Optimal Life Fitness, for health, fitness and a new lifestyle outdoors.

If you are a Strength and Conditioning Coach, thinking about becoming one or even just doing the fitness for the local park football side, the following points can be considered my Top 10 pointers for managing your role:

1. Know the Strength and Conditioning Requirements for the Sport:- finding out the requirements for the sport is the crucial first step. Is it a power based sport, does the athlete need to be fast, do they need to be strong, how long do they perform? Requirements may be position specific and individuals may have different needs. Knowing what biomotor abilities the sport requires is a crucial first step.
2. Assess your Athletes:- getting a bench mark of where your athletes/ clients current levels of strength and conditioning are at is vital. Performing specific and relative physical assessments that are also repeatable will help you understand where your clients are at in relation to where they need to be and will also serve as a tool for measuring progressions- you need to know if your programe is working!
3. Know what the Coach wants:- this is hugely important. You may have the best strength and conditioning programme written but if the coach feels the team needs more attack or defence time s/he is going to get it. If you have have a full-time S&C position this may not be as great a problem. Once you know what the wants the next thing is to work out how much time you will be given and how often.
4. Have a Plan:- once you have an understanding of the needs of the sport, assessed your team/ athletes and have an understanding and agreement with the coach (as to how much time you will actually have) you now need ot have a plan. The plan will need to consider all elements of training as per the needs of the sport, it will also need to consider seasonal variants. Having a periodisation or plan that includes an off season, pre- season and competition time including peak matches, recovery weeks will help in making sure you get all that your athletes need in. This plan may include giving athletes extra and individual homework and food plans, you may have athletes needing to: put on weight; lose weight; get faster; get stronger.
5. Be Adaptable:- even if you have the best laid out plan you will not get to do everything you need to do with your athletes- just accept this and roll with it. The key here is to be adaptable, work out what is needed and what you can do to meet these needs. Sometimes equipment may not be available, the ground might be snowed under, the lights on the track might not be on, you may not have all the equipment you need- these things will happen be prepared and be ready to adapt.
6. Have Passion:- this point could have been the first one. If you don't have a passion for what you do you will find it very difficult to succeed. This goes for anything you opt to do in life.
7. Be an Educator:- not all of your athletes are going to be meat heads. They will appreciate all that you are trying to do for them if you take it upon yourself to educate them rahter than dictate to them.
8. Keep it Simple:- movements are movements. The people at the top have gotten to where they are today by performing the basic movements well. Getting too complex may take you further from where you need to be.
9. Keep it Progressing:- training is about progressing. By keeping it simple you have a better means of ensuring progression.
10. Keep it Fun:- fun and variation may appear to contradict the previous points but making simple adjustments and variations are also key in maintaining interest and progression.
11. Be Organised and Record Everything:- these are an extra couple of points but are going to ensure that you are able to what you do.

These points have become more obvious to me over the last couple of months since I've been doing the Strength and Conditioning for a semi-professional Rugbly League team. We've had training sessions snowed out, rained out, fields closed, faulty lights, and gotten by doing all of our weights work with 4 bars and a whole lot of imagination.