Designing a Strength/Conditioning Program

[kez]

I've seen the recent strength thread but I would also find it useful to have a discussion regarding the designing of a strength/conditioning program as well.

What rep ranges should be used? Does the focus of the rep range change as the year progresses i.e. moving from a strength building range (6-12) to and endurance building range (12+)? Is their a specific muscle group that should be trained in more of and endurance range anyway eg. abdominals/core? What about sports specfic strength exercises verses general strength exercises. How much value is there in using general strength exercises? When should you have general strength exercises such as a push up over a sports specific exercise such as a handstand hold?

I'm particularly interested in this from a beginner gymnasts perspective where the strength base is weak. I know there's a bunch of other considerations including intensity, duration, volume, frequency etc. (some of which directly relate back to rep range selection) that come into the design of a program but my main questions at this point in time relate to rep ranges from a yearly plan point of view and the most appropriate exercise selection.

Any tips would be very useful. I feel my current program is a bit hit and miss and I'd like to improve it.


Kez

 

[BlairBob]

Kez, men's or women's gymnastics? Honestly, I wouldn't and don't train any gymnasts for any real difference in either situation other than being concerned with some nuances due to gender.

Beginner gymnast?

6-12 isn't really strength building. It's strength and hypertrophy. 3-5 is pure strength and what is best for beginning or weak gymnasts.

HS

1-2 push, pull, core, and lower body exercises. 3 work sets. 3-5 reps. Do not go till failure.

A lot of this will also depend on how often they are training and how long and so forth.

A beginning gymnast who is merely doing gymnastics recreationally is barely in the gym enough or the classes aren't enough time. As well as most beginners are not strong enough they do not need to worry about hypertrophy stages, power stages, etc. They need to focus on getting strong.

Some muscle groups are predominantly slow twitch while others are or can be quick twitch. Sort of depends on what that muscle is.

Some stages of the year have more of a focus on strength, power, post-season, etc. However, beginning gymnasts barely need to focus on power or endurance if they are weak to begin with.

It may be useful in regards to yourself to define where you are at strength development wise.

Nothing is more important to a gymnast than a HS. Nothing. A basic wall HS is a requirement for all basic gymnasts. 1m on the wall is merely a start. Some basic static positions are not more important than the ability to move the body through a ROM. HS, hollow, arch, demi-plie, releve, lunge, planche, L and straddle-L should never be de-emphasized.

Endurance? Gymnastics routines are 80-90 percent anaerobic. A vault is purely the phosphate energy system. Gymnasts will build plenty of endurance through adaptation to 2-4 hour workouts over time. There is some thing to be said about working higher rep phases for true beginners so they can become more motor memory efficient.

Sports specific strength exercises can get really silly sometimes. There is something to be said about other exercises like barbell work, kb swings (it's getting popular in some gyms with higher level athletes) and DB work. Some machines and bodybuilding exercises may be necessary for prehab and rehab. For the most part, they're not necessary especially given time constraints.

Basically push and pull in all 3 planes ( inverted, horizontal, vertical ), work stabilization of core (plank, hollow, arch holds) besides necessary flexion and extension ( leg lifts, reverse leg leg lifts ). Throw in some rotational/oblique work (lying and hanging leg wipers, russian twists or pommel circles).

Tumbling and vaulting cover most plyometric and lower body power training. Sled pulls, plyo box mat/box jumps work well as well.

 

[ryantroop]

Why wouldnt you go till failure? Get all them muscle fibers firing!

 

[kez]

Blairbob - Thankyou that's very helpful.

I've been using a rep range of 8-10 for the most part instead of the 3-5 range because I listened to a bloke talk about strength building for gymnasts and he said that pre-pubescent kids should be trained in the 8-10 rep range basically because they are still growing, and training at the lower rep ranges puts too much force/resistance on the bone sheath.

I'll ask the question too. Why not too failure? Doesn't this recruit more neuron's and hence increased muscle activation. Don't we want to recruit them to almost 100% to increase strength?

What about some stomach and back exercises that are used for the prime body positions? Shouldn't we train these at higher rep ranges say 12-15/static holds because the gymnasts need to have some endurance in these positions?

I've currently got rec. kids in the gym for an hour. I would have to assume that although we do some strength type activities at the end of the day they're not going to get any stronger on that alone?

However my comp. kids (only level 1-3) are in the gym for 3 hours a week. Can you expect at least some strength gains on this level of training? I don't feel that this year there was much increase in strength from most of the kids. I would have to say this may be due partly to my actual program not being as effective as it could be (hence a new program for next year) and also attendance/effort put in by some of the kids. Trying to balance skill work & strength work is a fine art as I guess everyone knows.

Cheers,

 

[BlairBob]

Try training to failure 3-5x a week. It's an awesome way to develop burn out. It can also fry your CNS. Overtrain too much and you will either need to take an extended recovery or risk injury.

Your second set won't be as good as your first set if you train to failure.

Training at lower reps is too much force? How about the force calculations for tumbling and vaulting? There is wisdom to this but let's not forget how much force can be put on the body when doing some skills.

Then you get into the modicum of let's not barbell train because it's more dangerous than allowing sharp fast turns on surfaces that catch or forces that collide with your body (pee-wee football).

