Just Fly Performance Podcast

Today’s episode features UW-River Falls strength coach Carmen Pata

Carmen Pata, MS, CSCS*D, RSCC*D, a two-time nominee for the National Strength Coaches Association College Strength Coach of the Year, is the Director of Athletic Performance at the University of Wisconsin-River Falls.  He has written two books, as well as articles for the Wisconsin Football Coaches Association, National Strength Coaches Association, Teambuildr, and the American College of Sports Medicine.

Carmen is a practical coach who is well versed in the “art” of coaching, and particularly the art of doing so at a small University where the coach-athlete ratio is very small and the level of incoming athletes from a physical perspective demands creative solutions to preparation.

A big reason I wanted to get Carmen on the show was the nature of his articles, being a mixture of experience intelligence and practicality.  Throughout this podcast, I enjoy talking about a diverse array of training methods.  It is always enjoyable to do episodes where we see how these training means are filtered into a training package, and in this case, 4-year training at a Division 3 school.

In today’s episode, Carmen discusses the biggest things he is trying to get out of his athletes form a mental and physical perspective.  He also talks about how he instills confidence in the weightroom and how athletes need to “earn the barbell” in their first stages of the program.  Finally, we get into year-to-year training progressions and Carmen’s creative utilization of vision training for his athlete populations.

Today’s episode is brought to you by SimpliFaster, supplier of high-end athletic development tools, such as the Freelap timing system, kBox, Sprint 1080, and more.

Key Points

The biggest thing that Carmen is trying to get out of the weightroom for his athletes

How Carmen instills confidence in the weightroom

How to “earn the barbell” in Carmen’s program

Year to year strength training progressions and emphasis from Freshman to Senior years

Carmen’s utilization of vision training in between his main training sets

Carmen Pata Quotes

“The biggest thing I am trying to instill in the weight room is confidence, but if we are talking adaptation, it might sound trite, but… just get stronger”

“One of the standing rules in the gym is that you are not allowed to say the words “I can’t”

“If you can do things you never thoughts possible, that is the ultimate transfer from the gym to the playing field”

“Before an athlete even touches the barbell, they have to earn the right to do that; that’s the first part of it, the second part of it is the RKC standard of 100 kettlebell snatches in 5 minutes”

“Our freshman year is an intro, solving major movement issues.  Our sophomore year is getting as strong as you can.   Junior year is introduction to the true Triphasic ideas.  Going into their senior year of training, that is going to Bryan Mann’s velocity based stuff (this isn’t a hard line on year to year work as some athletes may progress through these slower or more rapidly)”

“Most of the football players I work with want a big back squat, and good or bad, that’s what we do with them because it feeds into that program.  Our soccer team could care less about that 1RM back squat, they respond better to an escalating density style program”

“(The use of the RKC kettlebell test for freshman) for some of these freshman, it is their first idea of what work really is”

About Carmen Pata

@carmenpata

Carmen Pata, MS, CSCS*D, RSCC*D, a two-time nominee for the National Strength Coaches Association College Strength Coach of the Year, is the Director of Athletic Performance at the University of Wisconsin-River Falls. In addition to being an international selling author, Coach Pata writes articles for the Wisconsin Football Coaches Association, National Strength Coaches Association, Teambuildr,

Today’s episode features track and physical preparation coach Ross Jeffs.

Ross currently coaches at the regional training center in Rotterdam in the Netherlands.  Although having a track and field background, Ross has worked with world class athletes from a variety of sports.  He has been mentored by Jonas Dodoo within the Speedworks coaching system, and is one of the brightest coaches under age 30 that I’ve read or talked to.

I first heard of Ross just a few weeks ago when his article on “Trainers vs. Racers” came out on Simplifaster.  Although this article didn’t get a lot of shares, it was one of the best works I had read in the last year, and one that resonated heavily with thoughts I’ve had on neurotyping system and athlete individualization.

