Today’s episode features Angus Ross, physiologist and strength coach at High Performance Sport New Zealand. Angus is making his second appearance on the podcast, and is following up on his initial chat on aspects of eccentric strength training with lots of practical knowledge in the realms of stiffness, fascia, and performance.
Angus has worked with a number of sports at an elite level within the NZ system including sprint cycling and skeleton in recent years. Angus has a PhD in exercise physiology from the University of Queensland and has also worked within the Australian institute system with stints at both the Queensland Academy of Sport and the Australian Institute of Sport. He is also a Winter Olympian in his own right having competed at the 1998 and 2002 Winter Games. Angus is one of the most intelligent, and curious coaches I know, as well as incredibly pragmatic, seeking what works and delivers results.
As with any training method, eccentric training is just one tool for the job, and learning about the means, and how it fits into the total training process also opens up the questions of usage of training such as maximal overcoming isometrics and plyometrics, as well as monitoring which athletes might respond optimally to one method or the other, or knowing which sequence these means should be presented in over the course of a training year.
On today’s podcast, we will go in depth on double versus single leg stiffness, and what that means for team sport athletes versus track and field sprinters. We’ll also cover the benefits and use of plyometrics versus overloaded eccentric training, and how to look at using these methods in the course of a training year. Finally, Angus has some fantastic thoughts and ideas on muscular versus fascial driven athletes that resonate with many of my own thoughts and things seen in previous podcasts, such as our recent episode with Randy Huntingon.
Today’s episode is brought to you by SimpliFaster, supplier of high-end athletic development tools, such as the Freelap timing system, kBox, Sprint 1080, and more.
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Key Points:
- New happenings with Angus Ross
- Reactive strength and stiffness in sprinting
- Double versus single leg stiffness
- Maximal isometric or overcoming exercise versus plyometrics
- Ways Angus has been experimenting with a more frequent alteration of the training stimulus
- How fascial driven athletes can benefit from exercise that helps “fascial tightness”
- How muscle driven athletes can often PR after a few weeks of rest or almost complete rest
- Angus’ thoughts on velocity based training
- EMS and strength performance
Quotes:
“I’m sure stiffness from sprint data would show the same things as a single leg drop jump (athletes deficient in a single leg drop jump leak energy at maximal velocity)”
“The plyos might really develop tendon stiffness, while the longer slower contractions (i.e. supramaximal type work) still might develop some stiffness, but may also develop compliance as well”
“If I was going to periodize it, I might be doing some supramaximal eccentric work with some isometric work initially, because they marry well in addressing tendon properties, and you could do it with a small amount of plyos, and then morph until faster eccentric work, and towards plyos”
“The great coaches have the intuition to change (the emphasis of the program) when needed”
“When you got the motor patterns from 20 years of plyos in the system, they are there, if you makea change in the system, you will improve”
“What I’ve been doing essentially is a 4 week block on repeat, with a different week each block… for some athletes it’s worked great, but other athletes don’t feel like they are getting enough time on a stimulus”
“Changing the stimulus on a regular basis is a good thing…. some people it’s worked really well for”
“Some people are more resilient towards maintaining their fiber populations than others, and that might be what talent is” (great idea towards athletes who can go through things like high volume sprint training and still be very successful)
“You need the high density training to keep your fascia wound”
“We do very little in the high rep lifting range, especially with a senior athlete”
“The bigger the motor neurons are, the easier they are to depolarize”
About Angus Ross:
Angus is currently employed by High Performance Sport New Zealand in a power physiology and strength and conditioning role, primarily working with track and field. He has worked with a number of sports at an elite level within the NZ system including sprint cycling and skeleton in recent years.
Angus has a PhD in exercise physiology from the University of Queensland and has also worked within the Australian institute system with stints at both the Queensland Academy of Sport and the Australian Institute of Sport. He is also a Winter Olympian in his own right having competed at the 1998 and 2002 Winter Games.
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