Coaches can also benefit from understanding the concepts of positive and negative reinforcement and positive and negative punishment as they relate to motivation. Although coaches use a mixture of both reward and punishment, using rewards and a positive approach is arguably the best approach because it focuses on what athletes should do and what they did right.

This article will provide some conditions and standards with specific tools personal trainers may consider using in their initial interview with potential clients.

Evidence suggests a positive relationship between physical activity, exercise, and mental health. Exercise as a treatment modality is now being considered alongside psychotherapeutic and pharmacological approaches, and the role of specifically trained exercise specialists and personal trainers is an important component of the multi-disciplinary team.

This article explores what a facility-level culture may look like, identifies some of the expected benefits of purposely developing that culture, and discusses some misalignment between what coaches say they want the culture to feel like and the message the athletes are likely to receive.

With the need to be ready under any circumstances from operational missions to physical training, understanding how the adrenal gland functions is important for any tactical athlete. The adrenal gland mediates performance and can have a negative effect on the body’s physiology when exhausted. It is vital to understand the interventions needed to obviate the negative effects and enhance the positive aspects of such physiological function. This session from the 2015 TSAC Annual Training sheds light on this important physiological system that impacts both physical health and functional performance.

Learn to identify and combat risk factors among high stress tactical personnel; how they affect performance, sleep, and recovery; and how to begin managing stress. In this session from the 2016 TSAC Annual Training, Jeff Nichols explains how to lay out a clear and concise process to evaluate stress and create a plan specific to each individual to combat the negative side effects of stress.

This review analyzes relevant variables involved in acute interference effects of concurrent training (CT) sessions of aerobic exercise followed by strength exercises. The aerobic exercise intensity, mode, volume, duration of recovery interval between exercises, muscle groups involved, and utilization of ergogenic aids are the variables identified in this review. High-intensity interval aerobic exercises result in more pronounced negative effects on strength-endurance exercise but not in maximal strength. Cycling results in more negative effects on strength endurance performance exercise than running. A 4-hour to 8-hour recovery interval seems to be enough to avoid interference on strength-endurance performance. Reduction in strength-endurance performance is located in muscle groups involved in both exercises. Low aerobic exercise volume (3 km) with; 18 minutes of duration does not diminish strength endurance, whereas higher volumes (5 and 7 km) with ;30 and ;42 minutes of duration, respectively, generate impairments. Caffeine, carbohydrate, and beta-alanine are not able to revert the deleterious effect on strength-endurance performance, whereas creatine and capsaicin analog supplementation are. Thus, these variables must be taken into consideration to prescribe and organize a CT session. This information may help coaches to organize exercise sessions that minimize or avoid the impairment in strength performance after aerobic exercises.

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NSCA’s Essentials of Tactical Strength and Conditioning is a NSCA resource developed for those seeking the TSAC-F certification and for strength and conditioning coaches or personal trainers who work with tactical populations such as military, law enforcement, and fire and rescue personnel.

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