Science of Sports Training
How to engineer athleticism for efficient, injury-free performance.
Table of Contents
The role of the nervous system
Understanding the body as a whole
Scientific approach
Slow, inflexible strength is insufficient
Athleticism is trainable
Maximizing athletic potential
Efficient motor reflexes
Real-time feedback
True strength and flexibility
Integrity throughout the kinetic chain
Conditioning and endurance as bi-products
Training Fundamentals
Each sport presents individual requirements to athletes, but despite the diversity of sports skills, there are fundamentals, which primarily include the development of the Musculoskeletal System (MS) and Nervous System (NS).
The Role of the Nervous System
While both are important, the NS is what controls athletic performance, either hindering or unleashing athletic potential. Development of the NS ultimately determines the extent of athletic efficiency.
Sports and exercise science largely avoids this aspect of physical training because it’s extremely complex and difficult to grasp well enough to explain on paper.
Understanding the Body as a Whole
Luckily, we don’t have to be able to explain something fully to understand how to influence it positively.
The most important thing for an athlete or performance coach is not to be able to dissect and recite the complex anatomy and functions of the different body parts, but to have the appropriate practical understanding and competence to use and develop the body as a whole.
Scientific, Going Beyond Theory
Training athletes is scientific, not theoretical. There is a difference.
Our aim is to be able to demonstrate and teach sound athletic integrity and efficiency based on practical science, to help athletes unleash their full potential.
Nothing is more scientifically valid than nature. Observe the natural athleticism of animals.
Humans are the only species that cause their own injuries and have to be taught how to move naturally (efficiently).
Improving Efficiency Of The Neurological Response
We believe top performing athletes require and deserve intelligent training, where strength gains always lead to more potential energy with less effort, accomplished by improving efficiency of the neurological response.
Slow, Inflexible Strength Is Insufficient
Most training methods, exercises, and tools build “slow, inflexible strength” that are excessively taxing on the joints and don’t adequately train the nervous system. The result is insufficient transfer between training and the ability to effortlessly generate more kinetic potential for more speed and power.
Over time, athletes get worn down, performance degrades, and injuries get in the way. You see these effects commonly as athletes age.
The truth is, if you train correctly you can improve both the integrity of the musculoskeletal system and the efficiency of the nervous system to perform better and become more resilient with age.
Athleticism Is Trainable
Most coaches and trainers rely exclusively on “classic” training not because it’s the best way, but because they don’t know a better way.
Nobody will teach you the unorthodox styles or qualities of exceptional athletes that seemingly have an unfair genetic athletic advantage, because it’s almost always attributed to genetics and what “can’t be taught.”
We beg to differ. We believe, and have proven that athleticism is trainable. It is attainable through training not just muscular strength, but also elasticity and neurological efficiency.
Maximizing Athletic Potencial
To maximize your athletic potential you have to be willing to go beyond the status quo. Certain fundamental elements in training will always be there — you need to build baseline strength in the basic patterns, but it’s important not to overdo it with this type of training.
Your training must give your body a chance to recover properly as well as to develop unique skills, irregular movements, and individuality.
Too much structured, monotonous, classical training will not allow enough room for creativity and full development, and will cause your body (and mind) to burn out quicker as the years go by.
Efficiency Is King
Efficient Motor Reflexes
An athlete should develop efficiency of muscular actions at the level of motor reflexes, rather than wasting energy and time with having to think or using forced muscle efforts. The latter will accumulate unhealthy tensions and develop unproductive fear-reactivity.
It’s important to learn proper use of relaxation and rhythm to optimize the work of antagonist
muscles to improve speed, power, and agility.
Real-Time Feedback
Utilizing effective, less conventional training tools can give you the right type of real-time practical feedback to develop meaningful abilities. There’s little value in wasting time on ineffective exercises and/or equipment that don’t provide meaningful feedback about your integrity or efficiency.
Seek objective sources of feedback that don’t depend on subjective, irrelevant coaching cues that may or may not be accurate. The right tools and exercises provide clear, consistent, real-time meaningful feedback.
Are you able to perform the task/movement/exercise efficiently, pain-free, and produce a successful result, or not? And if so, are you able to repeat it within an instant?
Athletes get real-time feedback with our training process. They are forced to adjust their techniques to develop better perception, sensitivity, flexibility, coordination, and timing to get the optimal result.
This works much better than a coach’s prompts/cues combined with exercises that demand little in terms of relevant capability or true efficiency from the athlete.
True Strength & Flexibility
Proper training develops flexibility, coordination, rhythm, and speed without any sacrifice in strength and stability. It develops the highest level of athletic flexibility, a function of joint mobility, elasticity, and relaxation, for true strength.
It also develops dynamic balance — where you learn to put the whole bodyweight force into movements instantly and without losing your footing or straining/excessively overloading muscles, tendons, or joints. It helps you develop the perception to add pronounced accents in the correct phase of your movements for maximum power with minimum effort.
Integrity Throughout The Kinetic Chain
There is no quick and easy way to cultivate the feeling of movement integrity and efficiency throughout the entire kinetic chain.
Using the correct types of tasks and exercises in practice/training will help to develop a stronger
sense of kinetic integrity and efficiency by way of integrating the muscle actions of the legs, torso, and arms into a single chain of movement.
Using the wrong types of exercises however will promote isolated/disjointed muscle actions that will impede kinetic integrity and efficiency.
Conditioning & Endurance As Bi-Products
Lastly, with the proper type of training, fitness/conditioning/endurance is just an afterthought and is of minimal importance in training because it’s mostly a natural consequence of a highly functioning body with integrity and efficiency.
The more efficient a machine is, the longer and harder you can run it, with the least amount of strain or damage. That’s why we say “efficiency is king.”
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