Q: What is the minimum amount of strength I need before I can do plyometric drills? I have heard I should be able to squat at least 1.5 times my bodyweight before using plyometrics, is this true?
Many people ask this question and the entire topic is cause for a lot of confusion. Many coaches say that athletes should be able to squat at least 1.5 times their bodyweight before doing plyometric training. This is both true and false. Originally plyometrics were brought from the east and consisted of only 2 exercises, "depth" jumps and "shock" jumps - at the time they were known as "shock" training methods. Remember that a depth jump consists of stepping off of an elevated bench or object and upon hitting the ground immediately jumping back up. A shock jump consists of stepping off of a very high object and simply landing and absorbing the impact. Both of these exercises were also originally used from box heights of around 3 feet or more. It is true that for intense exercises like these an athlete needs to have superior strength levels which will enable them to absorb the high forces without injury. In general, squatting 1.5 bodyweight would be a minimal number for these types of high intensity exercises, especially when they're done off of high boxes.
The problem is, after plyometrics were brought to the USA from the Soviet Union and given their now common name, coaches began to lump all types of hopping, jumping, skipping, and bounding drills in with them. In the process, many of the general strength recommendations such as being able to squat 1.5 x bodyweight given for "real" plyometrics ie, depth jumps and shock jumps, were also carried over to include all plyometric drills. Although having good strength levels is definitely a positive thing it is not necessary to squat 1.5 x your bodyweight to partake in light to moderate plyometric drills. These include just about all kinds of jumps, hops and bounds, in fact, pretty much everything except for high depth jumps and shock jumps. If you think about it, life and play are plyometric activities! Next time you go by a playground have a look at the kids jumping around off and on playground equipment and such. They are putting a lot of stress on their bodies and surely not able to squat 1.5 x bodyweight yet how often do they get injured? Not very often!
The bottom line is that improving your strength will allow you to get more out of the plyometric activities that you do and will also allow you to do more intense variations of them.
Q: I am a wrestler who needs to keep my bodyweight down while being as strong as possible. What are your recommended loading and frequency parameters for increased strnegth and power without any mass gains?
Low (1-3) reps, multiple (5-15) sets per workout using heavy weights, or moderate weights exploding through the concentric phase as fast as possible. Minimize the eccentric or negative emphasis and terminate each set well short of failure. Most importantly though you need to watch your diet and make sure you don't consume an excess amount of calories. No matter how you train it's difficult to gain muscle mass if you don't eat excess calories and it's easy to gain muscle weight if you eat enough.
Here's a sample plan that would probably fit in well with what you want to accomplish.
Monday: Quad-dominant training (squat and squat assistance)
Tuesday: Upper body push-training (bench press and bench press assistance)
Wednesday: OFF
Thursday: Hip-dominant training (deadlift and deadlift assistance)
Friday: OFF
Saturday: Upper body pull-training (bench press positioning/stability)
Sunday: OFF
Monday: Quad Dominant Training
A) Powerlifting squat
Load: 90-95%
Reps: 3
Sets: 10
Rest between sets: 180 seconds
B) Speed-squat (using a slightly narrower foot stance than your competition stance)
Load: 45-55%
Reps 2
Sets: 5
Tuesday: Upper Body Push Training
A) Bench press
Load: 90-95%
Reps: 3
Sets: 10
Rest between sets: 180 seconds
B) Close-grip decline bench press
Load: 85-90%
Reps: 5
Sets: 5
Rest between sets: 120 seconds
Thursday: Hip Dominant Training
A) Deadlift
Load: 90-95%
Reps: 3
Sets: 10
Rest between sets: 180 seconds
B) Power clean from blocks
Load: 65-75%
Reps: 3
Sets: 5
Rest between sets: 180 seconds
Saturday: Upper Body Pull Training
A) Barbell rowing
Load: 90-95%
Reps: 3
Sets: 10
Rest between sets: 180 seconds
C) Lat pulldown
Load: 85-90%
Reps: 5
Sets: 5
Rest between sets: 120 seconds
Q: Can you explain more about neural fatigue? How is it that my nervous system requires more recovery then my muscular system and how can I maximally stimulate my muscles without fatiguing the nervous system?
Think of your nervous system as a rechargeable battery. Whenever you plug a battery into something that uses up a lot of energy it drains the battery so you eventually gotta spend some time recharging it. Generally whenever you use something that requires batteries the battery will give out long before the device itself gives out. Your body is the same way. The harder you train the more you drain your battery and even though your body can keep going and going and going like the energizer bunny the proficiency at which it goes is limited by your battery.
Imagine going for 3 whole days without any sleep. Even if you were completely inactive during those 3 days and hadn't used your muscles at all, you'd still most likely be very weak and tired because you'd drained too much from your battery (nervous system) without recharging it. With training you can increase how much juice your battery is able to put out but its more difficult to improve how quickly it recovers. It's kind've like sleep. No matter how much we may try to do without, it always catches up with us! When you're a novice athlete you can go out all the time for longer without many ill effects because you're really not capable of draining your system very much in a short period of time. However, the more advanced you become the more important it is to adhere to proper recovery - simply because you're now capable of draining your system more but .
The average teenager is probably suprised when they hear pro athletes complaining about needing more recovery time but realize that many NBA players are capable of putting so much stress on their bodies that they can completely trash a brand new pair of shoes each game and its no wonder they complain about not feeling refreshed when they have to play every other day.
One thing you can do is cycle your training with periods of high and low volume and intensity. It can be as simple as this. I'll use a weightlifting example but you can do this for any kind've strength, power, speed, or jump training. Built up volume and intensity for a couple of weeks and then unload to let the body recover. In this example you'd pick a movement and train it using 2 sessions per week the first 3 weeks and one session the 4th week.
Week 1- 4 x 5 at 80%
Week 2- 5 x 5 at 85%
Week 3- 6 x 3 at 88%
Week 4- 3 x 3 at 90%
In this example the real gains wouldn't be apparent until the 4th week when the body is allowed to unload and recover from the previous weeks fatigue.
You could also increase the duration of rest between training sessions periodically. Say you train once every 3 days. After 4 consecutive workouts You might insert a couple of extra rest days between the next 2 workouts and you'll find this will allow continued progress without stagnation.
-Kelly