Developmental Hierarchy Wrestler’s Edition
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INTRODUCTION
I’ve noticed a disturbing trend, particularly in the wrestling community, where coaches blend, blur or confuse sport and skill specific preparedness (SSP) with special physical preparedness (SPP). This results in decisions to:
1. The criteria for selecting movements for ANY sport should be based on the movement’s ability to cause physical adaptations in strength, speed, power, stamina, cardio-respiratory endurance, coordination, agility or whatever physical abilities are required by the sport. The movements that are most effective at causing these adaptations will be DISSIMILAR from sport specific movements. This is how we define “functional movement”.
2. Training is so specific, that adaptations earned in the weight room will not directly improve sport skills. Practicing sport skills is the best way to improve sport skills. However, all sport specific movements require certain fitness abilities in their execution. Improvements in strength and fitness level will allow an athlete the opportunity to learn and execute sport specific movements better than through sports skill practice alone.
If you believe that a fitter athlete is a better athlete (hard to argue), then the BEST way to improve fitness is through strength and conditioning practices. The BEST way for an athlete to know his or her potential in their sport, is to build a big base of general and special physical preparedness, COMBINED with hours upon hours of sport specific skills practice and mental preparedness techniques. No high level athlete reaches his or her potential in their sport through sports practice alone.
3. Strong is strong. There is no such thing as “strong for wrestling!” Sport specific training programs are not what you think. Sport specific training programs should be designed to improve the specific fitness abilities and energy system requirements of the sport. They should not be designed to “mimic” or “closely resemble” sport specific movements.
You have already proven this to yourself by hanging climbing ropes in your wrestling room. Not many coaches or wrestlers will argue that rope climbing is beneficial for a wrestler. Why? Because it improves a fitness ability that is specific to wrestling…grip strength! In 20+ years of competing, coaching and spectating, I have yet to see a wrestling maneuver that looks anything like a rope climb! So, put the bench press back in your training program. It does a much better job at developing upper body pressing strength than rotating dumbbell presses on a swiss ball (these are fine too, but they should be considered as an assistance movement).
SUPPORTING ARGUMENTS: TRAINING HIERARCHY PYRAMID
“A pyramid can only grow as tall as its base.” Louie Simmons, World Renowned Strength Coach
The goal of any athlete is to know his or her potential in their chosen sport. As a young athlete moves through the competition ranks, the type and organization of training he or she engages in becomes increasingly important. At the highest levels of athletic competition (college level and beyond), the athletes that perform best have not only the genetic predisposition to do so, but they are also better prepared physically and mentally than their competition. This sounds like common sense; but it leads to many questions. What is general physical preparedness (GPP) and why is it important? What is special physical preparedness (SPP) and how does it differ from sport specific preparedness (SSP)? How and why should my training program change throughout the year? Does any of this matter? Can’t I just wrestle and be done with it? Not if you care about knowing your potential…
Training Hierarchy Pyramid
Have you heard of Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs? It is often portrayed as a pyramid, with the largest and most fundamental needs at the bottom and secondary or higher level needs at the top:
Maslow’s theory suggests that humans are motivated by unsatisfied needs, and that certain lower level needs need to be fulfilled before higher level needs can be addressed. It is a psychological model that many great companies and organizations use as a framework to help their employees or team members reach their performance potential. Bear with me here, there is a point I’m getting to…
Failing to plan is the same as planning to fail. How many athletes have a plan for improving, or more importantly, reaching their potential? Wouldn’t it be great if there were a model similar to Maslow’s pyramid that would give purpose and direction to an athlete’s training? Well, we’re in luck! Coach Scott Sonnen (CST – Circular Strength Training) has created a theoretical training hierarchy pyramid (THP) that illustrates the developmental stages of athletic performance:
According to this model, any deficiencies in lower levels of the pyramid will adversely affect the ability to maximize potential in higher levels. But, before I dive into how wrestlers can use this framework to reach the highest levels of performance, allow me to define what constitutes each level:
1. General Physical Preparedness (GPP):
“GPP is intended to provide balanced physical conditioning in endurance, strength, speed, flexibility and other basic factors in fitness. GPP may include participation in a variety of different physical activities which provide low intensity, all-round conditioning, with little emphasis on specific sporting skills.”
