Evolutionary Athletics

Make sure you subscribe to my FREE Newsletter - Click Here Now for EXCLUSIVE members only content!

One thing I am constantly amazed at is the lack of emphasis on physical strength for female athletes. Even nowadays, when I think that, for the most part, the myths about weight training making you muscle-bound and “manly” have been busted, most female athletes either do not strength train or have a terrible strength training program. I will see girls doing “plyo programs” and “conditioning workouts” until the cows come home. The funny thing is that, almost without exception, the top female athletes that I have worked with all possess very high levels of relative strength.

I coach for one of the top club teams in the mid-Atlantic area and we held our tryouts recently. About 40 or so girls tried out for 10 spots on the team. The funny thing is, if I had simply done nothing else other than observe them doing pushups and walking lunges and taken out the top 15 from that… all 10 girls that were eventually selected would have been in that top 15 from a relative strength standpoint. Compared to the average female, the average male is faster, jumps higher and is overall more explosive from an athletic standpoint. Why? Because the average guy is stronger than the average girl. So then why have most male-dominated sports embraced weight training, but trainers and coaches of female athletes still lag behind?

The number one thing (other than improve skill) that a female athlete in the 13-16 year old range can do to improve her sports performance is to improve her relative strength. This doesn’t require any fancy programs or weight machines or special bands or shoes. Pushups, pullups and walking lunges will do to start. The majority of girls I start working with for the first time cannot do a full-range pushup with good technique. Eventually, all of them get to the point where they can do sets of 5 with perfect technique. Without exception, this has resulted in improved performance on the court.

I will do a follow-up explaining some of the progressions I use for developing relative strength for a beginner athlete.