Thoughts.

(Cu & T) (D, Ca, St & etc)

By the way, the oldest and first grouping of links I did can be found here. Bunch of older ultimate-related stuff if you haven’t seen it yet, including some fitness info.

Been spending some time on the ultitalk.com forums lately (searching for something outside of the RSD monotony), and wrote this in response to a question about training. You might be interested to download the file, if your team is lacking a lifting program or you’re an individual looking for something to work from.

Caution: one size does not fit all. Train smart.

Without further ado:

Genie,

You might be interested in a general lifting program Dartmouth Ultimate followed a few years back–it’s a general strength program, designed not to be too technical (good for a college ultimate team when some people have no lifting experience), and incorporating some plyos and single-leg work to help prep for ultimate play.

The program is designed to be done in six weeks scaling up the weight as you scale down the reps, with three days a week (likely MWF, though TThS would probably work too) and about an hour-hour and a half to commit to working out, depending on how quickly you work. It also tapers down so that you should be at a relative peak by the end of the program (you can cycle back to the start if you want to).

For the record, we always spread the program over 9 weeks (with practice it was too much to lift three days a week), which fit our pre-season winter training leading up to spring break very nicely. The first year we started this program the A team had no significant injuries in the spring season (which was a big difference from prior years, but sample size skepticism should apply here).

My own impression, having followed the program for at least two seasons and maybe another off-season as well; it’s a solid all-around program that will help get you in game shape. It’s not going to make you into a stud by itself, and it’s not going to kill you either (unless you try to do so to yourself very hard).

I’ve uploaded the .xls (excel) file here for download.

Some descriptions are on the second page (book) of the file. [edit: the current download link is an older version without descriptions added - however, the internet is a great source of descriptions and video!]

I’d recommend throwing in some sprinting/conditioning work to go with as others have suggested here (I would recommend against straight “cardio” in favor of good old-fashioned intense interval work in the range of 100-200m, perhaps starting with 400s if you have the willpower and really feel like your endurance is lacking). I don’t buy not being able to do a lot for endurance in 6 weeks–people have gotten “in shape” in less time with enough hard work. (Which is, incidentally, the Most Important Thing with training. Do you want it enough?)

Incidentally, I subscribe to the theory that it’s less “endurance” and more “recovery” that gives you staying power in ultimate–there’s all sorts of breaks on-field, between stoppages from calls to your man just chilling in the stack, and you get to rest between points too–train to go hard when you’re on, and recover quickly when you’re not.

Somebody asked a great question looking for more information on deadlift technique similar to the clip I linked in my post on squatting.

Get lifting.

The squat.

This is the simplest (and most complicated) lift you can do. It is the easiest (and hardest) lift you can perform. It is the most beneficial (and most dangerous) lift you can perform.

It is a lift you absolutely need to be doing.

This lift does far more than simply train your legs. It’s not simply a lift you do to get big. This is a movement, and its benefits will carry over to all aspects of your life, if done correctly. It makes you stronger and healthier.

Avoiding the squat invites a host of nagging aches and pains, most notably in the back and knees. The hip strengthening that comes from effective squatting is a panacea to your back and knee woes–when your hips are actually able to carry their load of the work, it saves your knees from taking more force than they have to–and you’ll develop a range of motion and core strength that allows your back to stay in a more natural position, unperturbed by stress and torque from weak/tight muscles.

I’m going to preface the descriptive part of this post with a warning: Don’t be stupid. Don’t trust me as though I’m a certified fitness professional or your doctor (ask me in 10 years when I’ve got my MD and a few trainer certs under my belt). Don’t jump headlong into heavy weight training if you’ve never done it before (or if you haven’t in a long while). The risks of overdoing it far outweigh the benefits, and particularly given the timing of this post–in the fall “off-season” for college and the post-season for club–there should be no major impetus to overdo it to strive for incremental benefit. Just doing the lift properly and consistently will lead to great results without much loading at all.

For information on proper squat technique (in far more depth that I’m going into here), check out T-Nation, and keep an eye out for Dave Tate, Mike Robertson, and Eric Cressey. Crossfit is also hugely keen on the squat (including the overhead squat). They have a wealth of videos that can enhance your understanding.