I’ve known through Christian Thibaudeau’s neurotyping, as well as personal practice and reflection, that some athletes just can’t handle as much CNS intensive training, and that some athletes tend to do better with longer times under tension in the weightroom or even in their event specific training.  What I hadn’t considered was how this impacted the nature of maximal velocity sprinting and jumping, and how we can practically speed train athletes based on what we are seeing in practice (you don’t even need to know neurotyping to understand how this works, since it’s simply based on practice times versus race times).

For my chat with Ross today, we cover Ross’s background in classifying athletes (such as the muscular versus elastic bandwidth), who the “racer” is in practice, as well as the “trainer” and then how this can be utilized in track and field and team sport performance training.

Today’s episode is brought to you by SimpliFaster, supplier of high-end athletic development tools, such as the Freelap timing system, kBox, Sprint 1080, and more.

Key Points

How Ross goes through a system of classifying athletes and what they optimally respond to (in terms of fascial, muscular, response to plyos, heavy weightlifting, etc.)

How and why muscular versus fascial athletes respond differently to training

Who the “racer” is vs. the “trainer” and how to train each of them for speed

How Ross trains maximal velocity in context of team sport

Ross Jeffs Quotes

“I see it as elastic, concentric and fascial.  I see concentric at one end of the spectrum and fascial as the other and elastic sits in the middle…. the names aren’t really important, it’s just semantics”

“When the athlete comes in, the first month we might spend building tissue tolerance in the weightroom, some kind of improvement in the soft tissue; that might be spending a bit more time in the weightroom, 60-70% weight plus (and full range of motion), slightly heavier maybe to get some remodeling in the tissues”

“The fast-twitch guys on one type of a spectrum, they might come out of a phase like that (more weights, tissue remodeling) and they might look pretty good, but a fascial guy might look slow, and their ground contacts could look crappy”

“I think as coaches, we change too many variables too quickly”

“We should make our decisions on big rocks (such as heavy lifting versus plyometrics and response) before we go into minutia”

“(Regarding bike sprints and muscle tension in general) The fast twitch guys have a really good ability to tune their system by just having some level of muscular tension, and they don’t need to put their feet on the ground like the fascial guys”

“You have some athletes who can get very close to or even attain their competition velocity in training, as long as they are fairly fresh, while you have others who can’t get anywhere near it… in reality both athletes are giving 100% effort but their speeds are anywhere between 85 to 100% of their actual PB velocity, so the stimulus that is actually being applied from athlete to athlete is massive”

“If you have a trainer who can constantly apply a very high stimulus in training,

Today’s episode features Dr. Ebonie Rio, leading researcher in tendon pain and rehabilitation at La Trobe University.

Ebonie has a clinical career that has taken her to the Australian Institute of Sport, the Australian Ballet Company, Australian Ballet School, Melbourne Heart Football Club, Alphington Sports Medicine Centre, 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics and much more.

In approaching the full spectrum of training, the field of tendons and connective tissue represent an area that not much is known relative to others, such as muscle physiology.  Even our fascial system has been referred to as a “dark matter” of sorts since there is a lot about it we do not know.

This manifests itself into tendon injuries (think knee/patella and Achilles) being very nagging and hard to rehabilitate because they do not “play by the same rules” as muscles and bones.  At the same time, when we train for performance and injury prevention, knowing how to improve the capacity of our myo-fascial system to sustain and handle loads is critical.  It is also important to look at how various training means will have an impact on not only our muscles, but how our tendons and connective tissue adapt.

This episode with Ebonie Rio is fantastic for helping to build a more well-rounded knowledge of athletic tissues and subsequent training.  In this episode, Ebonie covers why tendons are different than muscle, how to optimally load them in training and rehab, as well as brain science and tendon training.  

Today’s episode is brought to you by SimpliFaster, supplier of high-end athletic development tools, such as the Freelap timing system, kBox, Sprint 1080, and more.   

View more podcast episodes at the podcast homepage.