When it comes to recruiting motor units we are either recruiting the most amount of motor units at one time either slowly or quickly. Slow, for strength, quickly, for power (plyometric, stretch-contract). For strength, we need to recruit as many motor units as possible but since it does not need to be done quickly, there isn't really a time limit. However in something like a sprint or punch on floor, we need to recruit as many motor units as possible in as quick as possible.

You simply do not recruit that many motor units when an exercise's intensity is low to medium as compared to when it's high or near maximal. Doing many reps is training simply the endurance. There is some crossover from training high reps as it will train the ability to be better at medium intensities but again not high intensities.

A simple L-sit could be very intense for one gymnast where as a back lever or front lever would be very intense for them or up the ante and we start talking about Cross, Maltese, Azarian, Manna, etc.

Eccentrics/Negatives recruit a lot of motor units as they are typically done slowly. They also are harder to recover from because of how much damage they inflict.

With rec kids, one could possibly train to failure as they are not going to be in the gym till next week if they go 1x a week. They more than likely would have enough time to recover if they went 2x a week and had class M/W or Tu/Th or W/Sa.

3h/w? That is probably 2x1.5 or 3x1.

The only way to build maximal strength is to train for it. You can build some at lower intensities but not to the point of real strength/power. You're not getting the most bang for your buck.

Getting strong makes doing less intense exercises so much easier because their intensity is lower, so you will be able to do more of them to a certain degree. You're probably not going to start doing 50 or 100 of them. You will be limited by strength-endurance to a degree possibly.

However, with training at higher intensities you have to adjust how much volume and you'll typically need to rest between exercises/routines/muscles so they can have enough time to recover and be able to repeat such an action.

However, it can be helpful to train at lower intensities at beginning stages to develop better adaptation and muscle memory to such drills. Over time this will allow the body to start recruiting more motor units to accomplish said task which will make it easier.

To note, with my beginners, because they are not very efficient at movements, it can be better for them to work more repetitions. Typically with beginners, working negatives is hopeless so it's better to stict with static holds. I will have a hard time and more headaches getting them to work at higher intensities because they are not able to deal with the discomfort as well as a more experienced or stronger/powerful gymnast.

I tend to work my beginning to intermediate gymnasts in the 5-10 rep range. It's also a matter of good form. They are much more interested in being attentive to form in lower repetition ranges than in higher repetition ranges. Do I want 5 perfect reps or 10 crappy reps?

Will yelling and adding more repetitions increase their ability to do them correctly? (Only if it's a matter of them being lazy and not beyond their scope of strength or power).

As well, you can't really work in the power phases of intensity if you do not have some strength to begin with. How can I expect a gymnast to hop in a pushup hold if they cannot hold it correctly in the first place?

Rec kids coming 1x a week will get stronger to a certain degree. It's just really slow strength development that will flatline at some point in time. At the rec levels, we're looking at more innate genetics or simply the most active kids (because they're active every day besides the day they come into gym playing on bars and tumbling at home and everywhere).

At the lower developmental levels, it seems to be really hard to motivate kids sometimes. I can watch our L1-4 and just shake my head sometimes. Their coach/es can try really hard but some of these kids are just "soft". As my dad likes to say, " some people are born with 30 feet of gut and some have 12". Some might eventually do compulsory if they stick around that long or can past multiple obstacles. Who knows.

This post was way longer than I wanted it to be.

 

[Geoffrey Taucer]

This post was way longer than I wanted it to be.

It was an excellent and very informative post, though. Thanks!

What specific exercises would you use for precompetetive gymnasts? Level 4 gymnasts? Level 6 gymnasts? Optional gymnasts?

EDIT: Another question: if the goal is 3-5 reps for strength movements, what's the goal for static strength holds?

 

[ryantroop]

I wouldnt do till failure more than 2 times a week, if even that for younger kids.

You are correct that psychologically it's insanely intense.

However, if you are only getting your kids 1 day a week, that sort of work out may be worth while.. they will feel "sore" all week, and feel like they are getting a good work out from the experience.

Maybe it's just a matter of reading the kids to see if it's something that will benefit them, and their interest in the sport... as far as I was concerned, the workout I got from gymnastics was way more intense than anything else Ive done, and I loved it for that. I suppose I try to instill that same feeling my my athletes...

 

[BlairBob]

Ever since Coach Sommer's initial article on the planche and lever, I've been using 60s of volume for static holds. That isn't a 60s hold. Worksets are 50% max hold. 15-20s for max hold before moving on to a more difficult hold.

I'm not sure a mere 60s of wall HS is enough. In my 90m classes, we typically will work 5 wall HS. For my developmental levels, I have been telling them to count to 100 which shouldn't be challenging for some boys who can hold a 3m wall HS (and since they are L4 boys, their HS still look typical L4 boys).

1 day a week? Go all out. 7 days is more than enough to recover and parents love when their kiddies go home and want to eat and go to bed.

A lot of what I think is in this and Coach Sommer's GymnasticBodies program.

http://www.usa-gymnastics.org/home/publications/technique/2006/8/pdf/GetFit.pdf

For my developmental and rec kids, it's all about developing the grip strength to hang and support. They work a lot of planche leans on a floor bar trying to get their chest over their wrists besides L-sits, straddle-L, hanging L's and supports besides a lot of skin the cats.