One way to potentially lower an athlete’s susceptibility to injury is a proper warm-up protocol. Warm-ups can potentially aid in injury prevention as a result of optimized movement preparation, and it can also reduce muscle soreness and improve performance.

In the push for personal training sales, many gyms will use assessment protocols as a way to prove to clients that they can indeed benefit from personal training. This article examines the merits behind this concept.

Through a well-designed resistance training program, firefighter recruits can gain the movement skills, confidence to exercise, and foundational strength/physiological adaptations that they need for a long and healthy career.

Read a step-by-step description of how to perform the two-arm kettlebell swing, in this exclusive excerpt from the book Exercise Technique Manual for Resistance Training-3rd Edition With Online Video, published by Human Kinetics.

Learn practical programming ideas to implement in youth speed training programs. In this session from the NSCA’s 2017 National Conference, Lance Walker explains how to leverage the differences between starting, acceleration, and maximum velocity dynamics (movement preparation) and plyometrics. Learn about the most common errors made by young athletes when training linear speed with practical tools, teachings, and contextual cues.

In this session from the 2015 NSCA TSAC Conference, Matt Wenning explains the sumo deadlift, a foundational exercise for maximal strength development and a tool that is essential to the tactical population due to its movement pattern. The ability to learn proper technique and progressions with this exercise can help to improve a tactical athlete’s performance and decrease the likelihood of injury because it trains major muscle groups and multiple joints at the same time.

Unlocking the Hips

Strength and conditioning professionals who incorporate a properly designed and supervised training program can help their young athletes train, compete, and reduce the likelihood of injury.

This exercise technique excerpt demonstrates the Zercher squat as a possible alternative and more field-specific squat for tactical athletes.