Key Points

Why tendon injuries are fundamentally different than injuries of other tissues in the body

Optimal contraction and tempo emphasis for the sake of tendon training and rehabilitation

The four types of loading on tendons

How the “24 hour rule” provides guidelines for the art of tendon loading in rehabilitation

How strong muscles can help mitigate tendon injuries

Guidelines for range of motion when rehabilitating tendons

Improvement in neuromuscular versus physical changes in the rehabilitation of tendons

How to approach prevention of tendonous issues in sport performance

How tempo oriented and metronome training is great for both the brain and tendon rehabilitation

Ideas on maximizing tendon strength for athlete performance

Dr. Ebonie Rio Quotes

“Our tendon injuries provided us the biggest challenge (compared to broken bones or muscle strains)”

“Tendons don’t have an inflammatory process, muscles have a 3-phase response of inflammation…. Tendons are not the same, the pain is not inflammatory”

“If we say things like tendonitis (incorrectly), that really invokes an inflammatory condition, and that means people will think of a passive approach.  We use the word tendinopathy which gives the indication for a load based program”

“Tendons really love load, we just have to help them with the timing and the progression of it”

“When you rest, you drop (tendon loading) capacity”

“There is no one recipe that people should do that completely rehabilitates a person.  It has to incorporate (all training tempos) and it needs to be progressive.”

“The first type of loading on a tendon is a tensile load; it is when I ask your tendon to store and release energy like a spring”

“The next load is compression, compression is where the tendon is sort of squashed against a bone, like our Achilles tendon when in dorsiflexion”

“The third load is a combined load of tensile load and compression… like a fast change of direction where you drop into dorsiflexion and then switch the other way”

“Our final load is a shear or friction load”

“Anything that is fast and in compression is provocative for a tendon”

“Isometric strategy is the first way in; it won’t provoke tendon ...

Today’s episode features Christian Thibaudeau who is back for his third appearance on the podcast.

Christian is a world-renowned expert in strength training, but has gained recent attention particularly for his neurotyping system (read my review of it here), which trains athletes in accordance with their neurotransmitter levels and sensitivities. His original podcast with me on the topic is an important listen (if you haven’t listened to it already you should do that before you dive into this episode) and is also our most popular episode to date.  The neurotyping system is a true game changer, and Christian followed up his original talk with episode #99 which went in depth into competitive aspects of each neurotype, and how to approach competitive “chokers” from a neurotyping perspective.

Today’s episode is a two-headed monster of awesomeness when it comes to developing athletes.  The first half of this show, Christian goes in depth regarding early childhood (even down to the 0-2 year old range) and what experiences a child needs to have to optimize their chances of being a good athlete later on.  Christian also gives his take on the over-coached, over-speciailized epidemic that is plaguing youth sports today.

The second half of the show goes deep into specifically training the 2B and type 3 neurotypes (think those athletes with a “weaker” nervous system), and how to properly approach them from a speed, power and sport skill perspective.  Training athletes in the 1B and 2A categories, and even 1A are pretty straightforward, as modern power development methods such as French Contrast will easily improve abilities here. Athletes with less dopamine sensitivity have different needs, and there are other strategies that can prove useful here.  

Finally, Christian gives some insight on nutrition and neurotyping, as well as thoughts on training frequency.  

If you are interested in your own personal neurotype, there is a questionnaire for this now available on Thib Army.

Today’s episode is brought to you by SimpliFaster, supplier of high-end athletic development tools, such as the Freelap timing system, kBox, Sprint 1080, and more.  

View more podcast episodes at the podcast homepage.

