Over the course of my career I have used various forms of assessment to determine the athletes readiness to train and compete. Sometimes they looked more like something you would see in physical therapy clinic and other times it was just pure end range jumping, throwing and running tests. I kept searching for an assessment tool that would give then information I was looking for. A few years ago s [...]

It is always interesting at this time of the year at the start of spring training and with the NFL combine to read the stories of how people have changed their technique. I have been following the Tim Tebow story with great interest. Apparently he has a team of “experts’ who have completely revamped his throwing style. He is not going to unveil his new technique at the NFL CONbine, but will wa [...]

If you are an overhead athlete, a thrower, tennis player, swimmer, volleyball player etc. you need to use strengthening exercises that involve overhead movements. This is another myth that seems to pervade the exercise community and has definitely sprinted in to the athletic development community. You need to pay close attention to how you get overhead. You must get hip to the shoulder. Cheat and [...]

Here is some food for thought to spur you thinking:It is relatively easy to get strongIt is very easy to make someone slowerI am interested in your comments, before I post mine. This is how I began my presentation to the Throws group at USA Track & Field Podium Education program [...]

Someone sent me a picture of one Americas promising young hammer throwers squatting an ungodly amount of weight. I was amazed that with everything we know today that coaches are still having their athletes do this. Why in an event that demands high speed coordination are we still training our athletes to be slow? This type of work is roadblock to success, not a building block.This is just one even [...]

This blog post by Scott Berkun really got me thinking. He identifies two kinds of people complexifiers and simplifiers.Complexifiers are averse to reduction. Their instincts are to turn simple assignments into quagmires, and to reject simple ideas until they’re buried (or asphyxiated) in layers of abstraction. Simplifiers thrive on concision. They look for the 6x=6y in the world, and happily tur [...]

I was so excited I excited when I found out that Dani won, I jumped up and cheered. I was in the middle of volleyball practice and everyone thought I was nuts until I explained my happiness. I got to watch a strength training session with her and her coach Denis Knowles and his son who designs her strength training program in 2007. What an impressive athlete, with great coaching! Denis has a long [...]

The following piece from yesterday's NY Times sports page made me decide to write this. Someone needs to set the record straight. The former Mets pitching coach Rick Peterson, who for 20 years has pioneered biomechanic analysis of pitching motions, said that he shielded athletes from the physics behind what they do. You can’t build a car and drive one at the same time,” Peterson said. “When [...]

Jonathan Hewitt wrote the following 2 responses to yesterday's post ( My response is in bold): Please correct me if I'm wrong (and I often am) but I think I heard you say one time that you have your volleyball players and throwers throw with their non-dominant hand. Why is this? Perhaps I heard this somewhere else, Not Sure. Throwing with non-dominant arm has nothing to do with symmetry, I do th [...]

I’m going to wrap up this blog series by saying that I found my trip to China to be one of the more exciting things I’ve done as a coach and I learned quite a bit despite having a very limited grasp of the language. I believe that China can be dominant in the sport, not just in throwing and long distance events, but also in the sprints and jumps. With China’s immense populatio [...]