Trampoline Periodization Series: Article 4 Maximum Strength

Hello Everyone,

Welcome to the 4rth article of the series. This article will focus on how to develop the maximum strength of the athlete. This phase is usually where a lot of injuries occur if it is not done correctly and or if the phases before were not trained properly. The athlete has to be mentally and physically ready for this phase for it to work properly.

The “maximum Strength” phase includes exercises that are forcing the athlete to use 95-105% of their power. You may ask “how can an athlete use more than 100 % of their strength” This means that athlete is going to fatigue and may not be able to actually accomplish the full number. The athlete should be failing on the last rep. Do not administer a set of 10 at 105% because it will never happen. Due to the fact the intensity is so high the reps must be very low. Usually they are around 3-6. The start of the phase should be 6 reps and as the phase progresses the intensity increases even more and the reps are dropped to 3. In this phase even 1 Rep Max (1RM) can be performed once in a while. 1RMs should not be performed more than once a week to prevent overload and injury.  More on 1RM later.

 The point of Max strength is not to get bigger; we already increased muscle size in the hypertrophy phase to help solidify the body. Now we want the muscle to be useful so that when we ask the muscles to contract fast we will get power.

                                                Speed x Strength=Power

                                                Power= jump height

In trampoline to jump high it is not enough to have very fast contractions, nor is it enough to have Hulk Hogan body type. You need a mix of strength and speed to be able to get a 21 second compulsory. In this phase we are working on the strength. This phase has longer rests and lower volume but higher intensity then our other phases because of the stress it puts on the body.  Keep the exercises simple and short. Squats, push ups, tricep dips, chin ups, crunches, back lifts. Single joint exercises mostly. Full Body exercises are in the next phase and do not jump ahead coaches, even though we all want to. This phase needs to be slow and paced to prevent injury. Every week the athlete should be pushed harder. Text Books say that every 2- 4 weeks change the program.  You are using the same muscles for 4 weeks but use them in different ways every week. For example if your program entails squats, crunch, back lifts, chin ups and  1RM bounding then next week change it to lunges, v lifts, reverse leg lifts and rope climbs. Same muscles, however different orientation. The muscles will learn quicker this way because the muscle says “Hey what’s going on, wait this seems familiar, oh ok I get it”. This happens a lot quicker than if you were to go from our example above of a first week to then say calf raises, handstand push ups, windshield wipers, levers. These are completely different exercises with minimal correlation to the ones done a week before. The coach can keep it simple and change up muscle groups every 3-4 weeks but considering the fact that a complete work out of a trampolinist can be summed up in a few exercises it seems kind of pointless. We also must remember these athletes are still young and learn faster than a 25 year old. A senior team member has gone through these phases and needs to focus individually on each exercise longer then a younger athlete. These younger athletes can breeze through exercise programs differently because their body is still learning. Change it up and take note of their favourite exercises. After a while you will see exercises that they simply put more effort into because they enjoy the movement. I would ten times rather do a V lift then a leg lift. Same muscles but I try harder on V lifts so it would make sense for my coach to prescribe V lifts.

During this “Maximum Strength” phase the athlete should still be doing aerobic conditioning. Start off conditioning with 10 laps and gradually increase it. I also force my athletes to increase their muscle endurance by jogging to exercises rather then walk and take their time. For this phase it will be harder to do that because if the athlete is tired during the exercise then you are not getting a true strength value. You are getting more endurance then anything. Endurance is not the focus right now. For the other phases have them run and jog and keep the rest minimal but this is 1 of 2 phases that require almost complete rest. Do not let them rest fully or the brain goes to sleep but they need to be rested.

The older athletes and the younger athletes should be doing the same exercises but at different intensities. I have heard coaches say that they won’t condition an athlete before a certain age because they are too young. I recommend these coaches reconsider.  Any athlete can condition even ones with asthma and other medical concerns. Sometimes special routes have to be taken to prevent harm to the athlete however any athlete who wants to do trampoline has to condition or their career in the sport is going to be very short. If coached correctly the older athletes should be able to be left to their own devices so that you as a coach can focus on the newer athletes who are lost. I remember when I conditioned my coach went outside and we didn’t see him for an hour. He taught us what to do and if we were confused we watched the big boys and followed them. I’m not saying leave the property but the idea is the same. If coaching is done correctly it should be very easy and the coach should simply be there for teaching new skills rather than yelling at kids to do things properly.  

