Draft prep movement training can be a challenging periodization to plan for since there is a short mesocycle of typically 8 weeks. The goal is to reach the highest genetic potential of speed for each athlete safely but quickly. You will see how we periodize for our draft prep training down to the week, day, and exercise.
The format we use to lay out the periodization is organized so we can see the day and type of training to the left. Moving to the right you’ll see the aspect of training weather its camps, plyometrics, technical drills, or application drills. Our camps are always first and designed to specifically prepare the athlete for the type of training planned for that day. For instance, Mondays and Thursdays are agility days that involve lots of lateral change of direction may dictate that more lateral lunging or hip adduction/abduction focused exercises will be implemented into CAMPS. Plyometrics typically follow CAMPS. Application typically follows the plyometrics and the technical drills are implemented between application drills based on flaws the athlete may present during the application drill. The volume (reps and sets) for each application drill depends on form and injury imitations. Typically, if the athlete is healthy high volume of basic level speed work is recommended in the first week. The focus of Tuesdays and Fridays is linear speed. Wednesday is our active recovery day with the focus on doing speed drills in our Olympic pool. The pool allows us to de-load the joints since the pool water will support half the weight of the athlete.
Week 1 is our general preparatory phase (GPP). In this phase the athletes are medically evaluated to identify imbalances. Our exercises are designed to balance the athlete then progressively overload the body to solidify the bilateral muscle balance. Much of emphasis is put building a base level of strength so the muscles can adapt to basic speed drills. The more high level advanced training is dependent on the base level GPP adaptation to speed training to maximize speed and avoid injury. There is a heavy emphasis on learning technique for agility and 40-yard dash starts. Lots of resistance speed training is utilized to work on the acceleration phase.
Week 2 is our intensification phase. More volume is added to the exercises introduced in the GPP phase. Also, longer buildups into the a-run exercises are added along with more heavy resistance training on acceleration sprint training. In this phase we will introduce phase 1 of assisted sprint training. The assistance will be really short with maybe just for the first step of a 10-yard sprint. This drill is high-risk high reward, which is why there is multiple phases the progress in intensity. Only athletes that are healthy will partake in assisted work.
Week 3 drills progress in volume, resistance, and distance of each drill. Phase 2 of overspeed is introduced with ankling and buttkick drills. The athletes’ muscles are now prepped for higher intensity drills such as phase 2 of over speed.