Key Points

Child athletic development, particularly from ages 0-2 and how neurology and neurotransmitters fit into this equation

Why great natural talent is often labeled as “uncoachable”

Recent developments in neurotyping, including training for the type 2B

“French Contrast replacements” for athletes who are not 1B and 2A Neurotypes

How to use the weightroom to improve sensory feedback in athletes for sport skill

How to train a team sport 2B in the weightroom who needs to gain speed

The effects of proteins and carbohydrates in different neurotypes prior to and after workouts

Ideas on training frequency in bodybuilding versus athletic performance

Christian Thibaudeau Quotes

“Modern parents castrate their child’s chance of being a great athlete before the first year of life is over”

“The foundation (of athleticism) is built in the first two years of life”

“(Child athletic development from age 0-2) depends on two main things, and the first one is movement skills…  that depends on the visual system, the vestibular system and the proprioceptive system, your hands and your feet.  The hardware for this system is laid out in the first 2 years of life.”

“The kid needs to see many different shapes, many different colors… three dimensional stuff”

“The vestibular system is where most kids are lacking because parents are lazy… it is developed when a kid has to adapt to rapidly changing positions in space”

“The hands and feet are the two main sensors when it comes to being in a relationshiop with an opponent or in space, so you need to touch as many different textures and shapes as possible, the feet need to be in contact with the floor as much as possible”

Today’s episode features Dr. Michael Yessis, Soviet sport science expert, creator of the 1x20 training system, and internationally renowned expert on sports training and biomechanics.

On this podcast, we’ve had plenty of coaches who have talked about the 1x20 strength training system and the results it has brought them.  Being 142 episodes into the show, I figured it would be great to go straight to the creator of the system and talk about its’ origins, intentions and implementation.

The 1x20 system itself is incredibly simple to carry out, but there are a few important features that are important to understand to get maximal benefit.   

As important as it is to get stronger, it’s also important to keep it all in context of what actually makes a great athlete.  Dr. Yessis has created a simple system that gets athletes strong in a hurry, but he also knows that being the strongest athlete on the team doesn’t mean you are the best!  In that sense, Dr. Yessis gives us lots of helpful insights on how to help a training program really transfer to the skills needed for sport success.

On today’s show, Dr. Yessis gives us great insight on the advantages of moderate intensity efforts in the weightroom, some important details on the 1x20 system and its’ effectiveness, as well as in-season training, special strength and plyometric ideals.

Today’s episode is brought to you by SimpliFaster, supplier of high-end athletic development tools, such as the Freelap timing system, kBox, Sprint 1080, and more.  

View more podcast episodes at the podcast homepage.

Key Points

Advantages and disadvantages of heavy (80% and up) weightlifting for athletes

Why speed is the number one variable in training athletes

Planning of strength work and emphasis throughout the year

How the 1x20 strength training system came about

The advantages of the 1x20 system over other types of strength training systems

Training cycle patterns in the 1x20 system

Workout variation in the 1x20 system

1x20 for different types of athletes, such as track sprinters versus a field sport athlete

How plyometric progression works within the 1x20 system

Dr. Michael Yessis Quotes

“If you look at world class performers, not one of em’ is the strongest man on the team, so how much strength do you need?”

“The ultimate goal of training is to develop more speed, not strength”

“(Regarding barbell training) The ideal adaptation within the body happens within  the context of a moderate intensity program”

“Every coach should look at this as the criteria for any program they use “Is it improving the performance of the athlete”, this is the bottom line”

“Many times (heavy) strength training for the older athlete or the adult can lead to negative gains”

“The specialized strength training is the key to making a better performing athlete, but the specialized strength has criteria”

“If your strength training is general, which most programs are… it has no effect on performance.  You get stronger but your performance does not get better.”

“Muscular endurance must precede muscular strength… it gives you more circulatory abilities”

“For the greatest gains (in strength training) you need a moderate intensity”

“Too many get by with only a few strong joints and muscles… with the 1x20 you can use over 20 exercises in a session”

“I don’t have athletes do deep squats, we do ½ to ¼ squats… where in sport do you see range of motion you see in a deep squat?”

