Activ8 Performance Personal Training

💥Enhancing acceleration phase mechanics and power via sled sprints💥

Stride Length: Avoid short strides and aim to create horizontal force by pushing the ground away. Short strides waste time and leaves behind lost distance that can’t be regathered.......
Ground Contact Time: The amount of time each foot spends on the ground is longest at the beginning, as the body is trying to overcome the weight of your body fighting gravity. This takes a great deal of strength.......
Shin Angle: The shin angle is going to determine the projection angle (roughly 50 degree) as well force application to the ground as the athlete is driving out.......
Heel Recovery: Heels should recover quickly, with limited backside mechanics (movements occurring behind the center of mass) such as heel to butt, especially during the first 4-6 steps. Keep the heel recovery low.......
Body Position: Foot should strike directly below or slightly behind the hips. Look for Triple Extension of the driving leg– ankle, knee, hip. The body is driving out at a 50 degree angle to the ground. (This is a straight line from your head to your back leg.)......
Often athletes concern themselves too much with trying to be quick with their legs. Instead of trying to push out and be powerful, athletes are ‘spinning their wheels’ and are not getting triple extension (ankle, knee, hip). The sled push sprint sets up the ideal environment to ‘feel their feet behind them’. If you are getting that sensation, then you know you are finishing off your leg drive.......

During sprinting, the hamstrings, adductor magnus, and gluteus maximus (hip extensors) produce the majority of their force at high-velocity while the foot is in contact with the ground.......
When we train using high-velocity exercises, like trap/hex bar jumps in this video and Olypmic lift variations we improve our ability to produce force at high velocities to a much greater extent than against very heavy loads, which require low velocities. Using heavy loads to improve maximum strength does transfer, but not as well as you might hope, to high-velocity force production. Even though it produces increases in neural drive in the muscle, it does not increase the speed of motor unit firing in the initial phase of a contraction.......
Therefore we hip extension should be trained for sprinting using high-velocity exercises like jump squats, trap/hex bar jumps, and Olympic lifts. I like the trap/hex bar jumps as they are quicker to teach and address athletes with mobility limitations. Yes Olympic lifts do have their own unique benefits such as force absorption and coordination.

📈BAR PATH 🏋🏾‍♂️
Plays an essential role in not only the ex*****on but as seen here the landing mechanics of Olympic lifts. The bar shouldn’t travel perfectly vertical, from the bar’s contact at the hip (sn**ch) and upper thigh (clean), it will travel forward slightly (the less the better), and then must come back toward the lifter into the rack position or overhead position.......
Keys to an effective bar path include:
🔑 Keeping the bar close (especially after passing hip)
🔑 Hip intention (vertical brush/bump)
🔑 Wrist angle (knuckles facing down)......
The end result you will find is that the bar should move backwards slightly to towards the lifter. Starting with the bar over the ball of the foot and receive it over the center of the foot. A negative bar path outcome can include being forced forward onto fore foot at the catch instead of the heels. (On the right)

REDEVELOPING THE PHYSICAL QUALITIES FOR ATHLETIC PERFORMANCE ......
The mid-thigh pull is a great exercise to initiate rate of force production (RFD) training after ACL reconstruction or meniscus repair 6-8 weeks post op depending on the athlete. Once strength/stability has been re-established in the joint and surrounding muscles.......
You can’t be explosive unless you are first strong.......
Why mid-thigh pulls? They produce peak power output compared to other lifts, create peak ground reaction forces and it is not technically difficult for a return to play athlete to perform. (Except these are a bit high)......
12 week post op progression - mid-thigh power clean - be able to decelerate and absorb force under load.

Similar to the suitcase carry, the J carry (with a trap bar or barbell) is a great anti-lateral flexion progression to challenge the core.......
It challenges the core to maintain a neutral posture as the body tends to adjust to weight on one side with a hip shift. I like to pick a straight line on the ground and walk with each foot on each side of the line. This gives me some instant feedback on body alignment and positioning.

Time off from training can be great, but sometimes it is unavoidable when you don't want it to be.(injury, vacation, life events etc) Most teams and individuals take extended time off during the holiday period as an example.......
This time away from the gym can usually be accompanied with poor eating which can have you feeling out of shape, and wanting to train hard, but here lies the trap. (especially, for older populations) You need to have a solid base, your base needs to be big, you need general physical preparedness ((GPP)......
Strength coaches like to build a base using a GPP block and exercises to increase work capacity and reducing the risk of injury, (by strengthening connective tissue) and prepping the body for the hard training blocks that are to follow.......
Key GPP exercises to increase work capacity include sled pulls, drags and pushes, farmers carries and their variations. The essential anchor movements also form part of the GPP format to create injury resiliency.

Movement signatures are critical factors in the return to play paradigm. Following injury many athletes will distribute force differently due to damaged fascia and cognitive function. ....
“Rate of force development is important but it’s not the only consideration in athletic populations, many athletes are fascia and hydraulic masters.” - Dan Pfaff....
How the upper body and other joints move influences what the feet do. Besides my genetically hairless calves what do you see here?......

Poor landing mechanics which includes knee valgus (knee collapsing inwards) are often cited as a predictor of ACL injury risk among athletes. One of the ways I like to teach landing mechanics is to have athletes step off a box and land on one leg in a soft bent knee position........
It is important to teach and cue clients how to avoid stiff, quad and trunk dominant landing patterns prior to initiating higher level jumping and side stepping in rehab or training. This exercise facilitates a slow deliberate approach to teaching optimal landing mechanics using a hip strategy while minimizing frontal plane collapse....
This exercise is an effective screen for injury prevention and to reduce excessive knee valgus and poor trunk control with landing. It can be used for rehab, for corrective exercise and as a precursor to single leg plyometric drills with the primary goal to create an optimal neuromuscular landing strategy and reduce harmful loads on the knee joint.....
You can see that Ian’s right knee has a tendency to collapse inwards, this could be for numerous reasons relating to a previous injury. Remember it is okay to allow athletes to self-correct using their own motor errors as they will naturally adjust and learn from their loss of balance to find their stability.....

270m Barbell Carry finisher today.. unbroken..

TEMPERING......
This summer I was introduced to tempering, it’s NOT foam rolling, smashing or trigger point therapy. Created by tempering is used to break up adhesive tissue and muscle. It tempers tendons, ligaments, and bone due to its compact and heavy weight and helps rid excessively tense muscles of that hypertonicity that commonly occurs with strength training.......
Notice how my training partner, to body temper my upper posterior chain. A series of “crushes” and rolls to open up my back and later glutes and hamstrings. The reason tempering works so well is that it creates myofacial release in only seconds.

Using this heavy rod (marketed as the X Wife)takes training to another level because it is so heavy (135 lbs) the body has to adjust to the weight anaerobically. This will help an athlete gain strength and restore motion much more quickly than just training and foam rolling alone.......

Summer internship with Syracuse football 🏈 👍🏽