Specificity

[Guest guest]

The purpose of weight training is to increase the ability of the body

to produce force in the same muscle groups and ranges of motion that

are used in sprinting (for example). Thus, it would seem that the

exercises that have the greatest chance of transfering to sprinting

are those that work the same muscle groups in a similar way.

For example if you were to choose between the bent over row and the

bench press to improve shot put performance, you would choose bench

press, because it works the same muscle groups as the shot put and it

works them in a similar way. Are you saying that the bench press is

considered mimicry? Doesn't an exercise have to look somewhat like

the sporting action in question to be functional?

Could you (or anyone) please explain exactly which 'basic tenets of

specificity and transfer' the power clean and squat address, but

which the single leg 8 " box step up does not? - None of these 3

exercises can address the speed or 'rate of force development'

portion of the speed/power equation, since they are all relatively

slow compared to a foot contact time in a sprint. (And according to

the presentation - it is not the actual speed of a strength training

movement that counts, but rather the intended speed that counts

anyway). Therefore all that any weighted exercise can hope to do is

improve the force production ability of the body. The effect of this

should be that the body 'feels lighter' and can therefore be moved

faster.

I do not see how the step up is less specific or would cause any more

neural confusion than a squat or power clean. It is a technically

simple exercise to perform and it allows a far greater load per leg

than a squat or power clean. It also works the muscles in a relevant

range of motion - developing strength in the top 1/4 of the knee and

hip extension and not wasting time, energy and recovery ability

developing strength that will not be used while sprinting.

Lyndon McDowell

Brookings, SD

USA

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To: Supertraining

From: kshobman@...

Date: Tue, 19 Feb 2008 13:55:23 -0600

Subject: Re: Specificity

There is an excellent presentation in the Supertraining files on

specificity. I'll let you figure out the difference from that.

Miimicry

is pretty much never good as it ignores basic tenets of specificity

and

transfer and instead simply attempts to add resistance to a movement

that 'mimics' the sporting movement. At best this isn't really going

to

do any good and at worse it may cause some neural confusion.

Squatting is the more efficient exercise for base strength. 'Transfer

better' is a bit of a loaded question, since there are far more

variables than simply exercise selection which determine that.

However,

a unilateral exercise simply isn't necessary and by definition would

take twice as long to perform.

And yes, you have to transfer. Zatsiorsky makes a statement something

like 'the transfer of strength to speed is of exceeding difficulty'

in

the Science and Practice of Strength Training, which anyone coaching

sprinters can attest to.

Personally, if I could only do one exercise for all athletes for

sprinting I think it would be the clean. And my preferred method of

transfer would be sprints and sprint starts. Because specificity does

rule and if you want to run faster - than run fast.

As did say, with more than one exercise I would probably perform

squats,

cleans or high pulls, glute-ham-gastroc raises and jumps of various

types. And, of course, I would sprint.

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