“In the beginning you must learn proper execution (of lifting skills)”

“Forget the amount of weight, it is how you are doing the exercise with good form.  You need that good form for proper neuromuscular development”

“When you use maximal weights, technique usually deteriorates”

“We use the 1x20 system as a deload for higher level athletes; they are not on a 1x20 but when they need a deload week or two… or three or four… then they use the 1x20”

Today’s episode features UK physical preparation coach Sam Portland.

Sam has been a strength coach on the elite level for nearly a decade, working with premiership rugby, Olympians, and international competitors ranging from hockey to track and field.  He was first introduced to me by Keir Wenham-Flatt in our podcast together, where Keir mentioned Sam’s experience with “speed gate golf”.

Sam is a forward thinking coach who got started in the coaching game very early and has a knack for the intuition of developing athletes.  In speed gate golf, Sam found a method, not only to essentially eliminate injuries from his speed training program, but also get athletes faster than they have ever been in the process.

I’m very interested in the ideas of getting faster and jumping higher without “trying as hard” and I think nothing speaks to that more firmly than studies like Rewzon’s famous (at least in terms of how often I use it) long jump study where jumpers who jumped to “targets” in the landing pit that were not necessarily their maximal distance, would jump further in the end than jumpers who jumped as far as they could every leap.

Sam has taken this idea into speed training in a creative way that helped field sport athletes (rugby) get some tremendous results, and this method is a motor learning gem that can speak volumes to physical preparation, track and sport coaches alike.

Today’s episode is brought to you by SimpliFaster, supplier of high-end athletic development tools, such as the Freelap timing system, kBox, Sprint 1080, and more.

View more podcast episodes at the podcast homepage.

Key Points

Sam’s background as an athlete and what got him into the physical preparation field

The birth of “speed gate golf” and how it was able to get athletes very fast while minimizing injuries

How Sam changed his language in the weightroom to improve the athletic development quality of it

How Sam would program speed into the context of sport coaching if he were a sport coach in a “Global Dynamics” of coaching model

Sam Portland Quotes

“If you look at coaching, we are academics in a kinesthetic world”

“Every time speed gates come out in professional environment people get hurt (pull hamstrings)”

“(By doing sprint and technical drills through the gates) their feedback loop is always positive”

“(In speed gate golf) It became a really competitive game because people wanted to run slow, instead of all wanting to run fast, the goal was to run slow, but run slow technically well”

“(In speed gate golf) We used rank-record-publish”

“(Using speed gate golf) We didn’t have a hamstring, calf, groin issue at all out of 28 players, and we were knocking boys down into the 10 meters into low 1.6’s”

“Any time a guy ran a 2 second 10 (submaximal, accurate running), there was a picture of me and him shaking hands going on my Instagram”

“From there, we just built our process of intensification, they’ve showed me that they respect it and understand it…. we just took our rhythm from our a-skip drills and bounds and put that into the gates… show me your a-skip, show me the bound, and now just speed it up a little bit”

“Speed gate golf is a 2 second day in trainers… we’d go back to those extensive qualities, then we’d go to intensive qualities”

“When you start looking as training as an organism in response to oxygen, then you are going to go a long way”

“(In regards to relaxation) Athletes always want to be “on”… nah…. be “off””

About Sam Portland

@coach_sportland

Sam Portland has been a strength and conditioning coach at the elite level for nearly a decade with a vast array of experience.  Sam has worked with premiership rugby, Olympic athletes, international competitors across a plethora of sports including hockey and track and field. Aside from this Sam keeps in touch with the grass roots aspects of athlete preparation by hosting his ‘combine program’.

Today’s episode features kinesiologist Zig Zeigler.  Zig is an expert specializing in kinesiotherapy, sports performance, post rehab conditioning, and corrective exercise with over 27 years of experience.  In his career, Zig has assisted many thousands of athletes, including some of the world’s best in professional sport.

