Is this you? As a journalist, you can create a free Muck Rack account to customize your profile, list your contact preferences, and upload a portfolio of your best work.
Claim your profile
Articles by Explosive Athletes
How Often Should Athletes Do Jump Training? And How Many Reps Should They Do?
Read More >> This piece is the final installment of a series on plyometric and jump training. Direct links to the previous pieces: 1, 2, 3, 4. We've covered a lot of ground in this series.
Testing Your One-Rep Max? Try This Surprising, Science-Backed Trick to Move More Weight
Read More >> Over the past two decades, the amount of research on post-activation potentiation (PAP) has skyrocketed. Most proven PAP protocols utilize a heavy strength exercise (for example, Barbell Squats) followed by a high-velocity activity (for example, Vertical Jump). By squatting a heavy weight for a couple of reps without going to failure and then resting for a few minutes, you can jump higher than you would had you not lifted the heavy weight.
Your Vitamin D Supplement Probably Isn't Working. Here's How to Change That
Read More >> The benefits of vitamin D for general health and athletic performance have been well-documented. Exogenous vitamin D supplementation is associated with increased upper- and lower-body strength, reduced injury risk, as well as improved sprint times and vertical jump height. Furthermore, having higher serum levels of vitamin D decreases your risk of many serious illnesses, ranging from depression to type 2 diabetes, cancer and even overall mortality. That all sounds great on paper.
Hate Jogging? Sled Walk Drills Are The Perfect Alternative
Read More >> The sled has become a popular training tool in recent years. It's mostly used to improve acceleration and/or anaerobic conditioning. What many athletes and coaches don't realize is that sled work is also an excellent way to train the aerobic system.
5 Single-Leg Strength Exercises Hockey Players Should Be Doing
Single-leg exercises should be a part of every hockey player's training program. They build strength and muscle, improve stability and give your spine a break from heavy loading. However, many athletes use single-leg movements solely as accessory work in the 8- to 12-rep range. A better approach would be to vary your rep ranges and perform both lower and higher reps to alter the training stimulus. For pure single-leg strength gains, spend more time in the 1- to 5-rep range.
Why Young Athletes Should Utilize the Lateral Plyometric Jump
All too often, athletes ignore lateral movement in their training. Why? Well, with literally thousands of exercises and drills at their disposal, athletes often ignore lateral movements for other, more popular options. After all, the Squat, Bench Press and Deadlift aren't lateral movements, neither are Sprints or Box Jumps. But when it's time to compete in practices and games, there's no avoiding lateral movement. That's why the athletes who do train in the lateral plane are at an advantage.
Why Ample Rest Is Key to Building More Fast-Twitch Muscle Fiber
Athletes are always interested in "getting more fast twitch." Everyone has two general types of muscle—slow-twitch muscle fibers (also known as type 1 fibers) and fast-twitch muscle fibers (type 2 fibers). Although slow-twitch muscle fibers do the majority of the work during slow and moderate aerobic workouts, fast-twitch muscle fibers are used for shorter, more explosive movements—like sprinting and jumping. However, most athletes are confused on how to develop fast-twitch fibers.
How The 'Snap Down' Drill Builds Explosive Athletes From the Ground Up
For athletes to truly grasp what it takes to be faster, more explosive and more agile, they must understand the relationship between their feet and the ground. To a certain extent, much of those athletic traits can be attributed to two things—force absorption and force production. How much force can you absorb? How much force can you produce? How fast can your absorb/produce it? How long can you sustain that level of force production?
The Steel Mace: Why Every Athlete Should Know This Unique Piece of Equipment
My earliest memories of athletic training revolve around conventional equipment. You know, the barbells, dumbbells and weight plates that make up most of today's weight rooms. I embraced this and became a modestly good powerlifter over time. It wasn't until I retired from powerlifting and football that I began to seek other methods of upping my strength and fitness. I was bored of the typical training, and I wanted to save my athletes from having to train the same way all the time.
Get a CrossFit Body Without CrossFit
We all know the look I'm talking about—lean, muscular, athletic, powerful. Male or female, this tends to be the ideal physique. Not too muscular, not too skinny, but light and athletic. It's the CrossFit look, where it's cool to be healthy, not just jacked and tanned, and where the emphasis is on a strong and functional physique rather than bodybuilder bulk—which is great.
9 Unique Ways You Can Use a Foam Roller to Become a Better Athlete
Read More >> A foam roller has an extremely boring job. It usually lays somewhere in the corner of a fitness facility or weight room, waiting for you to pick it up, roll your muscles, and then put it right back. Maybe you even have this piece of equipment laying somewhere around your house, and if so, it's most likely gathering dust.