Mel Siff, Supertraining
We cannot generalize which exercises or activities are considered GPP for all sports, since all sports are unique and require different physical skills and capacities. GPP activities provide balance in fitness by filling in the gaps that are not trained through special physical training (see #2 below) or sport specific training (see #3 below). There is no way to scientifically prove that training GPP works, but the best and most well-known strength coaches train their athletes this way.
Wrestling presents a unique sport. To be a champion wrestler, you must be a fantastic general athlete. Wrestling requires sufficient capacity in strength, speed, power, stamina, coordination, agility and flexibility, as well as, tremendous anaerobic and aerobic work capacity! Because of these requirements, almost any training could be considered specific to wrestling. However, in attempting to classify certain activities as “more general” and “more specific”, we can establish prioritization of training. For example, consider the following running drills:
GPP exercises and activities for wrestling include, but are not limited to:
SPP concentrates on exercises and activities that train the fitness abilities and energy systems that are required by the sport. SPP aims to improve special FITNESS, not “mimic” or “closely resemble” sport movements! Together, GPP and SPP constitute “Base Level Physical Preparedness”. It is extremely important to recognize the difference between base level preparedness and sport specific preparedness (see #3 below).
Although wrestling requires complete general athleticism, the most vital physical requirements are:
Sport/skill specific preparedness refers to movements or skills that are specific to a particular sport. This is called practice! This level includes all skills and drills that are trained or practiced during sports practice. This level focuses on the specific sporting activity, and it is where athletes have the opportunity to use the fitness gained through GPP and SPP to improve sports performance! It is true that fitness can and will be improved through practice and competition (think live drilling). However, and this is very important, FITNESS IMPROVEMENTS FROM WRESTLING PRACTICE AND COMPETITION ARE LIMITED BY THE SIZE AND DEPTH OF YOUR BASE LEVEL PREPAREDNESS!
SSP activities for wrestling include any drill or skill that is specific to wrestling (penetration shots, turns, escapes, throws, pummeling…if you do it in practice…it is a sport specific skill!)
4. Mental/Emotional Preparedness:
Mental and emotional preparedness is the highest level of the pyramid, and this is where athletes of all sports distance themselves from the competition (assuming same physical preparedness). Mental training exercises include visualization, mental rehearsal, self-talk, rituals, deep breathing, meditation, etc. Many of these exercises and activities can be practiced or performed before, during and after training, practice or competition. Although mental preparedness sits on top of the developmental pyramid, it can and should innervate all types of training.
Read More About Mental Preparedness
THE PLAN
The following are general recommendations for putting the information presented in this article to use:
Post-Season:
Starting in the post-season, training should be comprised mostly of GPP exercises and activities. This period should last between 4 and 8 weeks, depending on the degree in which an athlete needs to physically and mentally recover from the competition season. Remember, GPP exercises and activities are low intensity and provide balance in your program. These exercises should train physical abilities or energy systems that are NOT specifically required by the sport. Recall that GPP exercises or activities for wrestling include anything that provides low intensity or aerobic conditioning or that requires a high skill component.
Off-Season:
The off-season for wrestling starts in April or May and continues through August or September. Off-season training should increasingly become more special (SPP) and less general. During the off-season, intensity of training should slowly and progressively increase, so that there is enough stress present to cause the body to adapt and become fitter. Remember that SPP refers to training the physical abilities and energy systems required by the sport. SPP training for wrestling should focus on developing and improving maximal strength and power and their derivatives, and in careful doses, anaerobic conditioning. Wrestling practice and competition can be present, but you need an off-season, so keep it under control.
