Athletic training is a broad term and is always subjective to the sport you play. Every sport and every position is going to have a difference in training needs and athletic qualities which you must adapt to, which is why athletic training evolves around one main point:... ⭐ TRAIN FOR PURPOSE ⭐ Training for purpose means the workouts and exercises you do have specific reason to be carried out and a crossover to your sport. The aim is to become better at said sport, which means you have to include movements that would enhance how you move in the pitch, track, court, ring or pool. 🦵 IMPORTANCE OF YOUR LOWER BODY 🦵 Every sport is primarily on your feet, involving a variety of different movements. This means you should NEVER be neglecting training your lower body in different movement styles, creating a strong, powerful and functional base. You ankle and foot strength are important, which means you should do movements which require you to be in an extended ankle position; whether it's body weight or under additional resistance, your ankles most build the strength and stability. Your posterior chain will also be a dominant muscle group whilst performing your sport as it's used in all forms of lifting, jumping and running. It's best to strengthen these through compound movements. 🦘 PLYOMETRICS 🦘 To increase your speed and your fast twitch muscle fibres, you should be practising plyometric movements in your workouts. These are jumps and throws, which are either under no or low load, that require you to exert as much force as quickly as possible: box jump, broad jump, medicine ball slams, wall slams. Most sports require you to be fast, and your speed may give you an upper hand against your opposition. Plyometrics don't have to have great volume, but should have high quality of reps as you want to focus on exerting as much force at a time to make the movement as fast as possible. 🏋️ OLYMPIC LIFTS & EXPLOSIVE MOVEMENTS 🏋️ Olympic movements work on your explosive power in triple extension, using a number of muscle groups, and are mainly under two exercises: clean and jerk, and snatch. These lifts have a number of variations that are more popular than the originals, such as hang cleans, which have a lesser range of motion but still allow you to train your explosive power. Olympic lifts are great for developing core strength, upper and lower body power, and overall stability from your ankles up to your shoulders. Although they are greta, sometimes you don't need them and can simply do your basic compound movements in an explosive form, such as box squats which power onto ankle extension. These movements cross over well to the majority of sports as you need to build speed and power, using as much force as possible.

Progressing in the gym is something that some people don't know how to do... "I've been going to the gym for 2 months now but I'm not really adding on much weight to my lifts!" Progressive overload is the key to PROGRESSION (funnily enough) and this is how to master it. There are 6️⃣ ways to add progressive overload into your workouts: ⭐ Add more weight ⭐ Increase reps and sets ⭐ Increase the frequency ⭐ Improve your form ⭐ Increased time under tension ⭐ Less rest in between sets ADDING MORE WEIGHT: Adding more weight to your exercises can be done well, or it can be done badly. You should be considerate about how much weight you increase your lifts by, as you don't want to risk "ego lifting" which will make you prone to injury. For your compound lifts, adding weight will be easy as the total weight lifted is going to be high in comparison to isolation exercises such as lateral raises; the jumps will have to be proportionality smaller. If you're going for a new weight, consider asking an experienced gym member for a spot in case you've gone too high. INCREASING REPS AND SETS: If you're finding that your last reps aren't as intense anymore, you can always add more reps and sets onto your exercise to reach fatigue. A specific strategy people to add more reps is "cheat reps. This where you compensate your form to really squeeze out as many reps as possible, reaching true failure. Always important to do this safely and only when you're comfortable with a movement. INCREASE THE FREQUENCY: Your biceps aren't growing? Train them an extra day of the week. Increase frequency spreads the workload across a longer timeframe and also allows much more volume than adding extra sets. For example, in a single workout you may just be able to add one additional sets after your initial three working sets (totalling four sets), but now you can repeat that four on a separate day; that's a lot more muscle use. Consider how much time you have in the gym to repeat exercises on different days and make sure you're not over training. You must allow your muscles time to recover, which means you can't just head bench press every day of the week, you'll be too fatigued.