Zig is currently the host of The RunRite Challenge on airing every Saturday morning 7:00 am- 8:00am MST on ESPN Radio-Denver.  He also competed collegiately in Track and Field earning All American honors in the Long Lump, 400M Hurdles and 110M Hurdles.  You can find his “non-orthotics” on barefootscienceusa.com and his personal website, fitnessfromthegroundup.com .

If you haven’t guessed it by listening to this podcast thus far the feet are absolutely critical in nearly every aspect of athletic performance.

When it comes to training the feet, Zig is one of the leading experts in the world, especially in connecting foot training to athletic performance.  As is a trend on this show, I enjoy steering towards this topic since it is both critical to performance, and also not talked about nearly enough.   Ever since I read an article Zig wrote on not squatting through the heels, I’ve had my own interest sparked on how the foot impacts our experience of resistance training and beyond.

Today’s episode draws strong links between the foot and biomechanics, and we also dig into Zig’s favorite strength and sensory modalities to restore foot function to its optimal state.  This is an absolute must-listen for any coach, trainer and athlete, as there is so much that we just cannot make up for properly if our feet are not working correctly.

Today’s episode is brought to you by SimpliFaster, supplier of high-end athletic development tools, such as the Freelap timing system, kBox, Sprint 1080, and more.

View more podcast episodes at the podcast homepage.

Key Points

What sparked Zig’s interest in the foot and related training concepts

The most important processes in how the foot strikes and absorbs the ground

What quantifies a good ground-strike in running

Zig’s take on applied foot strength training for athletic performance

Why just training barefoot isn’t enough to optimize your foot function and performance

Coaching cues for the feet in sprinting that are well intentioned, but don’t really work

Wbat good and bad proprioception training for the feet is and how to train it

 

Zig Ziegler Quotes

“The feet are the most neglected, yet truly the most important part of the body when it comes to our training programs, because without them we have to find ways to compensate and work around them”

“People are being told, “you need Orthotics, and you are going to need them for the rest of your life””

“Heel striking, excessive forefoot training, all of these issues, as you work your way up the chain, it leads to patellar tendonitis in the knee or jumpers knee, or runners knee, patella-femoral syndrome, hip pain discomfort, even IT band issues are related to weaknesses and dysfunction in the feet themselves”

“The first joint that should be absorbing, storing and releasing pressure back up the entire chain is the big toe on both feet.”

“The most important arch is the transverse arch… it is the arch that connects all the toes together.  All of the muscles of the feet are triggered when that arch is activated”

“9.9 out of 10 individuals are not using their feet properly, their weight is back on their heels…. most people have a collapsed medial arch or tightness on top of their foot”

“One way to test whether or not your foot has strength is try to curl your toes while in plantar flexion (and see if it cramps or not)”

“What you do (with your feet) when you are standing still is what you are going to do when you start running”

“(In single leg stance) I look for the foot pronating and with that pronation is there any internal tibial rotation,

Today’s episode welcomes back to the show Tommy John, along with neurological training adept, Alex Lee.  This episode was recorded in-person, after spending a few hours playing “around the world” in basketball and sliding down slides on a children’s playground.

Tommy John is a Chiropractor/Sports Performance coach (depending on which way his hat is aligned) and is a field leader in neurological training.  He blends psychology, culture and intention into a masterful training system that helps athletes stay healthy and maximize their sport experience.   His book “Minimize Injury, Maximize Performance” is a leading edge guide for the success of young athletes in today’s regressive sport culture that does not prioritize the health and well-being of young athletes.

Alex Lee is a chiropractic student at Life West who will graduate in 2020 and has years of experience in neurological training techniques.  As an athlete who experienced back pain as a result of training that didn’t prioritize human movement, he has found freedom from pain and enhanced athleticism by utilizing the techniques taught to him foremost by Tommy John, which he now utilizes in his own coaching and teaching.

This episode is all about how to optimize training from a neurological an psychological perspective.  If we think about the biggest rocks of training, the absolute foundation, it all starts with an athlete’s intentions and the basic functionality of the human body (being a “better human” as Cory Schlesinger puts it).  Tommy John and Alex share lots of anecdotes and insight as to how we can optimize our own performance, and that of our athletes by incorporating neurological principles in this awesome conversation.

