CONDITIONING:
The process of participating in specific training interventions and exercise regimes to become “fit” is the basic concept of conditioning. Classic forms of conditioning training include; HIIT, Fartlek, Tempo Running, Interval Training, Tabata, Circuit Training, Cross Training, and, the recently more popular CrossFit and Work Out of the Day (WODS) methods of training.
The physiological demands of sporting competition incorporate a multitude of athletic necessities. So it should come to no surprise that one crucial component to performance is in fact conditioning, or, the level of fitness of an athlete. All athletes are required to have a base level of fitness for their respective sports in order to handle the demands of their sport, but more often than not, many athletes actually scrape through trials for new teams, or weave into competition selection because of their technical and tactical abilities and talents. However, the fitness levels of many of these athletes could substantially be improved.
Elevating an athletes level of conditioning would not only allow them to engage in their sporting competition for longer, but would also allow an athlete to execute their sporting skills and tasks at a more optimal level for longer. As such, the conditioning of an athlete is an important quality to develop and improve because it’s essentially (what we refer to at CSC as) the “athletic engine.”
Enhancing the athletic engine requires a strategic and structured approach to energy system development. But what are energy systems? Without going into too much depth, our body’s function via 3 main energy systems, these systems are our body’s metabolic pathways to producing energy – which all operate and interplay with one another. These systems are:
The Oxidative (Aerobic) Energy System - How our body’s utilise oxygen to breakdown glucose and fat to produce energy for muscular contractions. This energy system is critical for developing our cardio-vascular and respiratory health, to perform well during long duration events, or for rapid recovery between bouts of intense exercise.
The Anaerobic Glycolysis (or Lactic Acid) System – How our body’s utilise glucose in the blood or glycogen to produce energy, in the setting of limited oxygen supply, during high intense exercise. However this energy system typically lasts between 10 seconds to 120 seconds, the end product being an accumulation of lactic acid.
The ATP – PC Energy System – How our body’s function immediately without oxygen, due to the energy stores that are available in the muscle. This high rate of energy transfer corresponds to the ability to produce rapid, explosive and forceful actions by our muscles. However the disadvantage to this system is its limited capacity to store readily available energy, and lasts usually no longer than 10 seconds.
In order to condition our athletes, after determining the demands of an athlete’s sport, at CSC, we devise and formulate specific conditioning programs for our athletes, with a calculated approach to the enhancement of the energy system demands of their sports. We do this by distinguishing what the overall time of the sporting competition is. We analyse the key movement patterns of the sport. We identify the percentage of time that an athlete walks, jogs, runs or sprints. We uncover the percentages and averages of how long an athlete may hold onto a ball or have time in possession, how long they may be actively engaged in play, the speeds they’re likely to hit, the length of time a trial or race may be, as well as, ascertain the recovery time’s or periods during competition, or between events. Thus, through CSC’s vast array of programs, we condition our athlete’s through our gym-based and field-based programs as part of an overall approach to athletic development.
Now, it must be noted that generally when most coaches or people label something as “conditioning” they tend to be referring to endurance, and/or capacity, as the main components to conditioning, despite the fact that an athletes “condition” is universal, taking into account all the elements of their performance. With this being said, even though our CSC programs incorporate a thorough, holistic approach to every aspect of physically preparing our athletes; for the purpose of the term “conditioning,” primarily we will focus on the following attributes of endurance and capacity to developing the athletic engine of our athletes:
Aerobic Capacity (AC) – this refers to the greatest amount of oxygen a person can consume whilst performing exercise. Each sport has a level of aerobic capacity that will assist an athlete in meeting the demands of that sport, or recover between bouts of intense competition. Effectively, increasing AC allows an athlete to perform or compete to the best of their ability for the duration of their sport.
Aerobic Endurance – is the relative intensity of exercise an athlete can maintain for a prolonged period of time. Generally this is in the form of low-intensity exercise. Think running at a steady pace for more than 2 minutes, or swimming without stopping for 5 minutes.
Aerobic Power – is measured as the highest rate at which oxygen can be taken and used by the body during maximal exercise, also defined as the maximal oxygen uptake, or VO2 Max. The ability to develop an athlete’s VO2 Max will positively affect the cardio-vascular system, the pulmonary system, oxygen transport capacity, increase the lactate threshold and improve the economy of movement – all important factors to improving overall performance.
Anaerobic Capacity – is the maximal amount of energy that can be released through anaerobic metabolic pathways during intense, exhaustive exercise. The higher our anaerobic capacity, the greater we can buffer the onset of fatigue – especially during sports with repeated high intense bouts like Boxing, AFL, Rugby, Soccer, Tennis and Basketball.
Anaerobic Endurance – also related to muscular endurance, is known for it’s high-intensity exercise qualities, which provides an athlete with the ability to perform repeat bouts of exercise. For many athletes having the ability to perform repeated high intensity bouts throughout the duration of competition is crucial for success.