***This clip*** is THE clip to see if you’re new to squatting, want to teach other people to squat, want to squat, or do squats. It gets at the most basic components of squatting in the quickest way I’ve seen (I wish I had known this last year when I was teaching guys to lift!) Note the stance at the beginning.

Another squat option for the particularly risk-averse is the front squat–note that this will work your hips differently than a back squat, emphasizing the quads more (which astute readers will note in a comment I made last week, is not a muscle group that I believe needs training emphasis in most of the population).

Mark Rippetoe puts bad form more eloquently than I ever could:

The common form problems in the squat upset this balanced lever arm relationship and result in the biomechanical inefficiencies that typify bad form. If the knees cave in toward the middle, the quads are being asked to do the job of the adductors, and, as in our earlier example of the hamstrings in the deadlift, they are strong enough to do it, even though it leaves the adductors untrained and ultimately weakens maximal squat capacity. The femur and the tibia, which normally operate vertically parallel as the knee flexes and extends, deviate inward (toward the midline) at the knee, squishing the lateral meniscus in the knee joint due to the uneven load. The bones move wrong, the muscles move them that way, and the muscles get trained wrong as a result.

Don’t train the muscles wrong. Practice GOOD FORM! Get a spotter to observe you. Use a mirror for cursory checking (but realize that it’s not the end-all be-all, as your view is limited). GET A CAMERA and RECORD YOURSELF lifting. Number one way to see how good or silly you look. Most of you will disregard this advice and just go dick around in the gym (or perhaps worse–not go to the gym at all). At the very least, get somebody to check you out for the first few times you do it until your body gets a good sense of how it works.

Squatting IS a natural movement to some extent, so you can teach yourself–however, most of us lack the range of motion in the hips to truly pull it off. Do the Samson stretch. Practice doing overhead squats with a broomstick or similarly light-weighted item. Make your hips work through a full range of motion (Get Your Butt in Gear). Squat.

You get better at squatting by squatting, but only well-intentioned squatting. When I caution against going too heavy too soon it is for this reason–you need to be able to get a full, comfortable range of motion (and know its limits) before you progress to developing strength through that range of motion. This means, ideally, a fair bit of time devoted to squat technique before you even get under the bar. If you want to get under early, that’s your perogative, but use light weight and still focus on form (if you can’t get your butt down to parallel without arching your back, go as far down as you can without compromising it–and consider box squats). It’s important to progress slowly if you want to avoid injury trouble and weakness-inducing imbalance down the road.

As you get comfortable with your range of motion (and you WILL notice an improvement in your fitness just from this improvement alone without any additional weight), THEN you can start adding resistance (weight) and make yourself into an Athlete.

To be sure, you can get away with just about anything for training in the short term. But long term, you need to plan. Set some goals. This practice will help ensure continued progress (and an idea of what might be stalling your it if you hit a wall).

Female readers should note that this advice applies every bit as much if not more so to you. The lack of strength training in women’s ultimate is rather astounding to me. Getting “huge” is not a consequence of lifting–it’s a consequence of diet and bodybuilding. If you know me, 5’8″, 135lbs on a good day, you’d know that all my training has done very little to jack me up–I’ve maybe seen a net gain of a few pounds at most. It has, however, helped me to lean out, and left me heck of a lot stronger and more athletic than I would have been without stepping inside of a gym.

There is no good reason not to squat. None. Absolutely none at all. Do you have reservations? Email me or leave a comment and I’ll do my best to allay them. Short of being recently (a couple months) off of ACL surgery there’s very little that should keep you from this, the most fundamental of motions.

UPDATE: Deadlifting is the squat’s complement; I’ve written about it here and here.

If you don’t know what a deadlift is, you DEFINITELY need to be doing deadlifts.

If you do know what they are, you should still be doing them. And you can probably be doing them better.

Before you go to the gym, check out this extremely informative crossfit article on deadlift technique. As the title says, it’s a bit, but if you and your training buddy both read this and spot each other, I can almost guarantee you you’ll see good results. Hell, I coached myself without a second set of eyes and saw plenty of benefit.

Train the posterior chain! Anyone can accelerate–but being truly explosive, in starting AND stopping*, will make you unstoppable.