Today’s episode is brought to you by SimpliFaster, supplier of high-end athletic development tools, such as the Freelap timing system, kBox, Sprint 1080, and more.

View more podcast episodes at the podcast homepage.

Key Points

Methods from a neurological perspective to “be a better human”

How fatigue can be a teacher and assessment from an intention driven perspective

How an athlete’s “why” impacts their results

How spending time away from weights, by using maximal intention ISO’s can be incredibly effective

Where the field of chiropractic and sports performance is headed

Alex and Tommy’s top bodyweight, barbell and ballistic exercises if they could pick only 1 of each

Early specialization and injury as a cultural sport phenomenon

Tommy John and Alex Lee Quotes

“One of the easiest pass/fail methods to rewire the body is standing on one leg”

“We should be a good mover before we load the move”

“I get still excited that, in the face of whatever we are dealing with, can stimulate and adapt at any level at what you are trying to put intention behind”

“The brain doesn’t know we are training and it’s positive, it senses the system is being threatened.... it will do the gnarliest environment ever where it’s like “I am going to die if my knee hits the ground before 5 minutes is up of an ISO lunge”, the changes in the face of fatigue (are immense)”

“Every single suggestion I make is going to check your “why” and if you don’t have that clear picture, usually based around something you love… whatever that is, it’s coming and if you don’t have it, you will dip out… and your expectation of your gains is not going to be there”

“If there is an injury, if it senses it’s going back to that environment, it’s going to freak out, even if the environment is safe… one of the purposes of rehab is to break that PTSD”

“I remember 2 years after (training hard on ISO’s) I stepped back in the weightroom and was able to move stuff around… it was like Bruce Willis in “Unbreakable”.

“When you can get to a place in your head when you are training everything max effort, physiologically, the adaptation is insane”

“A true chiropractor will just go in and assess the spine and see where it needs to be ...

Today’s episode features the first in-person recording of the Just Fly Performance podcast with Stanford University basketball strength coach, Cory Schlesinger.  

Cory’s combination of creativity and intuition makes him one of the most unique strength coaches I know, and his passion for the proper physical development of his players shines through in the many podcasts he has been on in the past.  He has a decade of experience as a strength coach, and is in his third year as the sports performance coach for the Stanford University’s Men’s Basketball team.  He also works with NBA and NFL players along with currently preparing athletes for the 2020 Olympic Games.  

I’ve known Cory for a little while now, and have wanted to have him on the show for a while, but I felt it would do the most justice to be able to actually sit down in person and record a show, so this marks the first in-person recorded episode of the Just Fly Performance Podcast.  

Cory’s methodology in the weightroom resembles, to me, the art of a master craftsman, who has a myriad of tools for a variety of purposes.  Where some coaches only have a hammer, Cory has the whole set of hammers and then some. The way Cory creatively and intuitively can determine what his athletes need in the gym, instead of what he himself as a coach wants to see is what sets Cory apart in this field.

Today on the show Cory and I talk about how to make a true athlete driven training system, and then what it really means to be an athlete and train for it.  This episode is also packed with common sense ideas that the modern strength coach can use to better serve athletes.

Today’s episode is brought to you by SimpliFaster, supplier of high-end athletic development tools, such as the Freelap timing system, kBox, Sprint 1080, and more.  

View more podcast episodes at the podcast homepage.

Key Points

How Cory sees the creation of an athletic qualities in the weightroom

How Cory structures each workout for his basketball players

How the strength coach fits in a true “high performance” sport mastery system

How to manage athletic performance in light of moving well/absorbing and releasing force/etc.