Why 'Autoregulation' Is Your Easiest Path to Better Workout Recovery
Although not as exciting as the latest training program or nutrition strategy, recovery is a pivotal part of athletic development. Overtraining, under-sleeping and over-stressing can all lead to poor recovery and inhibited performance. This can lead to stagnation in your training gains and increased risk of injury. But what if you aren't recovering from your training sessions even after you've addressed stress and sleep? This is where autoregulation comes in.
Why Isometric Strength Exercises Are Perfect for Very Young Athletes
Strength training for young athletes is a very popular subject right now. Teaching an athlete the importance and value of strength training from a young age can lead to tremendous benefits. It can help them build a great base of not only physical qualities such as motor coordination, proper lifting technique and overall preparedness for their sport, but also a rise in their self-confidence and how they see themselves on and off the field.
4 Ways to Increase the Quality of Your Workout Without Adding Reps
Are you spending hours a day at the gym but feel like you're not seeing progress? That can be a helpless feeling, but the truth is you shouldn't be spending so much time on training to begin with. If you're spending tons of time in the gym yet seeing little to no results, you're likely falling into the trap of "working harder" and not "working smarter." Just because you perform a billion reps per workout doesn't guarantee you gains.
A Beginner Olympic Lifting Program
This beginner Olympic Lifting program is ideal for someone who has never performed Olympic style lifting before. It incorporates many of the major lifts associated with traditional Olympic lifting and is structured to allow athletes to learn the movements. With this regimen, you perform all the exercises circuit style. Instead of going heavy, initially you need to focus on getting form and range of motion spot on.
Power Up Your Pecs With Inner-Chest Exercises
Many sports movements require a powerful, well-defined chest. You use your inner and outer pectoral muscles when you bring your arms together to tackle or block in football, grasp and hold a wrestling opponent, reach diagonally across your body to field a baseball, or pass a basketball with both hands. Boost your game with these inner-chest exercises. You can perform them at home or in the gym using a medicine ball and a cable. Superset each exercise to pump up your chest.
Dumbbell Squat and Press 101: A How-To Guide
The Dumbbell Squat and Press is a foundational exercise for any athlete who wants to build strength and power in the legs and hips, particularly in the quads and glutes. This variation of the Dumbbell Squat adds a shoulder press, which also increases upper-body strength and core stability. Through this guide, you'll learn how to perform the Dumbbell Squat and Press to take your workouts to the next level.
Four Old-School Exercises That Still Get Great Results
Stuck in a rut with your offseason or in-season conditioning program? The following workout comprising of four old-school exercises can provide a refreshing challenge. These workouts also happen to come from around the globe, as they are Bulgarian Split Squats, Russian Twists, Turkish Get-Ups and Romanian Deadlifts.
The Best Training Tool to Strengthen Your Posterior Chain and Prevent Knee Injuries
Most gyms don't have a Glute Ham Developer, or GHD. If your gym does, it's likely misused, underused or not used at all. That's a shame, because the GHD might just be precisely the tool you need to take your game to the next level. Glute Ham Raises performed on the GHD are one of the best exercises for developing the posterior chain. Unlike many similar exercises, Glute Ham Raises work the hamstrings through both of their primary functions—knee flexion and hip extension.
4 Advanced Jump Exercises Used By Explosive Athletes
In sports like basketball, soccer or hockey, acceleration and change-of-direction speed require more than just being big and strong. Lifting weights alone won't maximize your performance on the field, court or rink. That's why, to increase your explosive power, you should perform jump exercises in addition to your strength workouts. With that in mind, here are four advanced jump variations that can improve any athlete's lower-body explosiveness.
3 Tips to Achieve Correct Squat Form
We've all heard it before: The Squat is the king of all exercises. This often puts the Squat at the top of the programming food chain when athletes plan training goals for the new year. And for good reason: The Squat engages more joints and muscles than nearly any other exercise. With correct squat form, athletes from every sport can enhance their muscular strength and power-generating capacity. The relative benefits of Back vs. Front Squats, squat depths and Single-Leg vs.
4 Strategies to Create a Successful Weight Room Environment
You could have a state-of-the-art weight room or the best training program on the planet, but if you don't create an effective environment for your athletes, their results will ultimately fall behind. Your athletes need to be motivated to train, buy in to your programming and most importantly, work hard. As a group, we strength coaches have to remember that our job requires more than knowing the ins and outs of strength and conditioning.
Should Kids Lift Weights?
We are sending our kids the wrong message. Muscle magazines, Internet tough guys and even health teachers are filling their minds with absurd information about strength training. Here are some common sense answers to oft-asked questions to get your kids on track. Rather than focusing on power lifting or bodybuilding, young children should train to increase balance, coordination, agility, quickness, stability, strength, foot speed, reaction time, body awareness and cognitive ability.
5 Sports Health Tips to Extend Your Athletic Career
When Kobe Bryant announced that he was hanging up his sneakers for good, it got me thinking. His incomparable combination of athleticism, skill and sheer determination fueled his ascendancy to become one of the greatest ever to play the game of basketball. Although the new breed of basketball pundits—you know, those analytics guys with their PER metrics—are eager to point out Bryant's declining abilities, they ignore the fact that he's playing in his 20th season.
