3 Principles of Strength Training

The goal of conditioning is to prepare our bodies to do the unusual and unique movements of your chosen activity, whether that is yoga, dance, soccer or rollerblading.

There are 3 principles that need to be addressed in strength training in order to maximize your efforts.  The 3 principles are overload, specificity and reversibility.

The overload principle states that the strength of a muscle cannot be increased unless the muscles are stressed or worked beyond their normal workload.  You can do this in a variety of ways. You can increase the frequency of the exercise program, the duration, or the intensity.

Let’s say you want to be strengthen your ability to jump higher.

• You could do single leg toe rises, a set of 10 – 3 times a day (increasing the frequency by increasing the times you repeat it during the day.)
• You could do one set of toe risers working your way up to more reps (allowing the fatigue of the calf muscles to determine how many you do – increasing the duration)
• You could do a set of toe risers, then do 5 single leg jumps (which increases the intensity)

The principle of specificity states that the way you strengthen a muscle group should be as similar as possible to your desired movement goal. The example that I use most often for specificity training is abdominal exercises.

Most athletes know how to do “crunches” – which do strengthen the abdominal muscles, but not in the same coordination that they would be used for standing up straight and weaving a soccer ball down the field, for example.

The abdominal muscles in a crunch are doing an concentric contraction which means the length between the ends of the muscle are shortening, while the abdominals work more generally in an eccentric and isometric contractions when you are standing and walking. (Isometric contraction means the length of the muscle stays the same, eccentric contraction means the muscle lengthens as it contracts)

The last principle, reversibility, describes the loss of strength that happens when you stop training. This loss of strength can occur rapidly unless there is some other form of cross training to take its place. Generally speaking, a muscle needs to be conditioned at least two times a week in order to maintain its level of strength.

What does this mean in practical terms? A common example would be the person who doesn’t work out all winter long and then when summer comes they try and jump right in.  Clearly they are going to have a longer time getting back in shape than someone who went to the gym a few times a week throughout the year.

There are two factors that influence the strength of a muscle. The first is the size of the muscle and the second is the nervous system’s ability to control the muscle. Each muscle has many muscle fibers – often up into the hundreds of thousands.

When these fibers receive a message or signal from the nervous system they contract, or shorten. If the movement requires little strength, then fewer fibers will be directed to contract. As more strength is required, then more muscle fibers are called into action. Through strength training the nervous system is learning to better coordinate the contraction of muscle fibers – this increases their strength without increasing their size. It will do this naturally when the body is in good anatomical alignment – AND – when the athlete is not overworking their musculature.

What do I mean by that?  Turning on the whole body, tightening everything up no matter what the movement is.  Smart athletes are efficient with their muscle usage.  They have well-toned muscles, which are muscles that are strong and flexible.

Understanding the components of strength training will help you become a smarter and stronger athlete!