Andrea Hayden, Assistant Strength and Conditioning Coach for the Minnesota Twins Major League Baseball (MLB) team, talks to the NSCA Coaching and Sport Science Program Manager, Eric McMahon, about being great at your craft. Topics of discussion include how to train athletes in a sport you have never played and creating great career opportunities through education and networking. Find Andrea through Email: andreahayden@twinsbaseball.com | Find Eric on Instagram: @ericmcmahoncscs or Twitter: @ericmcmahoncscs

Night after night, Cirque du Soleil’s performing arts athletes defy gravity and expectations — executing elite-level feats across 480 shows annually. Maintaining peak performance requires more than talent; it demands strategic preparation, adaptability, and trust. Channeling backgrounds in dance and martial arts, married coaching duo Mike and Jade Esmeralda bring a philosophy of continuous improvement to Cirque’s collectivistic infrastructure. Preparing performers with diverse training experiences, they connect on an artistic level to balance readiness with creative expression. From applying RAMP (Raise, Activate, Mobilize, Potentiate) warm-ups for mitigating injury risk to tactical load carriage insights for LED costumes, the Esmeraldas leverage parallels across high-performance environments. Strategies for Cirque’s “valuable human artistic assets” must enhance durability, manage load, and support longevity in an unpredictable, physically — and psychologically — demanding profession. Jade’s evidence-based journalism also combats social media misinformation. Discover how they adapt daily, build buy-in across cultures, and redefine training for a one-of-a-kind population. Connect with Mike Instagram: @m.b.esmeralda, and LinkedIn: @michaelesmeralda, and Jade on Instagram: @jadesmeralda_ | Find Eric on Instagram: @ericmcmahoncscs and LinkedIn: @ericmcmahoncscs Discover more stage-specific strategies in the NSCA Performing Arts Special Interest Group on LinkedIn. See some of these impressive feats mentioned in this episode performed by Cirque du Soleil athletes on Instagram at @cirquedusoleil and @cirquedusoleilcasting.

Strength and conditioning coaches should strive to teach athletes in a way they can understand: by hearing, seeing, and practicing. This article describes some techniques that a coach can use to accomplish this.

This article is part of a continuing series of tactical strength and conditioning (TSAC) research reviews. It is designed to bring awareness to new research findings of relevance to tactical strength and conditioning communities.

The focus of this article is to describe the physiological needs of soccer athletes and then provide assessments for testing endurance of athletes of various ages, abilities, and genders.

While a basic fitness assessment will always be a part of a comprehensive client assessment, there is an array of more sophisticated tests and measures that are available to the personal trainer today.

Coaching staffs need to be mindful of how groups are formed for training, who the leaders are, and what group norms are established across the different combinations of athletes training.

This article is intended to provide an understanding of the demands of football from a bioenergetic perspective and provides a framework in which strength and conditioning professionals can design conditioning plans that focus on preparing athletes for competition.

Force Plate Assessment & Practical Application Presentation

This article examines how training the core and performance are connected. This article seeks to help propose how to best use the literature to maximize understanding and use of the current concepts.