The importance of understanding martial arts in context of coaching athletes

How to “athletically” build an NBA body in context of good human movement patterns

Cody’s advice on honing creativity in coaching

Cory Schlesinger Quotes

“Our training program is athlete driven, I give the the power of choice”

“I give them the category; their needs and their preferences are what drives the results”

“Guys are PR’ing in all of their lifts as we go through season, because I’m not putting an emphasis on it and our frequency is so high”

“Once you’ve adapted to those adaptable things (college practice schedule, introducing games, being in college for the first time) then let’s start adding volume in the weightroom"

“At the end of the day, it’s about the athletes, if they got the gold, it doesn’t matter what training program they are on, they got the gold”

“If you are just going to be the weightroom guy, don’t be talking about salaries…. because that doesn’t determine success… you gotta find value in other ways”

“I have to give (my tall players living in a short world) their childhood development back”

“If you are talking about building better athletes, make them better humans first, and then they’ll be better athletes because they’ll be able to express”

“What do you think chronic, heavy lifting is going to do, it’s all braking! Just imagine how good strength coaches would be if they took what the body already came with, and just make that better!”

“(Regarding muscle hypertrophy) If you take a weak athlete and you introduce them to general movement patterns and then you generally load it, mass comes”

“How I sneak in a lot of volume is… chins and dips.  A lot of these guys can get great hypertrophy through bodyweight moveme...

Today’s episode features your host, Joel Smith, talking on various elements of optimizing the manner by which an athlete experiences a workout.  

You could have similar workouts on paper, say 5x3 cleans or 10 jumps over a high jump bar, but the subtleties and nuances by which those repetitions are executed mean everything in how well an athlete will adapt to the movement, as well as move into the next workout with maximal freshness of the central nervous system.  

When you understand how to stimulate dopamine release, how to frame a workout to tap into the experiential brain, how to utilize sensory information to coach technique rather than internal cues (or even external), as well as how to make training fun and exciting when needed, you have the tools to turn an average program into an outstanding one.  

This isn’t to say meat and potatoes training isn’t important, because it certainly is, but having the tool-set by which to really optimize the way the athlete experiences the training process, both the fun and the repetitive, can really improve our effectiveness as coaches.

Today’s episode is brought to you by SimpliFaster, supplier of high-end athletic development tools, such as the Freelap timing system, kBox, Sprint 1080, and more.  

View more podcast episodes at the podcast homepage.

Key Points

How to get into the experiential mode network while training, and not the default mode network and why it matters

Training Gate Golf

Long Jump Golf

Low Rim Dunking/Playing Jump Games

5x200m Hurdles

“Tricking” athletes into doing work (team sport principles)

How the Easy Strength principles apply to speed and power training

Ideas on making basic lifts more “experiential”, Olympic lift examples

Olympic lifting

Various ways to experience the bar and the second pull/sensory

Some athletes just twitch different; when you do an Olympic lift well, it’s a harmony

Various ways to approach the catch, etc.

Keiser Jumper or anything else with a quantitative output

Impulse in Keiser jumper is what matters/step up jumps

Thoughts on VBT stuff

How to structure a workout to maximize the manner in which the athlete processes and responds to the work

Warmup/Meat and Potatoes/ISOS and super slow

About Joel Smith

Joel Smith, MS, CSCS is a NCAA Division I Strength Coach working in the PAC12 conference. He has been a track and field jumper and javelin thrower, track coach, strength coach, personal trainer, researcher, writer and lecturer in his 8 years in the professional field. His degrees in exercise science have been earned from Cedarville University in 2006 (BA) and Wisconsin LaCrosse (MS) in 2008. Prior to California, Joel was a track coach, strength coach and lecturer at Wilmington College of Ohio. During Joel’s coaching tenure at Wilmington, he guided 8 athletes to NCAA All-American performances including a national champion in the women’s 55m dash. In 2011, Joel started Just Fly Sports with Jake Clark in an effort to bring relevant training information to the everyday coach and athlete. Aside from the NSCA, Joel is certified through USA Track and Field and his hope is to bridge the gap between understandable theory and current coaching practice.