When an athlete is getting ready for a competition, performance training, or practice, they should be engaging in a warm-up that includes the 5 Biomotor abilities.

Flexibility
Coordination
Endurance
Strength
Speed

Flexibility, has long been known by many, to be important in the development and success of athletes. Within the past 5-7 years, coaches and parents are starting to implement and understand the importance of dynamic stretching. Moving and holding stretches for a short amount of time, prepares the nervous system to recruit muscles. Static stretching (which relaxes the nervous system) should be done after a workout or practice to help with flexibility.

Coordination or athleticism in a warm up can help athletes who need to fine tune small movements they don’t always notice in sport. High levels of athleticism include good hand coordination, the ability to separate lower body from upper body movements, balancing on one foot, and reacting.

Endurance describes the ability to maintain speed in the presence of fatigue. Warm ups generally should have a quick pace to them, not necessarily long and drawn out. It depends on the sport. As a rule of thumb a 100 meter sprinter shouldn’t warm up with a 3 mile jog. A warm up can be used to help athletes prepare for what they are about to engage in.

Strength in a warm up is sometimes underutilized. An athlete needs to be able to produce great amounts of force in everything they do. Part of the equation in force production is being able to move your own body-weight. Including push ups, crawling, postural stability, and core bridging will increase an athletes relative body strength.

Speed is a hot commodity in sports. You CAN teach speed. Reinforcing proper running mechanics in the warm up leads to better habits in competition. The warm up is the best time to pick apart speed because the nervous system is fresh and the body is ready to relearn. Finally, don’t forget we do get our speed, or lack of, from mom and dad.

-Cody Carter, CSCS
Director of Programming
EZIA Human Performance

300 yard Shuttle Variations

Mark off a distance of 25 yards with two cones. You’ll need someone to signal “go” and time you with a stopwatch. Sprint 25 yards to the first cone and touch the cone with your hand, quickly turning around to run back 25 yards to the starting point. Complete that a total of six times to equal 300 yards. Your timer should stop the clock when you finish running through the starting point the sixth time. Be sure to do a proper dynamic warm up before your time trial.

To measure the quality of your current conditioning level, run the 300 yard shuttle again, three minutes after completing your first 300 yard shuttle. If your two times have a large differentiation between them, your body struggles to perform when lactic acid forms in the blood. When your times become similar, you are on the right track to be being able to perform at a CONSISTENT high level. Average the two times together to get your score.

Try these workouts to improve your time:

250 yard shuttle (down & back 5 times)
5×250 yds with 2:00 min. rest between each one

200 yard shuttle (down & back 4 times)
6×200 yds with 1:30 min rest between each one

150 yard shuttle (down & back 3 times)
8×150 yds with 1:00 min rest between each one

The 300 yard shuttle is a great test for athletes because it measures how well they can sprint and change directions when the body creates lactic acid from working hard. Please note, the quicker you are able to run the 300, the harder it will be to shave off time…

Stop jogging and give this a try!

Cody Carter
Director of Programs
EZIA Human Performance

When it comes to training athletes, coaches often rely on the agility ladder to improve quickness and agility. The fundamental problem with this is that there are only so many foot patterns that an athlete can be challenged with before they show mastery. The agility ladder is a great tool for trying to stump a growing athlete’s nervous system, but may plateau their ability to improve quickness in their growing body. A great way to continue to improve quickness and agility is to unilaterally strengthen young athlete’s legs, one at a time. Not only does training unilaterally help with quickness, it also decreases the likelihood of injuries. Below are a few excellent single leg strengthening movements:
Single leg squats while standing on a box, walking lunges, and a single leg romanian dead-lift. All of these exercises should first be performed with just body weight until the full range of motion can be reached. After that, it’s safe to add weight from a dumbbell or medicine ball.
If you ever have any questions on how your young athlete can activate their full potential, contact me at EZIA HUMAN PERFORMANCE.

-Cody Carter
Human Performance Director

Featured in the Adrenaline Lacrosse monthly newsletter!

If I train on my own in the gym, what should I be doing?

This is a question that is often asked by our athletes who are starting their personally designed program at EZIA Human Performance. Our programs are built around ESP, which stand for endurance, strength, and power. This program is designed to challenge all ages, abilities and skill levels to help achieve personal performance goals. Your individual EZIA program is a periodized plan with workouts to use on your own. The foundation of our workouts are built around a methodology that EZIA Human Performance stands behind. Below, I listed four of the core pillars that stand with our EZIA methodology. When training in the gym on your own, consider the following points.

Train on your feet. The majority of things that are done in life happen on your feet especially sports. You are at the mercy of your own body. Many gyms have machines that are designed to spot train your muscles. They may seem like they are safe, but in reality could be making you weaker as an active human being. Instead of using the leg press machine where you lie on your back, try squatting on two feet while holding on to dumbbells.

Total Body and Multi Joint movements. Athletes for the most part use their entire body when making sport like movements. In the gym you should train your joints, muscles, and tendons the same way. It saves time. Instead of a regular shoulder press, try adding a walking lunge or a squat to a shoulder press in one smooth movement. These types of movements help with coordination and elevate your heart rate quickly.

Unilateral Movements. These are movements that are done with one arm or one leg at a time. Training unilaterally is important because when an athlete runs or throws, they use one foot or one arm at a time. If one arm or one leg is stronger, that imbalance could lead to injuries. Don’t forget you’re only as strong as your weakest link. Split squats or single arm rows are great examples.

Explosive movements. If you want to jump higher, play faster, accelerate quicker, or change direction better you have to train that way. Also, some great things about explosive movements are that they help speed up the nervous system, improve coordination, and when done with proper technique, they’ll decrease the likelihood of injury. My favorite explosive movements are plyometrics and olympic lifts such as the clean and jerk.

Cody Carter
Human Performance Director

This is the time of year that makes me start thinking about golf again…The start of the Farmers Insurance open at Torrey Pines. Tiger Woods opens his 2011 season this week at the famous course. While growing up in Iowa, golf didn’t really seem to come to mind in January, unless you were headed for a tropical vacation.

Even though there isn’t really an off-season in golf for Southern California residents, one person in particular has taken that frame of mind. Ezian, Eric Weinberg has taken his golf game to the next level by training consistently with me since April of 2010. Towards the end of 2010, his regularly scheduled golf game got bumped by rain storms, business travel, and holidays (his off-season). However, he continued to work hard at his golf specific training program I designed for him. When he was able to get back on the course again, right around his 50th birthday, he was impressed. Two months off from his golf game, with two months of hard work in the gym, paid dividends. Eric now hits the ball a club to a club and half farther!

Eric is a great example of someone who wanted to be a scratch golfer and chose training at EZIA to actually get him there…