So for the first 3 weeks you have the athletes doing exercises at 6 reps then for a few weeks they go to 5 reps and so on and so forth. But what do you do for the 1RM. Not many trampoline and gymnastics trainings focus on a 1RM. The 1RM acts like a muscle shocker. Think of how it feels to jump on a backyard trampoline and then switch to a Eurobed. Naturally the athlete will jump slightly higher because the muscles are prepared for a backyard trampoline. It is the same thing with trampoline conditioning. Trick the muscle into working a bit harder then it thinks it can and eventually the muscle will get use to that new work load and you will see strength gains. If done too much however the muscles will be strained too often and the body will not be able to recover. 1RM training has been shown to increase DOMS more than other forms of exercise. The technical training is still important and if the athlete comes in every day sore then the skills they do in their routines will look pretty bad. Once a week or once every two weeks depending on the training is a good safe number. Without a GoodLife Fitness at your disposal how are you supposed to perform 1 RMs with your athletes? All the coach needs to do is take an exercise and make it seem almost impossible. For the legs what I do is have them do bounding up onto a block as high as they can. It is simply a run and bounce up onto a block with no hands. The height of the block keeps getting higher once they land one. You can have a line up and each athlete jumps then back of the line. It will go pretty quick and the kids love it because it is like a competition to them. For core I will have the athlete lie back over a vault or block so they are lifting their upper body up with an athlete holding their feet. I then put weight on them and tell them to sit up. I make it hard so they literally cannot move then I relax a bit and allow the athlete to sit up a tiny amount. It is like a cycle I repeat until the athlete has sat all the way up. If you have done it right the athlete will feel like collapsing. Same can be done for chin ups as long as I apply the correct amount of pressure. You have to allow the athlete to move a bit but make sure it is very slow and he or she wants to give up. Then you give them some motivating words of encouragement and push them through.  It does take a while to perform this so having another coach helping will make it smoother. Train the athletes to do this as well. The older ones should know as much as you do about conditioning.

Here is a sample “Maximum Strength” exercise program for the first week

Exercise	reps	sets	Intensity (RPE)	explanation
Burpies	50	1	14-15	Aerobic and Anaerobic base- increases lactate removal so that rest is shorter in this phase and more can be accomplished
Coach resisted squats	6	2	19-20	Coach will be able to put on variable resistance compared to an athlete sitting on the shoulders. Push harder as the athlete gets closer to 6. Stand on a  block to get better leverage behind the athlete
Chin ups	6	2	19-20	Help athlete or resist athlete depending on the strength
Bounding	5-6	2	17-18	Athlete will not usually get that tired after 6 bounding but the ankles need to learn to take eccentric load and reciprocate that load into a jump. Will help prevent plantar fasciitis. Block should be higher than in last phase
Coach Resisted Sit up	6	2	19-20	Put feet under a block and have athlete lay back with arms above head. Sit up as coach pushes down at a variable degree.
Reverse Leg lifts	6	2	19-20	Push legs down and allow slow contraction as athlete holds onto a block.

As you notice this program is shorter. This is due to the fact the athlete will need a larger break in between every set.  It is not about how much is done all the time, it is about what is done. For the one RM days do the same protocols just put on a lot more resistance so the athlete is unable to complete the exercise after one rep.

What if the athlete is bigger than the coach and the coach cannot put enough pressure on the athlete? It is all about leverage.  Most exercises the athlete will not be able to resist the weight of a coach. The only one that may be a problem is squats. I do not see an athlete who is crunching while their coach hangs off of them. I do not see a coach sitting on the legs of an athlete who is doing a reverse leg raise. Unfortunately there is not much a coach can do to increase the intensity of a squat without adding weight. Unless you have a squat rack this may be very hard. So try making the athlete do single leg squats with resistance. Get a knee high block against the wall and have the athlete start with one leg straight and the other half bent on the block. Instruct them to have only their heel touching to prevent a push off. 

Figure 1: Single leg squat

I would encourage any gym that has high level athletes to buy a bar bell with weights. Any manufacturer will have used ones for a good price.  

Let us take a minute and discuss tapering. This is the concept of reducing the workload before a competition. If you have started this program in September then the athletes are competing by the time you get to this phase. This makes it tricky depending on the timing of the competitions. During the week of a competition, reduce the amount of conditioning but do not change the phase. Instead of 2 sets maybe only do one set and the time it takes to do the other can be spent doing routines beforehand. Please coaches do not get any bright ideas the week before a competition. Keep it simple and easy, no point in working a brand new skill two days before a competition. There is lots of time for that but the last thing that needs to happen is an injury because the athlete tried a flifis that he or she has never done before. Stick to routines and drills and half the conditioning program and increase the stretching program by a bit. Not much because that will create soreness as well but a slight increase like an extra 30 seconds on each stretch would be great.

It has been shown that stability and balance exercises cause the same musle activation as heavy loads. This means that during tapering and injuries the athlete can work on balance exercises instead of high intensity “Maximum Strength” training. Here are a few examples:

Single leg squats on the ground

Handstand balancing

Balance beam exercises

Stand on one leg catching foams or a ball

Log rolls- athlete starts on back in a hollow rock position and rolls over to stomach, then again to   

                  back all the way down a line trying not to touch the ground.

Single leg hops on a soft matt

Foam Pit races

Balance board – get a piece of wood and a large dowel

     All of these exercises stress the muscle but in a less intense fashion so they may be proper substitutes for conditioning during a period of tapering or rehabilitation.

Next is our “Power Phase”. 

Thanks everyoneJ