There is no “sport” specific training, only skill specific training. This is why I say this: you are not guaranteed that your 1000lbs squat will get you to run raster, you are not guaranteed that your 225lbs snatch will get you to serve faster, your long cycle KB swing may or may not increase your batting average, those tire flips could get you the winning submission or just break your nail. All these are training modalities that may or may not increase your performance on your athletic field. Athletic performance is a highly specific skill not one that can be duplicated in a gym setting. Then one must question, which most professional and trainees forget to ask, is HOW the training modalities transfer on to the athletic field. For example, besides increasing my hip drive, for other activities, how does KB swings increase my swing control in golf?
Let us take a look at both of these skills:
KB Swing:
- Limb manipulation (the performer is manipulating an object in their hand)
- Mostly triple extension
- Movement occurs within the sagittal plane of movement, the movement occurs fore and aft of the body.
- Little weight transference, meaning you do not need to shift your body weight from one foot to the other
Golf Swing:
- Limb Manipulation
- Slight triple extension
- Movement occurs in the Frontal and Transverse plane of movement. (think of your arms going up and down in jumping jacks with rotating left and right of the hips)
- Weight transfer from one foot to another, trailing leg to lead foot, trailing foot comes onto the toe
The answer to the question is progressive programming. This is a process to which skill is built upon skill in a systematic manner such that the outcome or the end result of all this skill building is an increase in athletic ability, on that athlete’s athletic field. This means a KB swinging will need to be progressed in a manner so that it affects the skill of a golf swing on the golf course. Below is a flow chart of one of many possible progressions to a golf swing.
Conceptually, the flow chart above “makes sense”. However, one must question: what is the qualitative regulation of skill progression? In other words, at what skillfulness level is it appropriate to move on to another skill or increase the difficulty level of the current skill and what are some observable behaviors are we using to gauge the level of skillfulness?
As I have stated in previous posts this is a systematic learning process and it is imperative that you understand it as an athlete and or the instructor. There are very distinct phases of learning the performer goes through when acquiring and mastering a skill. The level of skillfulness is directly related to the phase of learning and should be utilized, along with feedback from the performer, to appropriately progress skill in terms of difficulty and or introduction of a new skill. Below is a list in sequential order of these phases with some observable movement behavior.
Cognitive Phase:
o There is a high degree of cognition moderation
o High amounts of errors in performance
o Movement is choppy and slow
o Performance is inconsistent
o Instruction during this phase is most effective in enhancing performance
Associative Phase:
o Cognition moderation is lower
o Lower amounts of error in the performance
o Movement is “smoother” and deliberate
o Consistency of the movement has increased
o Coaching of challenging areas are needed
Autonomous Phase:
o Cognition moderation is lowest in this stage
o Little to none in performance errors
o Performance is highly consistent
o Little to no coaching is needed
Progressions within any program should be based on the performer’s skillfulness. The individual’s skillfulness is directly related to where the performer is within the learning phases. By utilizing the learning phases as your bases of progressions you, as the coach, will have a qualitative scale to indicate when the learning environment should be changed. Each change that occurs within the environment or environments should challenge the trainee so that skillfulness drops but does not totally degrade.
All trainers, with some experience and worth half a grain of salt, observes their clients and sees the above phases and progresses in some logical manner. They may not know technical names and or be able to articulate in a clear fashion. These trainers are the professional “technicians”, they train intuitively. It is the goal of these posts to educate you on what NO BS Fitness Professionals do on a daily bases and to enlighten our reading audience.
Next post drilling down on these concepts by providing some practical application and examples to the blog’s of Coach T
Post your question and comments! The only way to learn is to engage!
Be back with some more…Coach T