Pre-season:
During the pre-season, general and low intensity training should all but disappear, while special training should be highlighted. Sport specific skill training should begin to ramp up during the pre-season, with an emphasis placed on refreshing and improving upon sport specific movement techniques. It’s important to enter the competition season fresh, so I recommend a transitional period of one to two weeks of tapering or “de-loading” before the commencement of the competition season.
Competition Season:
During the competition season, sport specific skills and drills take the stage and should constitute the majority of all training. Fitness gains (general and special) from the off-season should be maintained during the competition season, but only to the extent where it does not interfere with practice and competition performance. Toward the end of competition season (tournament time!), mental and emotional preparedness should increasingly become part of an athletes training, while the intensity of sports practice tapers down. This is how athletes peak mentally and physically at the most opportune times!
CONCLUSIONS: SAND OR STONE?
This article was not intended to “down-sell” sports practice, competitions or technique camps, but rather to “up-sell” the importance of following a framework of development built upon a rock solid base of physical fitness. Is your athletic “house” built on a base of sand or stone? How big is your current base, and how tall can you grow your athletic pyramid? What is your weak link in the Training Hierarchy Pyramid, and what can you do to strengthen it?
Please post questions or discussion to comments.
INTRODUCTION
I’ve noticed a disturbing trend, particularly in the wrestling community, where coaches blend, blur or confuse sport and skill specific preparedness (SSP) with special physical preparedness (SPP). This results in decisions to:
- Select movements to train based on how closely they “mimic” wrestling maneuvers (i.e., band resisted penetration shots)
- Eliminate otherwise beneficial movements because “there is no scientific evidence” that training said movement will have a positive impact on performance (i.e., the power clean)
- Eliminate otherwise beneficial movements because there is a belief that training said movement will have an ADVERSE effect on performance (i.e., the bench press)
- Eliminating special physical preparedness all together, because “the best way to get better at wrestling is to wrestle”
1. The criteria for selecting movements for ANY sport should be based on the movement’s ability to cause physical adaptations in strength, speed, power, stamina, cardio-respiratory endurance, coordination, agility or whatever physical abilities are required by the sport. The movements that are most effective at causing these adaptations will be DISSIMILAR from sport specific movements. This is how we define “functional movement”.
2. Training is so specific, that adaptations earned in the weight room will not directly improve sport skills. Practicing sport skills is the best way to improve sport skills. However, all sport specific movements require certain fitness abilities in their execution. Improvements in strength and fitness level will allow an athlete the opportunity to learn and execute sport specific movements better than through sports skill practice alone.
If you believe that a fitter athlete is a better athlete (hard to argue), then the BEST way to improve fitness is through strength and conditioning practices. The BEST way for an athlete to know his or her potential in their sport, is to build a big base of general and special physical preparedness, COMBINED with hours upon hours of sport specific skills practice and mental preparedness techniques. No high level athlete reaches his or her potential in their sport through sports practice alone.
3. Strong is strong. There is no such thing as “strong for wrestling!” Sport specific training programs are not what you think. Sport specific training programs should be designed to improve the specific fitness abilities and energy system requirements of the sport. They should not be designed to “mimic” or “closely resemble” sport specific movements.
You have already proven this to yourself by hanging climbing ropes in your wrestling room. Not many coaches or wrestlers will argue that rope climbing is beneficial for a wrestler. Why? Because it improves a fitness ability that is specific to wrestling…grip strength! In 20+ years of competing, coaching and spectating, I have yet to see a wrestling maneuver that looks anything like a rope climb! So, put the bench press back in your training program. It does a much better job at developing upper body pressing strength than rotating dumbbell presses on a swiss ball (these are fine too, but they should be considered as an assistance movement).