*in my mind, stopping is the most underrated ability in ultimate.

UPDATE: More on deadlifting here.

Chime in with your own favorites in the comments, please!

Food items that I made sure I was stocked up on before I left for a tournament last year…

1. Gatorade Powder. Simply essential in my book. Mix with water at your desired concentration, get some electrolytes and some sugar during and between games. Stay hydratded, and stay cramp-free (probably). Great for sharing with your teammates too. Keep in mind that you probably don’t want this too concentrated…when I ran cross-country and track, at least, too much sugar meant sloshing in the gut and stomach cramps. I’ve also heard that the “sweet spot” for sports drinks is less like gatorade and more like the propel water–but sweet sells, which is why you had the former long before the latter.
2. Power Gel. I gave it a test run this year and found it VERY useful for quick in-game pick-me-ups. Maybe not necessary if you’re a role player every couple points, but if you see lots of action over a weekend, especially if you play defense and/or cut, this is a great way to replenish the tank. By regionals/nationals time I was having one at halftime of every game, with perhaps a bit spread out between points of the second half/late-day games when I needed a bit more energy. It also comes in a caffeinated version, if that’s your schtick–my personal feelings on caffeine as well as the tendency for any caffeine-related surge to eventually be followed by a crash led me to avoid it for tournament purposes (but maybe for single games, or at the end of the day…?).
3. Powerbar/Gatorade Bar/Cliff Bar. Your basic energy bar. This should have some protein in it! Eat it between games when you have some time to actually digest it–in the middle of a game you want the fast-acting stuff, because adrenaline and the need for your body to perform means basic digestion gets slowed (if not shut down) during play. You might want a few extra in case breakfast options are unsatisfying for whatever reason, whether that be rushing to the fields or your distaste for McDonald’s. Remember to start your day off with protein.
4. Gummy bears/something else sweet and sugary and share-able. Great for the end of the day. Nutrition-wise, your primary concern is just to replenish lost energy, and pretty literally any food you eat at that point will do the trick–the simple sugars hit you quicker though (one time high fructose corn syrup actually comes in handy). And plus, your teammates will like you better (and if you’re the sort of person who likes to warm down and get his teammates to do the same, you can give them a carrot to do so).

Fruits and other items tend to be good for halftime of games; they don’t hit you as quick as your gels or Gatorade will, so they’re not ideal for in-game. You can check out a list of the Glycemic Index of several common foods here. This file, incidentally, comes from Kris Kelly’s materials from last year’s Ultimate Coaches and Player’s Conference (UCPC)–the full archive is here. For guidelines of how to use the GI, check the second slide of Kris’ bit on staying balanced. I disagree with his contention about having only high GI food between games–I think you can work in slower digesting stuff at those points (assuming your breaks are longer than 5-10 minutes–which is to say, your game ends before hard cap)–but the basic idea of what to eat is there, if you’re still trying to figure your own tourney diet out.

What foods can’t you do without? What have you eaten and opted against?

Check out this this great post on running form by Vern Gambetta.

The money line:

This means that at the end of the stance phase forward pelvic rotation has to be avoided. Abdominal muscles play a crucial role in this.

Train your core to hold your pelvis in proper position. How? You want to train the core to hold your pelvis so that it is tilted upwards more. Tight quads and weak abs leave most with anterior tilt, and it saps power in almost all athletic movements.

Train your core with static holds, use the bird dog exercises described in this article. Whatever you do, don’t cheat. If you want your core to hold your pelvis when you’re running, you need to train your core to hold it when you’re simply holding still. When you do holds, really focus on straightening out your back by tilting your pelvis up towards yourself more (and then hold your core tight and flat as long as you can). This SHOULD be hard. If it isn’t, try harder (or upgrade to using an ab roller–slow at first, starting from your knees). Remember that, while the goal at first is to move the pelvis into the right position, long-term you want to be able to HOLD that. Ideally all day. You can practice this positioning while walking around when you get strong enough–work your way up from stability to mobility to strength to power.

And stretch your quads. Check out the Crossfit warmup for details–do the Samson stretch. As a matter of fact, do the Crossfit warmup before all of your workouts. You’ll see some pretty quick benefits. Tight quads really kill the potential for your core to hold the pelvis.