3 Tips to Blast Through Training Plateaus
Beginners to resistance training can perform almost any exercise and make significant gains. However, for intermediate and advanced lifters who want to get stronger, improving is not as easy as performing a fixed-rep scheme. Performing the same exercise the same way over and over can lead to training plateaus. The more advanced you are, the faster you can find yourself hitting that wall. Here are three suggestions to advance your training so you can blast through those training plateaus.
Why Bulgarian Split Squats Are the Best Lower-Body Exercise for Athletes
Squatting is a necessity for athletes. It's a key movement pattern that must be trained to maximize strength, speed and power. But there's more than one way to squat. Most people immediately gravitate toward the Barbell Back Squat. From the time any athlete picked up their first weight, the Barbell Back Squat has likely been part of their programming. While this exercise does offer massive upside, I don't believe it's the best overall leg exercise.
How and Why You Should Do TRX Spiderman Push-Ups
The quest for awesomely effective core exercises is like a never-ending treasure hunt. Sometimes we find an exercise that's like gold, and it becomes a staple move in our core workouts. One core exercise that's moved high on my personal list is the TRX Spiderman Push-Up. I've known about it for awhile, but since I recently added it to my workouts, I've learned to appreciate its benefits a lot more.
The Simplest Way to Know When You Should Add More Weight to an Exercise
To make gains, you need to gradually increase the difficulty of your workouts. As your workouts get harder, your muscles will become bigger and stronger. This is the concept of progressive overload. Exercises must place additional stress on your muscles, either by lifting more weight or doing more reps. Over time, your muscles adapt to the stress, and you must once again increase the weight or reps. This is the marker of progress. However, progressive overload can be a bit complicated.
5 Simple, Scientifically Proven Ways To Get Better Workouts
Crushing a workout is one of the best feelings a person can have. You leave the gym or weight room soaked with sweat, satisfied you put forth an awesome effort and got better because of it. That's the high that great athletes and dedicated gym rats get hooked on. But how can you make that euphoric feeling more common? How can you cut down on the days where you drag through your workout and increase the days where you feel all but unstoppable?
3 Reasons Why Athletes Should Try Zercher Squats
There are endless ways to squat. Seriously, here are 101 variations for free if you want them. No one should ever have to perform a traditional Barbell Back Squat if it causes them pain, because there are so many other options available that provide similar benefits—and without the painful drawbacks. When it comes to squat variations, Zercher Squats are probably one of the most underused, misunderstood and undiscovered.
Snatch Exercise: Form Guide, Common Mistakes and Effective Variations
The Snatch exercise—and its variations—is among the most effective lifts for improving explosive power for athletes. It's also one of the two lifts that athletes compete in at the Olympics—why it's called an Olympic lift. What makes the Snatch so effective—and challenging—is the distance the barbell travels in the lift. In a single movement, the bar moves from the floor to over your head—the farthest the bar travels in any exercise.
How to Improve Athleticism With Sand Workouts
Sand plyomtetrics and jump training has been shown to increase performance measurements linked to strength and lower post-training muscle soreness than other surfaces. But incorrect use of sand training has also been linked to performance decreases in measurements for 20- and 40-meter sprints. Here's a guide to using sand training correctly to benefit performance outcomes.
How to Work Out When You Have Sore Shoulders
Don't let tight or achy shoulders derail your in-season or offseason weight training. This article provides tips for working around shoulder pain and stiffness without disrupting an upper- or lower-body conditioning program and provides additional suggestions for preventing shoulder issues. Two sample full-body workouts are also included. First and foremost, let's address some of the common causes of shoulder pain.
3 Workout Techniques That Will Make You An Explosive Athlete
Explosiveness is the key to athletic development. The ability to start and stop at high speeds is what makes an athlete "explosive." How can coaches make their athletes more explosive? Below are three methods. Plyometrics are anything that requires jumping and change of direction. In reality, this happens constantly during a game. Therefore, we must train our athletes' bodies and nervous systems to maximize their plyometric qualities and produce the most force development possible.
The 3-Minute Total Arm Pump
There's nothing more satisfying than walking out of the gym with a great arm pump. Unfortunately, in pursuit of bigger guns, many gym-goers spend their entire time doing arm-centric exercises, ignoring the rest of their bodies in the process. No one likes to be known as the guy who only lifts arms—but you don't want to be the guy with toothpicks hanging off your torso, either. That's what makes this superset perfect for athletes.
Show More
loading
Actions
Is this you?
As a journalist, you can create a free Muck Rack account to customize your profile, list your contact preferences, and upload a portfolio of your best work.Get in touch with Explosive
Contact Explosive, search articles and posts on X, monitor coverage, and track replies from one place.
Learn more about Muck Rack