Functional Path Training

Making Shapes

Shapes was brought to the forefront of my thinking about 10 years ago when I was working with one of my swim teams. The coach kept talking about getting smaller into the wall and taller off-the-wall off the wall into a streamline. I left the workout thinking what he was really telling the swimmers was to make different shapes. This got me thinking about the whole concept of shapes and what we needed to do to impact the athlete’s abilities to make the required shapes.

What are shapes? Shapes are postures, poses, and positions that enable the athlete to effectively produce and reduce force in the desired skill. What shapes do you need to make? What shapes can you make? How do you reconcile the two? This must be evaluated in the context of their particular sport demands. It usually involves work on body awareness, some strengthening and some lengthening. In my system, shapes are a specific training module. Shapes can be improved significantly with consistent investment of time. In analyzing programs for the last 10 years in volleyball and swimming work on shapes averaged about 30 to 35 minutes per seven-day microcyle. It does not seem like much but over a training year in addition to the individual athletes homework to help them work on specific shapes that they were deficient in it is a significant investment.

To make shapes effective it is imperative that it is connected to the desired movement skill in the sport. The athlete must understand this connection. It is really interesting to see how they enjoy it and how much they do relate to it until it becomes a part of their movement vocabulary. Use video of the desired sport shapes and then relate exercise in the shapes routine to help them understand the connection. For example, the overhead squat for a swimmer is a categorized as a strength exercise but it's more than a strength exercise, it represents an essential shape coming off the wall and transferring into a streamline. It is easy to show this to the swimmer. Now the shape on dryland has transfer for them to the water.

Shapes are FUNdamental therefore it is essential to challenge the athlete to make better shapes and have fun doing it.

Shapes

Looking at shapes will give you a different perspective on viewing, analyzing and effecting change in movement. Look closely at the shapes your athlete must make in the course of performing in their sport. Then look at the shapes they can make. Then look at what they have to do to reconcile the shapes they have to make with the shapes they can make. How quickly and efficiently can they change shapes? What is limiting their ability to make the required shapes – it is strength, flexibility, lack of body awareness or something else? With the young developing athletes making shapes has become an emphasis. I make it playful and set up tasks that require them to make as many shapes as possible and the challenge each other to change shapes almost like a big improvisational dance. It is very FUNdamental. For the mature senior athletes, I am now structuring a three to five-minute session of “shapes’ where they have to challenge themselves much like the junior athletes. I find myself increasingly speaking the language of shapes – big, little, tall, small, round, wide – It has given me a better perspective on reconciling coordination with sport skill. No more robots, just a dance of connected shapes!

Random Thoughts on Training to Wrap Up 2016

Volume is not a biomotor quality. Anyone can do more; the path to success is doing it better.

Train speed in – It is precious. Very easy to compromise by speed by doing too much

Strength as a motor quality is easy to develop and even easier to stabilize (Maintain)

Consist work is more important than an occasional spectacular workout

Train to your strengths and minimize the weaknesses

So-called “Reactive Agility” is best trained within the context of the actual technical and tactical sport practice. Coaches pointing to cones and flashing lights do not get it done.

The majority of “Programmed Agility” is actually injury prevention (working on force reduction ability) and rehearsal of complex movements in a controlled rather than chaotic environment

Use drills selectively, specifically and sparingly. Drills do not equal skills

Understand and apply the distinction between General, Special and Specific Strength

Injury prevention work should be a transparent part the regular training sessions.

Recovery is important but first you have to do enough work to warrant recovery

Agility

Agility is the ability to recognize, make a decision, react, start, move in correct direction, change direction if necessary, & stop QUICKLY. Quickly is a time span of hundreds of a second up to three to four seconds in most sports. Agility is not an isolated physical ability, nor is it as general a quality as it is often presented as. It is closely tied to specific sports skill and tactical situations. Much of agility is highly dependent of functional strength, dynamic balance, proprioception, body awareness and vision.