After one of Carson’s ab workouts last winter, the extra strength I had to hold my pelvis in a good position resulted in some VERY impressive PRs for me in that week’s track workout. It can make a big difference, and perhaps more importantly, it can make a big difference NOW.

(Part 1 | Part 2)

Supplemental work, in my mind, refers to work or mini-workouts that you do in addition to your normal routine(s).

This can refer to grip training, for instance–not enough to be called a “workout” in its own right, really, but it goes great as a finisher after a lifting session. Other things you might consider supplemental work:

• Forearm work. Slightly different from grip, but also very important for putting good snap on your throws. Think forearm curls, with the palm facing towards or away from you. Think wrist rolls, and bar twists (with extra leverage as you improve–hold the bar further and further off-center). A good ultimate player, more often than not, has well-developed forearms, or at least one on his throwing arm.
• Core work (but see here for a discussion of what core training really is, and give some thought to the work you’re doing)
• Single-leg work (this can make its own workout as well, but things like stability ball squats, while good for balance/proprioception/etc, generally tend to be followed with heavier/more intense work)
• Working on your weaknesses, for instance your posture–lot of fun reading to be had there, if you’re interested…otherwise, short version–you probably need to do more external rotation work for your shoulders and develop range of motion in your hips and thoracic spine so you can stabilize your lumbar (core) more. The latter range of motion comes from practicing proper squat form (I opt for olympic style squats more often than not–the extra range of motion and getting more strength from less weight both mean fewer injuries in the long term). If you’ve been benching for years and years and your back is lacking as a result, you might consider doing pull-ups or rows to try and deal with it as supplemental work (ie, a little every day) rather than as a part of your regular workout.
• Practicing lifting technique. Seriously. If you haven’t squatted or deadlifted before, practicing the form should precede any lift, and you should start light–and even after you’ve gotten a good hand on either/both, a bit of extra work on the range of motion will only help. Similarly, if you’re looking to get into olympic lifting (check snatches and the clean & press on the crossfit exercises page), practicing the form before you get into working out proper will go a long ways towards keeping you healthy.
• This also refers to recovery work…foam rolling, yoga, whatever suits your fancy. I call it “supplemental” but really it’s pretty essential stuff to do if you’re at all serious about your performance and health. Stretch before bed.

As for overtraining…this ties in to doing recovery work. Keep in mind that “overtraining” has become something of a buzzword to be avoided in fitness these days, but that overtraining (or, rather, over-reaching) can and should be part of any good exercise plan–you have to push your body beyond what it’s used to if you want to see good results. The trick is not to over-reach for too long–that’s when the physical symptoms appear, your testosterone level drops, and you start to see symptoms like mild depression, a loss of motivation, and a decrease in training returns, all of which can take weeks or months to adequately recover from. Again, the occasional period of under-reaching–intentionally doing less than you are capable of to give your body room to recover and grow–will go a long way toward ensuring you aren’t taken down for the count by overtraining. PLAN on under-reaching and recovering. And be willing to be flexible if your body tells you to back off sooner.

Again, when I talk about over-training I really mean over-reaching, a temporary plateau. If you’re curious about physiological overtraining, which is a treatable medical condition (requiring more than just rest and recovery, though that is also a big part of it), the NYT has a nice article on it you might find interesting.

Finally, applying training more specifically to ultimate. When you condition, seek to incorporate more game-specific work–you’ve surely done drills that involve lots of running along with catching and throwing. That’s the sort of thing I mean.

Outside of conditioning, or outside of using a disc, you can incorporate visualization–seeing game situations; for instance, when you do speed work envision running down on the pull or chasing a huck; when you do plyos, see yourself covering a defender and having to keep quick feet to respond to her, or leaping to sky for the disc. When you do track workouts, consider starting your reps with a quick one-two in the direction opposite your sprint, to emulate the stop-and-go of actual cutting. Practice accelerating from the dynamic positions you will be in in-game rather than the same old starting stance you take every time on the track.

In the gym lifting, you can gear your training more towards ultimate–this flows as a consequence of your goal setting. If your goals include catching or throwing, it would probably behoove you to work some grip work in to your training (stability for your head while running will also help with catching, as I recently posted about).