Power Training: What is it and How Can You Incorporate it into Your Programming?

Power is a word that is often used when it comes to training. We usually understand it to be to do with how fast or explosive you can be in one single movement e.g the power in a pass or the power you have in a jump. But there are actually lots of different types of power training and they are much more accessible and easy to train than you may think. 

There are two types of power that you should be looking to train to improve your performance. Please bear in mind though, that training with weight and resistance can be dangerous so you should always seek advice form a professional before trying this type of training at home:

1. Speed Power – Such as plyometrics and sprinting 
2. Ballistic Power – the addition of load (resistance/weight) to jumps, throws or strikes to increase the velocity/force of a movement 

As with anything, it is important to get the basics first before you develop your training. So let’s break down exactly what plyometric training is and the phases you need to be able to complete before advancing your training. 

Plyometric training has three phases:

1. Force absorption (being able to land properly to absorb force and avoid injury)
2. Stiffness (leaning to control force through a movement)
3. Reactive (being able to continually move and apply power/movement through a given action)

First, let’s look at force absorption or your landing. When completing plyometric exercises you should look to make contact with the floor with all four corners of your foot and land lightly, bending your knees and controlling your core in the movement (Stiffness). When it comes to reactive plyometrics, you have to make sure that you can control your force absorption and stiffness to recreate the movement again and again until you need to stop and land completely (force absorption). 

Incorporating plyometrics into your gym programming will help you to develop power in your game which will in turn help you to jump higher, run quicker and pass more powerfully too (depending on what exercises you choose to complete). 

As you progress with standard plyometric training, you can begin to increase the load. This can be done by using plyometric boxes fro jumping, adding weights to jumps, adding resistance bands etc to increase the velocity of your movement allowing your to produce more force and power in a single movement. 

The NET Gym programme has a range of specific sessions and programmes for you to follow in the gym to help you to improve your game away from the court with easy to follow video demos and step by step guides to help you in the gym. 

Launches January 1st.