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The Case for Explosive Training-Part 1

By George Hearn

Many of you have no doubt either come across someone or read an article warning you of the dangers of explosive training. What I want to do in this article is examine some of these "dangers" and show you why they indicate that you SHOULD train explosively. We will examine several effects that explosive training have on both performance and on qualities that may aid in the prevention of athletic injuries.

Let's get one thing out in the open-explosive (or ballistic) training CAN BE more dangerous than doing slow, controlled lifts and drills-relatively speaking. That depends on your definition of dangerous. Is performing a barbell snatch potentially more dangerous than doing a bicep curl locked into a Nautilus machine, or even a set of low velocity upright rows? This might be so, but competing in a contact sport like football or basketball is more dangerous than walking down the hallway at school. The question is-Does it make sense to expose yourself to explosive, ballistic loading in a relatively controlled, progressive manner. And, are there benefits that are derived from such progressive ballistic loading that cannot be had via any other method? It could be said that getting out of bed is also relatively more dangerous than staying there-you could fall down, have a greater chance of suffering a heart attack due to increased stress or any more of a number of "dangerous" things. If you stay there though, you sure won't accomplish much! The point I am trying to make is that you have to weigh the potential risks vs. the rewards in anything you do-training for sport is no different.

Now, let's look at some of these potential "risks" and see how they can be positives, if not imperatives. For example, it is true that lifting a weight as quickly as possible generates more tension in the muscle than lifting the same weight slowly. Some have said that this poses a risk in regard to the stress exceeding the connective tissues ability to withstand it. This MAY be true if an inappropriate load for the athletes present ability is used. However, if a load that allows emphasis on bar speed is used, and good technique is observed, then this form of exercise can provide a progressive exposure to the explosive/ballistic forces the athlete must exert and absorb in the playing arena. In this way, the athlete is more prepared than he or she would be had they not trained in this manner. The following paragraphs will examine this principle in more detail.

Let's first look at progressive overload from a connective tissue standpoint. There is a principle in orthopedics known as Wolff's Law. This law basically states that tissue adapts to the stresses and tension placed upon it. This adaptation occurs with a certain amount of specificity as to the type of stress that is imposed. As Dr. Mel Siff covers in his book Supertraining-"Graded progressive explosive training causes adaptation in the entire musculoskeletal system, with the rate of loading determining how the different tissues are conditioned. For this reason, it is important to use a wide variety of loading rates and durations to offer all-round musculoskeletal training." So, if you are engaged in a sport that requires ballistic muscle contractions and the absorption of ballistic forces by the body (blocking, tackling etc.), it makes sense to expose yourself to those types of stresses in training. To not do so may result in your joints and muscles being more vulnerable to injury.

Ballistic exercise is much closer to actual sports function in terms of the way muscles contract in it's performance. Ballistic exercise produces an initial burst of activity and high tension in the prime movers, followed by a strong eccentric contraction of the antagonist muscle groups to slow down or reverse the initial motion. This is exactly what happens in most sporting actions. For example, lets examine the action which takes place at the shoulder when a pass is thrown in football. As the arm is brought forward, the action is initiated by the internal rotators and adductors of the shoulder, with additional contributions from the trunk flexor and rotator musculature. Upon release of the ball, the external rotators and abductors of the shoulder, as well as the trunk extensors go through a phase of eccentric contraction to stop the movement of the shoulder and trunk respectively. This is an oversimplification of what occurs, but it does illustrate how your muscles function in a practical sense. So, what is happening is you are conditioning your muscles to function in a manner closer to what is demanded of them in your sport.

This should give you a glimpse into the way your muscles and other soft tissues respond and perform in an actual sport activity. As you can see, explosive exercise can be used to reproduce those responses in a controlled training environment. In part 2 of this article, we will look a little closer at how this type of exercise can effect the way you perform on the playing field.

About the Author:

George Hearn is a fitness and performance consultant in Nashville, TN, with a degree in Physical Therapy from Northwestern University and over 20 years clinical and training experience. He works with clients both locally and online. You can learn more about George at www.MaxximumPerformance.com