made sure many variables were covered. Core stability and core strength. Running mechanics and overstriding. Drill education. Massage. Specific muscular imbalances. Specific hamstring muscle weaknesses. From concentric to eccentric to functional training. Totally individualized approach to preparation in strength work. Lack of gluteal firing. Poor range of motion. Hip imbalances. Plyometrics. Monitoring fatigue and periodization of training. Having sufficient aerobic and anaerobic fitness to not allow fatigue. The list goes on.
Hugh Seward at the 2006 AFL conference on hamstrings said that the AFL was undertaking research to pinpoint solutions to hamstring injuries. A great initiative but he made it sound as if there was little known about the area. Unfortunately there will never be a cookbook for all this. But the research is out there and this is a multifactorial issue that needs to be addressed for each individual.
The cure is hard intelligent work. Again in the animal kingdom and humans simply running fast and adapting to that stress is the best solution. And even in rehabilitation progressively running faster and respecting the laws of nature and healing is a very effective tool.
But in many rehabilitations individuals must be assessed from tip to toe to achieve the the required result. The biggest problem I see time and time again is trying to beat nature. Simply takes tissue “X” days to heal and strengthen ( IE approx 3 weeks plus for basic healing and up to 8 for full strength). Simply takes “X” time to adapt to high intensity exercise ( over a week for a session and 6/8 weeks for a programme). So one has to always respect these laws and suffer the consequences if one doesn’t.
One thing that is confusing for many is the simplistic nature of how researchers and strength and conditioning experts sometimes polarize injury prevention and rehabilitation methods with almost religious fervour. Often there is a marketing spin to all this.
Some athletes have to spend time on totally non – functional unilateral concentric exercises to reverse imbalances and then transfer this to eccentric and then running specific needs. A long process. Some need to do some inner core work and slow drill work for weeks and then move to fast running. Others as I have explained simply have to run fast. And some lucky , lazy people seem to rest for 8 weeks, run fast once, get sore as hell then adapt in 2 weeks and play. The knowledge is out there now. It is all over the place. Soft tissue injuries will occur.
Do some hard smart investigative work and find out what your athlete needs and then be specific and evidence based and create an individualized solution.
Aquatic plyometric training increases vertical jump in female volleyball players
This is already an old article but reviewing some articles on volleyball S&C should be of interest. In the 2005 Med Sci Sports Exerc 2005 OCT journal an article “Aquatic plyometric training increases vertical jump in female volleyball players” was presented and the medline abstract is below. One possible flaw is the age of the players and also the control group that only did stretching. But nevertheless for this age group this method could provide a double whammy by assisting recovery and enhancing general strength and power levels and not injuring the players given there were no injuries in the study and little soreness. This was a progressive programme, consisting of two 45-minute sessions in a swimming pool twice a week. Exercises included power skips, spike approaches, single- and double-leg bounding, continuous jumps for height, squat jumps with blocking form and depth jumps. Thus coaches could mix and match a complete conditioning session by using these results and mixing in some varied volleyball relevant routines. An 11% increase in Vertical Jump in 6 weeks at this age is most promising versus 5% for the stretching group which occured in first month being obviously an adaptation to volleyball training. One of the reasons I reviewed this article was because some players at 15 have done little strength work and so an aggressive plyometric program can often cause more bad than good. Thus maybe in girls who have missed out on crucial developmental phases some work in the water whilst a strength programme is commenced may be a great bridging method.
ABSTRACT
PURPOSE: Numerous studies have reported that land-based plyometrics can improve muscular strength, joint stability, and vertical jump (VJ) in athletes; however, due to the intense nature of plyometric training, the potential for acute muscle soreness or even musculoskeletal injury exists. Performance of aquatic plyometric training (APT) could lead to similar benefits, but with reduced risks due to the buoyancy of water. Unfortunately, there is little information regarding the efficacy of APT. Thus, the purpose of this study was to examine the effects of APT on VJ and muscular strength in volleyball players. METHODS: Nineteen female volleyball players (aged 15 +/- 1 yr) were randomly assigned to perform 6 wk of APT or flexibility exercises (CON) twice weekly, both in addition to traditional preseason volleyball training. Testing of leg strength was performed at baseline and after 6 wk, and VJ was measured at baseline and after 2, 4, and 6 wk. RESULTS: Similar increases in VJ were observed in both groups after 4 wk (APT = 3.1%, CON = 4.9%; both P < 0.05); however, the APT group improved by an additional 8% (P < 0.05) from week 4 to week 6, whereas there was no further improvement in the CON group (-0.9%; P = NS). After 6 wk, both groups displayed significant improvements in concentric peak torque during knee extension and flexion at 60 and 180 degrees x s(-1) (all P < 0.05). CONCLUSIONS: The combination of APT and volleyball training resulted in larger improvements in VJ than in the CON group. Thus, given the likely reduction in muscle soreness with APT versus land-based plyometrics, APT appears to be a promising training option.
loris bertolacci 