(Behind the Scenes) Designing Our First Strength Session

It’s been a while! My bad. But I just read the book “Show Your Work” and it’s had an impact. I will start writing hopefully once a week. It will be less refined but that is okay. We’re starting our school year next week so I’ve been spending time prepping for Fall strength workouts.

To design any workout, you must first have guiding principles. Those principles must then create goals which you use to tell a story. The point is, it’s an easy mistake to make to just jump into writing. This is a lesson for all. It is good to know what, how, and why you are trying to do something.

Below are some of my plans. On the left is our 12 month training season. We’re entering our Fall season. Fall is not the time for big strength gains, that is Spring and Summer. It is time to trim down and prep for the season. With that said, we don’t want to over-prep. Wrestling is one of the longest and toughest seasons out there. Generally, if you’re 100% competition-ready on day 1, by Regionals, you’re going to be exhausted.

On the right, I flesh out more ideas for that Fall Phase. In general, this shows what each part of the workouts really looks like. I realized all exercises work as strength or conditioning, the real differentiator is that “strength” exercises are ones that are not done well when they are rushed. Just getting ball slams or really any explosive rep done is not enough. They must be done with full effort. This is contrary to circuit workouts. For instance, if you are doing a box jump, as long as you get up on the box, it was a successful rep.

I also wrote out a whole long list of exercises I like and think we can do this fall. This was a brain dump. Will organize later.  I also have a list of simple goals and themes I’d like to have for each workout up top.

Here in Wisconsin, it gets cold quick. Because of this, we want to spend as much time outdoors when it is nice as possible. Day one we are starting there. Besides enjoying the weather, it shows that you don’t need special equipment to get a great workout in. 

Workout Rationale

Test - 1 Mile Sprint

To begin, I want to challenge them but also get a baseline reading of where they are at. A one-mile sprint is a great way to do all that. Plus we get them on the line together and get them competing on day one.

Strength - Pushups, Gymnast Style V-Ups, Handstand Walks

I have lots of complex exercises to teach but we need to keep it simple for now. We want to have them think for a little bit. Maybe for one exercise but we don’t want to teach 6 new movements a day. This is especially true for the freshman. Ideally, at some point each day they are able to turn their brain off and just work hard. Besides, the workout is only an hour, we don’t have time for a thousand questions.

Here I also have a few “//”s. These are emphasis points. I also try to add a few potential questions to ask to help teach these things. This is for a teaching technique called bandwidth feedback that I will explain another time.

Circuit - Tabata - Jump Lunges, Bridge Circles, Farmers Carries

Then we have the real push. This will be a circuit- today it is a Tabata. :30 second sets with a brief pause in between exercises. After each round we will have a 1 minute break. We will do as many rounds as we can. In this format, its guaranteed to be hard as long as the athletes work.

Recovery - MFR - IT Band

Finally, we will spend time recovering every workout. Besides a huge benefit in longevity and injury prevention, we want to emphasize that working hard isn’t just about blowing out your lungs. Working hard is in all sorts of places. Whether that be working out, recovery, school, or work. We generally focus on MFR (myofascial release). With minimal time we can’t spend a half-hour on this. So for these workouts, I will teach them key areas they should be rolling out regularly.

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