Importance of Winter Conditioning
As we move into the heart of winter and with track season just six weeks away in Missouri, it’s important as coaches that we realize how necessary winter conditioning is for achieving great results. About six years ago, Missouri changed rules about conditioning and open facilities. These rule changes gave us the ability to train our kids (legally) year round. Once I was no longer handcuffed with restrictions from the previous rules, our program at Parkway Central began to take off. If you don’t have a formal winter conditioning program you will get out-worked by your peers. Can you still have success? Of course success can still be had in a two and half month track season. However, the less preparation your athletes have coming into the season the less consistent your program’s success will be.
You cannot expect your athletes to be self-motivated to the point that they will warm up, improve their bio-mechanics through drills, do energy system work (like intervals), cool down properly, and then hit the weight room for another hour. I have been blessed to work with a number of great young people and I have yet found a kid that could do all the latter mentioned activities on their own. The take home message in this is you must be there to oversee the work they do and get them to show up on a daily basis. The more time you put in, the more time your athletes will put in.
There are a number of ways to accomplish this task of winter conditioning but all successful high school winter conditioning programs have a few very important things in common. In no particular order: all inclusive, common training groups, consistent variety, and make every kid feel important.
All inclusive keeps you legal in the eyes of your state's governing body of sport. In addition, your school will be more willing to let you train the kids the way you want because you are not having just glorified track practice. Instead you are trying to improve your school's entire athletic community and you will be rewarded by gaining the trust of other coaches.
Common training groups will help you from going insane with kids going a thousand different directions. For example, jumpers will train alongside volleyball players. Lineman will train with throwers. Soccer players will mix up training with sprinters sometimes and distance runners other days. Paring the different groups helps keep your groups slightly larger so they can push one another. It also helps you keep tabs on their training.
Consistent variety helps keep kids interested on a daily basis but at the same time you can create training modules that help speed up the communication during training. For example if I say dynamic warm up two, leg series one, and bantaspeed drills mid-season power. My kids will be able to plow through much of this work without a lot of reminders from me on what comes next in the training. This frees you up to make sure kids are executing these drills properly and allows quicker movement to the next part training throughout the entire session.
To have a very popular program, it cannot be just about your few top athletes. If you focus too much attention in one area you may not be planting the seed for some of your younger or less experienced athletes to succeed later. One way I try to achieve this is to give every group as much as I can give them in specialization in the weight room by creating lifting routines that will enhance their sport. One year I had everything from tennis to bowling strength programs. Every session when we walk in the weight room I write a powerful quote up on the board. I try to find a quote that relates to something a kid may have been struggling with on that particular day. We just started that this winter and the kids really do enjoy seeing what I will put up. I have used Yoda to the Dalai Lama to get a point across to the kids. Most importantly, when a kid leaves from a practice they must shake my hand to check out. Shaking hands allows me each session to speak with every kid that trains with us. At that time I tell them thank you and take a moment to highlight something positive and something to work on for the upcoming session.
About the Author: Ryan Banta is in his 11th season coaching track and field, and is currently the head coach at Parkway Central High School in St. Louis, MO. He also helps coach a track and field club, the St. Louis Lightning. He has coached numerous athletes to success in his career including a state record 4x800m in 2009. He was also invited to the Olympic Training Center as an emerging elite coach. To find out more about Coach Banta, check out his profile on our site and also on EliteTrack.Com.