Today’s podcast features coaches Dan Back and Tim Riley. Dan Back is the founder of Jump Science and is a coach at Xceleration sports performance in Austin, Texas where he trains both track and team sport athletes. Dan has been a guest on episodes 263 and 337 of the podcast, speaking on sprint and jump topics. Tim Riley is the Director of Sports Performance at Kollective in Austin, TX where he supervises all pro, collegiate, and youth athletic development. Tim currently oversees and conducts strength and conditioning sessions for NFL, PLL & AVP athletes.
In the quest for improved athletic qualities, we often look at things in isolation. We look at the most powerful training means, right now, to help us to achieve better performance. For the best results, however, we need to broaden our view of training, and understand the qualities at the bottom (early athletic development) and the top (maximal strength and force training) to maximize potential. We need to understand all of the iterations of skill and strength that come before the sprint, jump, throw, agile moves, etc. you see on the field, and how everything works together in the grand scheme of training.
On today’s podcast, Dan and Tim speak on their own early athletic experiences, the critical “base level” abilities explosive athletes need for a better vertical jump (as well as general explosive movement), where and how maximal strength work fits into the long-term development equation, warmup and game-based concepts, assessments, and more.
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Timestamps and Main Points
3:30 – Dan and Tim’s early sport and training experiences
12:30 – Dan’s take on track and field speed and abilities within the scope of team sport performance and two leg jumping
18:00 – The potential of mass-amounts of calf raises to have a negative impact on speed later in life
23:30 – Core general physical preparation methods in athletic performance, such as grappling, hurdling, racing, tag, etc.
27:30 – Discussion as per the pyramid of jumping and jump preparation
37:00 – How Tim and Dan view the warmup process, considering more of a traditional warmup versus more of a game-oriented warmup
51:30 – Dan and Tim’s assessment process for athletes, and looking at macro-type assessments (performance driven) vs. more micro-level assessments (joint based or more discrete movements)
1:04:15 – Thoughts on how strength training can transfer more easily, given an appropriate base of explosive movement training and skill
Daniel Back and Tim Riley Quotes
“I can see (the martial arts drills) in my daughter’s ability to fall and get back up (in other sports)” TR
“When I first started getting obsessed with jumping, my standard workout was 2 sets of 100 calf raises 5 days per week, and looking at myself in my 20’s I was a great jumper, but I wondered why my maximal velocity was so bad, and I really wondered about some of the negative influence of all those calf raises as a teenager, vs. what if those are all sprinting contacts instead?” DB
“I saw these kids at 4 and 5 years old, 6 and 7, and the bulk of their training is broad jumps for distance, bounding for distance, jumping from one mark, and landing on one foot, climbing up wall” TR
“Jump in a way that’s fun and do it consistently for years… and that should come on top of a base of more variety; and that’s where running, agility, interacting with other people and the ground that should be in the movement variety skill” DB
“The best athletes were already really explosive, fast, powerful, good movers before they touched a weight… or took weight training seriously” TR
“The most dynamic play-makers are people who have had exposure to a bunch of different modalities, and then they get strong” TR
“A basketball hoop in the shallow end of a pool is the most fun” TR
“I’m starting to get some things in from a workout standpoint, in the warmup” DB
“Why that dynamic warmup is really useful; it’s a double edge sword with them getting better at the test, but isn’t that a good thing, if they are getting better a squat, a hinge, a lunge, a single leg hop” TR
“With the micro-assessment, watching the warmup is as far as I take that generally” DB
“Weightlifting should be a tiny-tiny fraction, if at all, for youth athletes, and you really want to focus on those explosive components first” DB
“You eventually learn, they very well may add 80lbs to their squat and jump like an inch higher, there’s just not any guarantee of transfer when you don’t have that base, that background of athleticism, variety and development” DB
“You can’t replace a childhood of athletic activity with a 6-week jump program… you need that diverse background and years of jumping, if you are going to get really good at jumping” DB
“I don’t know if there is a perfect time to infuse weightlifting for performance. How do you quantify when someone is ready (to use weightlifting to enhance their performance)? Maybe when the potency from (all the preceding sprints, jumps, movement literacy, etc.) We’re not getting the same sort of feedback, now let’s introduce this external implement and see how your body responds” TR
“There have been plenty of young football players where I’m like, “this dude’s isn’t going to get any faster after sophomore year, because he is going with the path of strength rather than speed; I’ve definitely had that thought of wishing strength was playing a smaller role (in these guys middle school football programs)” DB
About Dan Back
Dan Back is the founder of “Jump Science” and is a coach at Xceleration sports performance in Austin, Texas where he trains both track and team sport athletes. Dan reached an elite level in his own vertical jump and dunking ability, and has been helping athletes run faster, jump higher and improve overall physical performance for over a decade. Dan has been a constant source of coach and athlete education in the last decade through his website and social media channels.
About Tim Riley
Tim Riley is the Director of Sports Performance at Kollective in Austin, TX. He supervises all pro, collegiate, and youth athletic development. Most notably, Riley currently oversees and conducts strength and conditioning sessions for NFL, PLL & AVP athletes.
Riley started his training career five years ago after receiving a lifelong training certification through NPTI, under the supervision and mentorship of Professor Dave Boetcher. He then founded The Most Performance LLC, a training company working with young athletes. Throughout his career, Riley has acquired a plethora of certifications (NPTI, NASM, Precision Nutrition, & USAW among others) to further his education and better serve the training community, while also gleaning wisdom from multiple mentors: Connor Harris, Dr. Pat Davidson, Dr. Ben House, and Jeremy Hills, to name a few. To date, his professional experience spans across all ages; from high school athletes and collegiate athletes, as well as professional athletes in the NFL, MLB, PLL, AVP, and NBA G League.
Riley works year round, and specializes in NFL in-season, off-season, and pre-draft training. Annually, he works in collaboration with Jeremy Hills, assisting in coaching “NFL Elite Week” when over 60 NFL athletes came to Austin to train for the upcoming NFL season. Riley also consistently develops diverse training programs for in person and online coaching sessions, and is starting to offer programs in an easy to use PDF format for athletes who prefer to train on their own.
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