Power

BlueIsland

Moved onto power cycle of programme for Gaa season there Monday! Basically I doing 3x8 reps with 60% of what I was lifting in strength phase. Way I figured out programme is that you gotta be fully recovered between each rep to do the movement as fast and powerfully as I can. So I taking 10 seconds between each rep of 3x8 and 1-2 minutes between sets. This sound right to people?

Hanley

BlueIsland wrote: »

Moved onto power cycle of programme for Gaa season there Monday! Basically I doing 3x8 reps with 60% of what I was lifting in strength phase. Way I figured out programme is that you gotta be fully recovered between each rep to do the movement as fast and powerfully as I can. So I taking 10 seconds between each rep of 3x8 and 1-2 minutes between sets. This sound right to people?

Why 3x8?

As the set goes on, power output and quality of work will drop off significantly.

You'd be better with 8x3 or something along those lines, making sure you're fully recovered between each set.

You probably don't even need that much 'power' work unless you're quite strong already.

BlueIsland

Just from reading different sites in periodisation for football !! All seem to encourage 4 weeks of 3x between 6-8 reps! I was thinking it kinda like plyometrics with weights!

Hanley

Yah there’s a lot of info out there that says it, but pretty much all of it is wrong.

You’re better looking at what the top US S&C coaches like Defranco are doing. I only mention him because the info’s easily available. He does lots of heavy lifting and sled pushing/pulling with his guys for strength, and lots of high intensity/low volume box and hurdle jumps for power output/rate of force development.

There seems to be a lot of ‘cart before the horse’ stuff when it comes to power development. It’s a function of strength and imo, most guys aren’t ready for it. Think of it this way…

A motorbike accelerates really quickly because of its high power to weight ratio (ie it’s relative strength).

If the engine was smaller, it wouldn’t accelerate as quickly, but within certain limits it can be tuned to extract a bit more acceleration (power training).

The bigger the engine, the more potential to there is to extract additional power/acceleration thru tuning (power training).

Or you could just throw a bigger engine in there (ie get stronger), stop worrying about trying to extract marginal benefit and go off like a f*cking rocket.

I’m not saying you shouldn’t worry about power or speed, but if you try to move the bar as fast as possible (with good form) on every rep of every set during strength work, you’re going to get a similar benefit because it’s the intention (activation of high threshold motor units) that causes the gain, not the actual bar speed itself.

BlueIsland

Yeh I get ya!! Makes sense! I'll google that guy! I think I prob just wanna vary my programme after five months if heavy 5x5! Read up on periodisation and thought this be effective! I doing box jumps, bounding, depth jumps etc twice week also!