This is our lifting routine, 2 days per week
Note: I am not an Athletic Trainer, Physical Therapist, or an expert in weightlifting techniques. There are an abundance of videos / information telling us why nearly every exercise on earth is wrong, dangerous, or done poorly. I make corrections to our videos and directions when I learn something new and / or have time. I have attended and passed certification courses from USATF, USTFCCCA, US Army, US Coast Guard, and USA Weightlifting and have applied many of these methods to well over 6,000 customers, along with use myself. I’ve copied, as best I can, the bulk of this workout from the Ryan Flaherty / Tim Ferriss Podcast. I’ve used this workout with some athletes with great results - I often tell athletes and coaches to listen to this podcast, and take detailed notes, at least 3 times.
Do we lift high reps and low weight… or low reps and high weight? This is kind of a bad question. We do a combination of all types, depending on the time of our season. Our goal is to develop explosive, injury-resistant athletes with our weight room sessions.
Our Lifting Sessions:
1) When: Immediately after our 2 speed / sprint sessions per week… even if the sprint session was very low volume / not difficult.
2) We come back to the gym, jog on the treadmill for 5 minutes, do about 4 minutes of Sprint Drills / skips, lunge twists, etc..
3) We perform this Bridge w/ Band during our Warm-up. 8 reps x 8 seconds:
4) We then stand on our Vibrating Plate x 60 seconds with both legs, then 30 seconds with each single leg. We use a pretty high frequency: 100+
5) Hexbar Deadlift Warm-up. Without Drop
We load the desired warm-up weight, usually 40-50% of the workout weight. We will do 5 reps without dropping the weight.
Always keep the back flat. Keep the eyes looking slightly up - NEVER down. Breath out on the way up.
60 second rest.
Warm-up Weight again - maybe 55%. We will do 5 reps without dropping the weight.
60 seconds rest.
Warm-up Weight again - maybe 60%. We will do 5 reps without dropping the weight.
6) Hexbar Deadlift Workout. With Drop
We load the desired weight, for the workout.
One day per week we do about 4 sets of 8 reps. The other day we do 4 sets of 4. Dropping the weight each time.
Always keep the back flat. Keep the eyes looking slightly up - NEVER down. Heels on the ground - drive through the heels. Breath out on the way up.
Talk to your coach about the amount of weight to use for each, day, week, and month.
Complete the first set. Walk around for 30 seconds.
7) Complete 6-12 explosive jumps. Jump high and jump fast. Do NOT overthink this.
8) Take a 3 minute walking rest.
9) Repeats the Deadlift and the Jumps until all desired sets are complete.
10) We then go to our Bent Over Rows
6 Sets of 8 Reps. Talk to your coach about the amount of weight.
Keep the back flat; Eyes up; Breath out on the way up. Pull high up toward the chest. Extend the arms most of the way at the bottom.
90 second rest between each set.
1st and 4th set is underhand grip.
2nd and 5th set is wide grip.
3rd and 6th set is wide grip.
11) We then do Bulgarian Split Squats. 3 sets of 9 repetitions. 90 seconds rest between each set. Each leg does 3 sets! Talk to your coach about how much weight to use.
This video has some good advice on the technique:
Bulgarian Split Squat YouTube Video
12) We occasionally add Single Leg Bench Jumps at this point in the workout. Maybe once every 4th workout. 3 sets of 4 with each leg. Jump and land off the same leg. Jump high and far. Work on explosion.
13) We then do Single Leg 3-inch Drops: Stand on a platform. Balance on 1 leg. Lower down about 3 inches and maintain your balance. If needed, use a wall for balance. 2 sets of 20 for each leg. 60 seconds rest between each set.
14) For our Cool Down, we start with 7 Way Hips
Here is the 7 Way Hips Youtube Video Do this with each leg. 2 times per week.
15) We then go back to the Vibration Plate - see Step #4 above.
16) We then drink our post workout shake immediately.
17) We then walk for about 5 minutes and do some light / EASY drills for about 3 minutes.
18) We then Ice Bath x 12 minutes at 48-50 degrees temperature. You can buy a tub at Home Depot. This tub is made by Tubble and was purchased on Amazon. Buy a pool thermometer, an ice maker / bags of ice, and you are good to go. Keep the water moving around by gently moving the legs or swishing the water around.
19) The athlete then takes a shower and eats while using the Normatec Compression pants x 30 minutes.
Training Logs: It is fairly important to keep track of all the work you are doing.
We keep track of this specific workout on our Sprint Log, because we do this workout on our 2 sprint days each week. Notice the Bounding Log is maintained on this paper as well.
