Strength and Conditioning Stuff You Should Read: 5/4/20

Written on May 4, 2020 at 2:59 pm, by Eric Cressey

Here’s a list of recommended reading/listening since our last update on this front.

EC on the Vigor Life Podcast – I recently joined my buddy Luka Hocevar on his podcast to talk about career development and the skill sets fitness professionals will need for the future.

Athletic Shoulders with Eric Cressey – I was also a guest on the Science for Sport Podcast, where we discussed preparing shoulders for competition, and touched on the difference between the private sector and working for a team.

Youth Single-Sports Specialization in Professional Baseball Players – This study was recently published in the Orthopedic Journal of Sports Medicine, and it shows the early specialization isn’t the right path for developing a professional athlete. I thought that the most interesting part of the study was Figure 5, the Reasons for Single-Sport Specialization. It’s implied that pressure from parents and coaches isn’t a leading cause of early specialization, but I have a hard time believing that kids specializing before age 14 make that decision all on their own, and without outside influence.

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Anecdotal observation: some of my best training sessions of all time came on days when I wasn’t super motivated to train, but convinced myself to just go warm up and see where it led. Before you write off an entire day, see where a little movement takes you.

— Eric Cressey (@EricCressey) April 25, 2020

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Everything works – until it doesn’t. And, pushing maximal strength is certainly no exception. 👇 Early on, building strength is an absolute game changer. A little strength goes a long way in providing the foundation for joint stability, power, and endurance. Over time, though, added levels of strength don’t provide the same significant return on investment (point of diminishing returns). Instead, you need more specificity to develop these qualities. And, the stress of continuing to push for maximal strength effectively squeezes out other training initiatives because it’s competing for a limited recovery capacity. Eventually, pushing maximal strength actually interferes with the development of those qualities because it’s such a massive toll on the body to preserve. And, the risk of injury during training rises exponentially. Quality of life goes down dramatically as lifters are constantly banged up in their quest to gain 5-10 pounds of bar weight in an entire training cycle. “It is what it is” if we’re talking about a strength sport athletes where all that matters is what’s on the bar. It’s a terrible path to be on if we’re talking about an athlete or just someone who wants to feel, look, and perform well in their daily lives. #cspfamily

A post shared by Eric Cressey (@ericcressey) on Apr 30, 2020 at 5:37pm PDT

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