Approximately 2 million youth from 6 - 12 years of age participate in football every year. This article discusses the importance of long-term athletic development (LTAD) for youth football athletes and the significance of a player development pathway for long-term success and longevity in the sport.

Various aspects of resistance training, such as specific exercises chosen, workout structure, resistance used, volume (repetitions and sets), rest intervals between sets, and training frequency, can be manipulated to mold the strength training program to best meet an endurance athlete’s goals.

One area that can have great impact on the success of a high school athletic department is the strength and conditioning program. This session from the 2015 NSCA National Conference provides insights from Coach Kevin Vanderbush’s personal experience as the strength and conditioning coach at Ben Davis High School for 31 years. This session covers the most important components of strength and conditioning at the high school level and provides both the rationale behind certain practices as well as practical tips.

Acceleration and maximum speed are terms used in speed development programs, and when developing a program, it is vital to differentiate between the two. This allows coaches to target their training to the capacity most important in their own sport.

In this 2018 TSAC Annual Training video, Jay Sedory and Arron Prowett discuss the development of the Force Fitness Program used to create and advance the understanding of physical, mental, and spiritual wellness in order to prepare a well-rounded soldier for combat.

This article consists of five assessments that could be utilized by the tactical facilitator to measure upper- , lower- , and total-body power in law enforcement officers (LEOs). Although the focus of this article is LEOs, the assessments could also be used for other tactical populations.

Scenarios that provide a stimulus relevant to the sporting environment may help athletes develop better anticipation skills through the refinement of search strategies, response speed and accuracy, pattern recognition, and decision-making abilities.

This article in NSCA Coach discusses how machine-based testing can be used to gather data and improve training. Visit NSCA online to learn more on sports science and exercise research.

Learn about a framework for analyzing how knowledge is created through “coach talk discourses,” and how those discourses guide coaches’ thoughts, feelings, and practices. This article critiques the coach talk discourse of “buy-in” in order to provide strength and conditioning coaches with other ways to think about and understand coaching.

Dave Terry, Associate Director of Sports Performance at Georgetown University, discusses simplifying the process of programming for coaches to optimize their team’s potential. Terry also talks about fostering a culture that his athletes can take beyond the weight room and implement into their lives after college.