The Strength Athlete

A strength athlete’s primary goal is strength. If you ask this athlete why he trains, he will tell you that he wants to be strong, stronger, and strongest. This may be a competitive athlete (ex. strongman competitor), but not necessarily.

There are athletes all around the world who pursue strength with no ambitions for formal competition. Thus, while the phrase strength athlete is vague in nature, the overall goal of these athletes is clear. Strength!

These athletes certainly do not need the conditioning of a competitive fighter.

Typically, the strength athlete’s needs are not as diverse. For example, the strength athlete must not train as many skills as a mixed martial artist. His pursuit of strength is still complex, but focused towards more precise goals.

Strength, strength, and more strength!

Unfortunately, while pursuing strength, many of these athletes completely neglect general conditioning. In their eyes, if it is not strength related, it must be a waste of time. General fitness is put on the backburner. After all, how can conditioning work assist with strength development?

To answer this question, we can refer to the discussion of work capacity.

Enhanced work capacity offers many benefits to the strength athlete. A condensed list includes:

ƒ Speed recovery between sets

ƒ Speed recovery between workouts

ƒ Allow more intensity and volume

It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to appreciate the benefits of improved recovery, and the ability to handle increased workloads. These benefits are universal to all athletes (including strength athletes). Therefore, it should come as no surprise that more and more competitive strongmen and powerlifters have recognized the benefits of enhanced work capacity.

For example, suppose your bench press is stuck in a rut. You’ve identified your triceps as the weak link. Poor triceps strength is halting your gains in this lift. To improve your bench, you must strengthen the triceps. Fixing a weak link often involves adding new movements to your arsenal. After all, if you had been performing such movements all along, you probably would not have the weak link. If you wish to add more ingredients to your training recipe, you’d better have a big bowl of general fitness. If work capacity is lacking, you will not be able to handle the added workload. Thus, to overcome the weak link, you must

54

increase workload, and to handle the increase, you must possess high levels of work capacity.

QUESTION - Ross, how does a strength athlete make time for general fitness?

On page 45, I mentioned the importance of scheduling around your schedule. This simple, yet often overlooked idea, also applies to the strength athlete.

As mentioned, your goal is strength. Conditioning is important, but a secondary goal. Your primary reasons for conditioning work are to assist with your strength gains. You are not conditioning yourself for a marathon. You are seeking to enhance work capacity and reap the associated benefits (specific to your needs).

Therefore, we should follow two basic guidelines.

1. Conditioning workouts must enhance performance as a strength athlete.

These workouts must not detract from strength training. For example, the conditioning workout shouldn’t leave you sore for days, thus unable to complete a strength session. If strength is your primary goal, it wouldn’t make sense to destroy your legs with steep hill sprints the day before a heavy squat workout.

2. Conditioning workouts must be scheduled around the primary goal (strength development). Adding conditioning work to your schedule should not mean that the frequency and intensity of strength workouts will suffer. The conditioning work is designed to enhance performance as a strength athlete. For example, suppose Monday includes a strenuous lower body strength session. It would not make sense to then perform a strenuous lower body conditioning workout the next day (ex. hill sprints).

You could instead choose a conditioning workout that is not as stressful to the lower body (ex. swinging a sledgehammer). Light GPP work could also be included (ex. sled dragging or bodyweight calisthenics).

As for how conditioning work can be included, the specifics will depend on your strength training schedule. For starters, it is useful to revert to the template idea from page 45. Create a seven day template with each strength session identified.

For example, suppose your strength workouts fall on Monday, Wednesday, Friday, and Sunday. How can you include conditioning work within this schedule? There are a few options worthy of consideration.

ƒ Conditioning on Non-Strength Days – With this approach, a dedicated conditioning workout would be performed on non-lifting days. Using the example above, conditioning workouts could fall on Tuesday, Thursday,

55

or Saturday. Choose two of the three available days, and leave one day for complete rest (or active rest such as a long walk).

ƒ Multiple Workouts – Another option is to perform a main workout in the morning, and then finish with a mini-workout later in the evening. For example, Wednesday may start with a morning strength session (primary workout). Later that day, you can perform a brief 10 or 15 minute conditioning workout. This brief session will produce work capacity improvements, and can actually kick start the recovery process. Clearly, you do not need a conditioning workout on each strength training day, but this option can be utilized on occasion (ex. once or twice per week).

ƒ Finishers – As mentioned earlier, adding a finisher to a strength workout is a convenient way to close with a conditioning emphasis. Simply adding two finishers per week can lead to significant improvements in work capacity.

Using the three options above, you can see how each can be included within the week.

Day 1 – Strength workout + finisher Day 2 – Dedicated conditioning session

Day 3 – Morning Strength workout + Evening mini-workout (conditioning) Day 4 – Complete rest or long walk

Day 5 – Strength workout + finisher Day 6 - Dedicated conditioning session Day 7 - Strength workout

With this schedule, there are four strength workouts, two finishers, two dedicated conditioning workouts, and one mini-workout. Clearly, this schedule includes considerable volume and is not intended for the novice athlete. On the contrary, such a voluminous schedule is intended for the athlete who already possesses a good deal of work capacity. If work capacity is not up to par, you could drop the mini-workout (Day 3) and one of the finishers (Day 1 or Day 5).

Once again, the specifics of your weekly plan will depend on individual work capacity (in addition to your weekly strength training schedule).

Please note that the sample above is just one of infinite options. My reasons for including a sample are merely to offer a visual demonstration of the principles presented throughout the text. As an athlete or coach, I encourage you to tailor the material to your specific needs.

56