We all know of teams can be faster than a sum of their parts. Team speed is about way more than the speed of each individual player. A bunch of average players can truly sync up in extraordinary ways. But whenever I watch such a team play I always wonder how they would fare against a group of faster individuals that sync up in just the same way. We can appreciate the way they work together, but let’s not forget they can still get faster.
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The term medicine ball was coined by Robert J. Roberts in 1876. He had been inspired by one of the stories in Arabian Nights where an Eastern Potentate was advised by his physician to toss a large, soft ball of herbs a certain number of times a day until ‘he did sweat.’ Movement was being recommended as medicine back in ancient times. Roberts made a ball weighing 7-8lbs and sewn like a baseball. He then recommended a series of exercises in his work with the Y.M.C.A. that included lifting, circling and throwing the medicine ball.
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Speed has many different components. While they are all related in some way, they also have their unique properties. Perhaps one of the most unique is acceleration. You can’t even think about top speed unless you can get there in the first place. How athletes overcome inertia and perform over those first few steps is critical in nearly every sport.
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Speed is speed, right? Well, not exactly. The speed demands in team sports have some critical differences compared to track and field sprinting. Those had big ramifications in how speed should be trained for team sports. On this episode of the GAINcast, we take a look at training team speed. Read more
Lots of new topics in the December edition of Sports Science Monthly. Our first study looks at the role of genetics in endurance programming. We also look at research on whether athletes eat enough, monitoring acute:chronic training loads, biomarkers, acceleration performance, and some interesting new research on tactical periodization. Read more