The gym can be an intimidating space if you've never been before, and it's the biggest excuse I hear for people not going - "it's a bit scary". How can you start your gym journey with less anxiety and look like you own that shit? 1️⃣ Go with a friend: A gym partner can do many things for you, but mainly for us they can make you feel more at ease and your sessions more enjoyable. Depending on the individual, being alone may snowball your gym anxiety, so a familiar face is the perfect solution for some. When you both become more experienced, you can start to push each other and excelerate your gains. 2️⃣ Have a program: To ensure you're not confused in what you're doing, you must have direction, and the best way to do this is by having a good gym program to follow. Knowing what exercise and how many sets/reps you have in store, makes everything smoother and you feel like you know what you're doing! That's going to feel very contrasted to the original "HELP I HAVE NO CLUE WHAT TO DO" sensation. 3️⃣ Make friends: The gym community is fantastic and very supportive. Making friends with people in your gym as a great way in becoming more relaxed and comfortable. How can you make friends with all these strangers? Piss easy: - Compliment their gym clothes and ask where they got it from. - Compliment a lift and ask how much weight they were lifting. - Ask for advice on form. - Ask if you can work in on a machine they're using (9/10 times they'll say yes!). - Ask them to spot you and then see how their session is going It's just standard conversation skills, but it's so helpful! 🤷‍♂️ 4️⃣ Shove those headphones on and stop giving a fuck: People at the gym are more concerned about themselves and how they look, then being bothered watching you. Don't believe me? That's exactly how you feel! Realising no one gives a fuck about you and they're here to mind their own business should relieve you of the pressures you're making up in your head. Get some headphones, put your favourite music on and follow your training program, having a great session.

How you structure and Crete your training plan, should always be routed in your purpose: what are you training for? If you're a long distance runner, why the fuck would you need to do 1 rep max deadlifts? Would you need to be doing plyometrics if you're a body builder? The point is, your training should be crafted around your goals - simple! 🤝 Let's take a look at some examples! 👀 Powerlifting: The aim for a powerlifter is to move as much weight as possible, under competition conditions, for squat, bench and deadlift. This means you're going to be prioritising your compound movements, getting your body progressively overloading the weight in which you move, focusing in the lower rep ranges. Your primary compound movements (squat, bench and deadlifts) should be accompanied by secondary compounds such as cable pull downs, barbell rows and shoulder press as they benefit supportive/stabilising muscles in your main movement. Lastly, you want to include a selection of accessories that directly target weaker muscles in your squat, bench and deadlift. For example, triceps, hamstrings, adductors and hip flexors. Body Building: The aim for a body builder is to put on as much symmetrical, well-shaped muscle mass to suit the category they're competing on; it's all about aesthetics. You'd want to be including a lot of free weight AND machine compounds, staying in the slightly higher rep ranges, specifically focusing in intensity and time under tension. body builders will use plenty of accessory exercises to make smaller muscles pop and achieve a fuller, more detailed physique. Athletic Training: The aim really depends on what sports you do. Athletic training will focus in sport specific movements and whatever crosses over to your sport/position the best. For example, a prop in rugby will do a lot more heat compound lifts than the winger in the team, as they must be adapted to exerting as much force as possible in scrums and heavy hits. A track athlete, will do lots of plyometrics, olympic lift variations (such as power cleans) and unilateral movements to replicate the split stance of running. There's a lot of variation!

You've just started, or thinking about starting the gym, but you see this big slabs of metal and all the experienced gym bros, and you get a bit overwhelmed. Fear not, this is the basics of lifting weights and the main movements you should be doing. 🏋️‍♂️ COMPOUNDS 🏋️‍♂️ Compound lifts are movements that involve 2 or more hinges of your body. These type of exercises are the best for putting on overall mass and strength, and definitely the focus of what new lifters should be learning. Let's have a look at what compound lifts you can be doing: - SQUAT VARIATIONS: barbell back squat, barbell front squat, goblet squat, Bulgarian split squat, lunge, Zercher squat, box squat, leg press, hack squat, pendulum squat, smith machine squat. - HINGE VARIATIONS: deadlift, Romanian (straight leg) deadlift, good mornings, hex/trap bar deadlift, hip thrust, glute bridge. - CHEST PRESS VARIATIONS: barbell bench press (flat or incline), dumbbell bench press (flat or incline), cable chest press, machine chest press, dips, push ups. - OVERHEAD PRESS VARIATIONS: military press, seated dumbbell press, kettle bell overhead press, machine overhead press/ - HORIZONTAL PULL VARIATIONS: barbell row, single arm dumbbell row, machine row, chest supported dumbbell row, seated cable row, landmine row. - VERTICAL PULL VARIATIONS: wide grip pull down (cable or machine), close grip pull down (cable or machine), pull ups, single arm pull down. - ADVANCED LIFTS: Olympic lifts, kettlebell complex, the functional training (will be a separate post) I know what you're thinking... "fuck that's a lot of exercises, how am I supposed to do all of them??" 👀 Don't worry, you don't need to do all of them, just a set few consistently. If we could just pick a few for you to include, this is what we suggest you focus on: ⭐ Barbell Back Squat ⭐ Deadlift ⭐ Leg Press ⭐ Flat Barbell Bench Press ⭐ Incline Dumbbell Bench Press ⭐ Dumbbell Seated Shoulder Press ⭐ Seated Pull Down (close or wide grip)