SUPPORTING ARGUMENTS: TRAINING HIERARCHY PYRAMID
“A pyramid can only grow as tall as its base.” Louie Simmons, World Renowned Strength Coach
The goal of any athlete is to know his or her potential in their chosen sport. As a young athlete moves through the competition ranks, the type and organization of training he or she engages in becomes increasingly important. At the highest levels of athletic competition (college level and beyond), the athletes that perform best have not only the genetic predisposition to do so, but they are also better prepared physically and mentally than their competition. This sounds like common sense; but it leads to many questions. What is general physical preparedness (GPP) and why is it important? What is special physical preparedness (SPP) and how does it differ from sport specific preparedness (SSP)? How and why should my training program change throughout the year? Does any of this matter? Can’t I just wrestle and be done with it? Not if you care about knowing your potential…
Training Hierarchy Pyramid
Have you heard of Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs? It is often portrayed as a pyramid, with the largest and most fundamental needs at the bottom and secondary or higher level needs at the top:
Maslow’s theory suggests that humans are motivated by unsatisfied needs, and that certain lower level needs need to be fulfilled before higher level needs can be addressed. It is a psychological model that many great companies and organizations use as a framework to help their employees or team members reach their performance potential. Bear with me here, there is a point I’m getting to…Failing to plan is the same as planning to fail. How many athletes have a plan for improving, or more importantly, reaching their potential? Wouldn’t it be great if there were a model similar to Maslow’s pyramid that would give purpose and direction to an athlete’s training? Well, we’re in luck! Coach Scott Sonnen (CST – Circular Strength Training) has created a theoretical training hierarchy pyramid (THP) that illustrates the developmental stages of athletic performance:
According to this model, any deficiencies in lower levels of the pyramid will adversely affect the ability to maximize potential in higher levels. But, before I dive into how wrestlers can use this framework to reach the highest levels of performance, allow me to define what constitutes each level:
1. General Physical Preparedness (GPP):
“GPP is intended to provide balanced physical conditioning in endurance, strength, speed, flexibility and other basic factors in fitness. GPP may include participation in a variety of different physical activities which provide low intensity, all-round conditioning, with little emphasis on specific sporting skills.”
Mel Siff, Supertraining
We cannot generalize which exercises or activities are considered GPP for all sports, since all sports are unique and require different physical skills and capacities. GPP activities provide balance in fitness by filling in the gaps that are not trained through special physical training (see #2 below) or sport specific training (see #3 below). There is no way to scientifically prove that training GPP works, but the best and most well-known strength coaches train their athletes this way.
Wrestling presents a unique sport. To be a champion wrestler, you must be a fantastic general athlete. Wrestling requires sufficient capacity in strength, speed, power, stamina, coordination, agility and flexibility, as well as, tremendous anaerobic and aerobic work capacity! Because of these requirements, almost any training could be considered specific to wrestling. However, in attempting to classify certain activities as “more general” and “more specific”, we can establish prioritization of training. For example, consider the following running drills:
- 100 meter sprint
- 400 meter run
- 1 mile run
- 5k
- 10k
GPP exercises and activities for wrestling include, but are not limited to:
- Anything that provides low intensity, aerobic conditioning (jogging, hiking, biking, swimming, etc.) or
- Any other sport or activity that has a high skill component (tennis, golf, racquetball, basketball, etc.)
SPP concentrates on exercises and activities that train the fitness abilities and energy systems that are required by the sport. SPP aims to improve special FITNESS, not “mimic” or “closely resemble” sport movements! Together, GPP and SPP constitute “Base Level Physical Preparedness”. It is extremely important to recognize the difference between base level preparedness and sport specific preparedness (see #3 below).
Although wrestling requires complete general athleticism, the most vital physical requirements are:
- Maximal Strength, Maximal Power and their derivatives (explosive strength, strength endurance, power endurance, etc.) and
- Immediate and Short-Term Anaerobic Work Capacity – capacity to perform work for periods of time lasting from a few seconds to 1-2 minutes.
- Strength Training – aimed to improve maximal strength, dynamic or speed strength and repetition strength mainly through training barbell core movements (squats, presses, deadlifts, cleans, snatches, etc.)
