Sport Specific Training

Sports specific training must fulfill one or more of the following criteria:

• The exercise must duplicate the exact movement witnessed in a certain segment of the sports skill.
• The exercise must involve the same type of muscular contraction as used in the skill execution.
• The special exercise must have the same range of motion as in the skill action.

Strength training is an essential element of fitness for virtually every sports man and woman. Long gone are the days when coaches believed resistance exercises only added unnecessary bulk to the athlete, hindering their ability to execute skill.

The benefits of strength training to athletic performance are enormous and many. Not only is it an integral conditioning component for power athletes such as football and rugby players, performance in the pure endurance events can be improved with a well-structured strength routine.

However, aside from perhaps bodybuilders, sport-specific resistance training requires a more refined approach than simply lifting heavy weights to complete exhaustion. A physiological analysis of any game or event will confirm that most athletes require explosive power, muscular endurance, maximal strength or some combination of all three in order to excel. Rarely is pure muscle bulk the primary concern and when it is, other elements of strength are equally as important.