Strength is speed!

A lot of people have heard me say that I can tell who is the fastest athlete based on the amount of pull ups that they can do.  This works because pull ups are a test of relative strength to body weight.  When we run that is what we are doing, expressing our strength to bodyweight.  The stronger your legs and hips, the further you can move your body with each step, thus the faster you can run.  When an athlete is first learning to run they get faster by improving their sprint mechanics and nervous system activity but this adaptation only takes you so far.  Once you have a little bit of experience running the only way to get faster is to get stronger.  People who say they are "speed coaches" and only address the mechanics and nervous system activity drills are only tapping the surface of your athlete's potential speed.  A true "speed coach" understands that unless an athlete gets stronger they will never get faster.  Yes an untrained athlete will get faster by just working on running skill, but that improvement is very limited and ends very quickly.  Unless the athlete is working on improving their strength then they will never realize their full potential.  At The Spot Athletics we are not concerned with just making minimal improvements.  We focus on developing the total athlete through speed mechanics drills, injury prevention, explosive training, strength training, and conditioning.  This total athlete development allows our athletes to see long term major improvements in athleticism.  Don't get sucked into only working on sprint mechanics, make sure you are working on developing the whole athlete.   It always boggles my mind how people say they are doing "speed" work but their whole workout is what we do in our warm up.

Summer Programs filling up.

If you haven't signed up for one of our great summer programs then you need to do so quickly.  We have summer programs for soccer, volleyball and young kids.  Each of these programs is designed to maximize performance in your young athlete.  Our volleyball and soccer programs are sport specific programs that address the unique needs of each sport.  Our kids summer strength and conditioning camps with work on developing overall athletic ability in your young child.  If they don't acquire the proper motor patterns before age 13 then it becomes exponentially more difficult to make motor pattern changes.

Upcoming Events

The Spot Athletics is gearing up for an exciting winter season.

Starting December 5th The Spot Athletics will be offering a full season strength and conditioning program for Zenith Volleyball Academy. Class will run every Monday and Wednesday evening from 6:30pm- 8:00pm. Three different training packages are being offered. To learn more about this program and to sign up check out the zenith area of our website

COVBC strength in conditioning is already in progress but not to worry we will be starting up another class beginning January 12th and will run every Sunday and Thursday from 5:00pm - 6:00 pm right before COVBC practice. To learn more and to sign up for this program please check out the COVBC section of our website.

Attention Zenith and COVBC Club Volleyball Parents! The Spot Athletics is now offering Parent Boot Camps. These special Boot Camps will be offered during your childs practice so now you can get a great work out in, instead of sitting around doing nothing. C'mon you are already here, so join one of our state of the art Boot Camps and get into the best shape of your life. For more information check out the Boot Camps section of our website (located under the services tab)

The Spot Athletics and the Schelotto and Padula Soccer Academy are proud to be offering a Strength and Conditioning program beginning in January. Check out the S & P section of our website to learn more about this great opportunity.

Recent Training Results

A lot has been happening at The Spot Athletics in the past couple months. Most Notably, we have seen vast improvements in all of our athletes.

In our recent 5 week Zenith Pre-Club Strength and Conditioning Program we saw vertical increases of up to 4 1/2 inches and increases in explosiveness and agility.

One female volleyball player in particular who has been training with us for only 7 weeks showed a 6 1/2 increase in her vertical.

An 11 year old wrestler just finished up 12 weeks of training and increased his broad jump by 10 1/2 inches!

These are just a few examples of the Amazing improvements we are seeing in our Athletes. Contact J.L. Holdsworth at JL@TheSpotAthletics.com to learn more about how your athlete can tap into their full potential with Strength and Conditioning training at The Spot Athletics.

COVBC Volleyball

We are going to be offering a Parent Boot Camp for COVBC parents on Sunday's from 6:15pm - 8:15pm. If we garner enough interest then we will also run a bootcamp on Wednesday nights as well

Nutrition for Young Athletes

When it comes to young athletes the KISS (keep it simple stupid) approach is always best, especially with all of the confusing information out there about nutrition.  A young athlete is training and practicing like older athletes but their body has the added demand of growing on top of that.  Because of this, the caloric demand on their body is much greater.  Three simple rules to follow for young athletes are 1.  Always eat breakfast; this needs to be a healthy whole grain and protein rich breakfast.  2.  Lot's of healthy fats;  every cell in your body is composed of fat, without fat young athletes don't posses the necessary building blocks to grow to their full potential.  Simple strategies for this are eating whole eggs at breakfast, drinking whole milk, adding olive oil to food or shakes, and eating all natural peanut or almond butter.  3.  Get 5 meals/day; young athletes are constantly on the move and although sitting down 5 times/day isn't realistic, having meals packed and snacks ready to go for your young athlete is crucial to their health and performance.  Only eating once or twice per day will negatively impact not only athletic performance but academic performance as well.

So follow these 3 simple rules and your young athletes will be on their way to performing at their highest potential.

Heavy is relative

Everyone speaks of heavy weights but depending on who you talk to that varies significantly.  Some clients feel 15 lb. dumbbells are heavy while others feel they are light.  When speaking of heavy or light it is all relative to your absolute strength.  If you can do 100 lb. dumbbells for a certain exercise then 15 lbs. will seem very light.  When training you must use a weight that is heavy for you or you will not see an adaptation from your training.  We lift weights to get stronger and yet too many people use weights that are extremely easy and expect to see results.  Doing this is just a waste of time and will not produce results.  So weather you are doing 15 or 1 rep you should use a weight that is hard for you or you won't see any results.