- Anaerobic Conditioning – aimed to improve work capacity in the immediate and short term energy systems (providing energy for activities lasting from a few seconds up to 1-2 minutes). This may include barbell, dumbbell or kettlebell complex training or short bouts of intense interval training using other implements (medicine balls, battle ropes, sandbags, tractor tires, bodyweight calisthenics, stair sprints, etc.)
Sport/skill specific preparedness refers to movements or skills that are specific to a particular sport. This is called practice! This level includes all skills and drills that are trained or practiced during sports practice. This level focuses on the specific sporting activity, and it is where athletes have the opportunity to use the fitness gained through GPP and SPP to improve sports performance! It is true that fitness can and will be improved through practice and competition (think live drilling). However, and this is very important, FITNESS IMPROVEMENTS FROM WRESTLING PRACTICE AND COMPETITION ARE LIMITED BY THE SIZE AND DEPTH OF YOUR BASE LEVEL PREPAREDNESS!
SSP activities for wrestling include any drill or skill that is specific to wrestling (penetration shots, turns, escapes, throws, pummeling…if you do it in practice…it is a sport specific skill!)
4. Mental/Emotional Preparedness:
Mental and emotional preparedness is the highest level of the pyramid, and this is where athletes of all sports distance themselves from the competition (assuming same physical preparedness). Mental training exercises include visualization, mental rehearsal, self-talk, rituals, deep breathing, meditation, etc. Many of these exercises and activities can be practiced or performed before, during and after training, practice or competition. Although mental preparedness sits on top of the developmental pyramid, it can and should innervate all types of training.
Read More About Mental Preparedness
THE PLAN
The following are general recommendations for putting the information presented in this article to use:
Post-Season:
Starting in the post-season, training should be comprised mostly of GPP exercises and activities. This period should last between 4 and 8 weeks, depending on the degree in which an athlete needs to physically and mentally recover from the competition season. Remember, GPP exercises and activities are low intensity and provide balance in your program. These exercises should train physical abilities or energy systems that are NOT specifically required by the sport. Recall that GPP exercises or activities for wrestling include anything that provides low intensity or aerobic conditioning or that requires a high skill component.
Off-Season:
The off-season for wrestling starts in April or May and continues through August or September. Off-season training should increasingly become more special (SPP) and less general. During the off-season, intensity of training should slowly and progressively increase, so that there is enough stress present to cause the body to adapt and become fitter. Remember that SPP refers to training the physical abilities and energy systems required by the sport. SPP training for wrestling should focus on developing and improving maximal strength and power and their derivatives, and in careful doses, anaerobic conditioning. Wrestling practice and competition can be present, but you need an off-season, so keep it under control.
Pre-season:
During the pre-season, general and low intensity training should all but disappear, while special training should be highlighted. Sport specific skill training should begin to ramp up during the pre-season, with an emphasis placed on refreshing and improving upon sport specific movement techniques. It’s important to enter the competition season fresh, so I recommend a transitional period of one to two weeks of tapering or “de-loading” before the commencement of the competition season.
Competition Season:
During the competition season, sport specific skills and drills take the stage and should constitute the majority of all training. Fitness gains (general and special) from the off-season should be maintained during the competition season, but only to the extent where it does not interfere with practice and competition performance. Toward the end of competition season (tournament time!), mental and emotional preparedness should increasingly become part of an athletes training, while the intensity of sports practice tapers down. This is how athletes peak mentally and physically at the most opportune times!
CONCLUSIONS: SAND OR STONE?
This article was not intended to “down-sell” sports practice, competitions or technique camps, but rather to “up-sell” the importance of following a framework of development built upon a rock solid base of physical fitness. Is your athletic “house” built on a base of sand or stone? How big is your current base, and how tall can you grow your athletic pyramid? What is your weak link in the Training Hierarchy Pyramid, and what can you do to strengthen it?
Please post questions or discussion to comments.
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