It is time for part 4 of our ongoing series examining the keys to effective program design. In part 1 I discussed training mode, part 2 covered energy systems, and in part 3 we looked at autoregulatory training and training split. This weeks article will look at work capacity.
Work Capacity
This was touched upon in part three of the series but we will go into more detail. Every sport requires some form of work capacity. Luckily for us, the utilization of autoregulation (areg) makes programming for both types of work capacity a cinch. Essentially sports require one of two kinds of work capacity: peak or repetitive.
Peak Capacity
Peak work capacity is essentially the ability to produce one peak maximal effort during competition. For some examples of sports requiring peak capacity think of sprinting.
Or powerlifting
Other examples include pretty much every track and field event, speed skating, etc… Another fine example of a peak capacity athlete is a closer in baseball. He may play one inning, throw 10-20 pitches, and fire the ball at 95 mph+ throughout the course of that one inning.
Training for peak capacity is fairly simple.
When training for power or peak quickness, the goal is to move as fast as possible. So one would continue to do sets until they slow down or performance decreases. Here are 2 examples to clarify.
Power: (exercise : Set #1/ Set #2/ Set #3/ etc…
Vertical Jump: 29″/ 30″/ 30.5″/31″/ 30″ – Stop. The athlete did 4 sets before his/her performance decreased. You would then make a note that 5 sets were completed.
Quickness: (exercise and reps: duration of set in seconds)
Line Hops 30 reps: 10.5/10.1/9.8/10.0 – Stop. The athlete completed 3 sets before his/her performance decreased. You would note that you completed 4 total sets.
For exercises that are tough to quantify, like altitude drops you would tie it to a strength or quickness exercise. When your performance decreases on the strength or quickness drill, then you stop doing drops. Here is an example to clarify:
Altitude Drops: 5/ 5/ 5/ 5 -Stop- Performance dropped for line hops
Line Hops 30 reps: 10.5/10.1/9.8/10.0 – Stop- Performance dropped.
Strength training for peak capacity is pretty easy to organize. If an athlete was doing squats it would look like the following:
Set 1: Squat 385×5 reps
Drop off is 20% of 5 reps (5x.2=1) So when you can no longer squat 385 for 4 reps you stop the workout.
Squat 385x 5/4/3 -Stop- You could no longer squat 385×4 so the workout is done. You did 3 sets before drop off and 4total sets.
Repetitive Capacity
Repetitive capacity is required in any sport where a repeated number of high intensity yet sub maximal efforts are repeated. These types of sports often include incomplete recovery intervals. Some examples of sports involving repetitive capacity include football
and ice hockey (check out highlights 1 and 2)
Going back to our baseball closer analogy, a starting pitcher would fall into the repetitive capacity. A starting pitcher cannot go out and fire 95mph fastballs all day because he would only last 1 or 2 innings maximum. They would need to use a little more finesse so that they can last 5-7 innings.
Essentially the sports requiring repetitive capacity fall into the “major sports” category which also includes basketball, baseball, tennis, etc…
Areg for repetitive capacity is also fairly simple.
For quickness and power:
Line Hops Set 1: 30 reps in 10.5 seconds
The drop off is based on total reps so 20% of 30 is 6 reps.
You would then do sets of 24 reps (30-6) until you could no longer complete 24 reps in 10.5 seconds. It may seem complex BUT anyone who can multiply by 2 in their head should be fine, it is simple mathematics.
So the remaining sets would look like:
Line Hops x24 reps: 9.8/10.0/ 10.0/ 10.1/ 10.1/ 10.2/ 10.2/ 10.4/ 10.6 – Stop- including the first set of 30 reps you did 9 sets before drop off and 10 total sets. Your improvement in conditioning would be a result of the increase in work load.
Areg for strength training would look like the following:
Strength Work Capacity
Set 1: Squat 385×5 reps
Drop off is 20% of 5 reps (5x.2=1) So when you can no longer squat 385 for 4 reps you stop the workout.
Squat 385×4/4/4/4/3- Stop- You did 5 sets before drop off and 6 total sets. Make a note of the 6 sets completed.
Using the 20% and repetition number will work for just about every training method except for isometrics. When doing isometrics you would base the 20% drop off based on time. For example:
ISO Lunge 185 x 20 seconds
Drop off is 20% x 20 seconds or 4 seconds.
Continue doing ISO lunges until they can no longer be completed in 16 seconds.
Selecting the Right Capacity Measure
When designing your training program selecting between peak capacity and repetitive capacity is quite simple. Just ask yourself this simple question:
“Does my sport require a one shot burst of performance or does it require repeated efforts?”
If your sport is a one shot effort than peak capacity should make up the majority of your training time. If it requires repeated efforts, then you should spend the majority of your time working on repetitive capacity.
Of course some time must be spent training the non-dominant capacity for your sport as well. For example, who cares that you can lose very little speed during the course of the entire game if you only run a 5.5 second 40.
Or to the contrary, if you are a powerlifter, the increase in repetitive capacity will allow your body to adjust to greater training volumes and tonnage which, in the long run, will open up the door to increases in maximal strength in the future.
The take home message is this: You need to train using both capacity methods spending the majority of time developing the dominant work capacity in your sport.
Capacity Guidelines
While deciding when to switch from peak capacity to repetitive capacity, or vice versa, may seem complicated the following brief guidelines may help simplify the process for you.
1. Generally you should spend 70% of your time training the dominant capacity and 30% of your time training the other capacity. Now put your calculators away because this works out to the following guideline: For every 2 cycles training your dominant capacity, you should spend 1 training cycle training your non dominant capacity. So if you are a football player you should spend 2 cycles training repetitive capacity and 1 cycle training peak capacity. Pretty simple and no math required.
2. When your peak capacity drops to 2 sets you should switch to a repetitive capacity cycle.
3. When your repetitive capacity reaches 8 sets per exercise you should switch to a peak capacity cycle.
Closing
I hope you found this article helpful and interesting. The capacity examples were taken directly from the previous article. Deciding how to develop work capacity in a sport specific manner can be quite complicated, however the proper application of areg coupled with the simple guidelines set forth should help simplify the process for you. As always, if you have any questions just ask.
-Alex