A Mobility First Approach to Athletic Training
Our Philosophy
It is essential to realize that movement quality is the foundation of all athletic performance. The strength capabilities of any specific human body are trivial when the same human body is incapable of performing basic movement patterns. Improving physiological limitations and movement quality in our athletes is the first major goal of our training software. After physiological weaknesses have been identified and a proper mobility program is in place, we prescribe an age-specific strength training program that dynamically adjusts to both the athlete’s sport and position. Through both unilateral and bilateral movements, we develop the strength and power of our athlete's with a focus on increasing performance in the athlete’s specific sport.
The Big Questions
What is High Performance Training?
High Performance training can be simply defined as athletic training that is specific to an individuals sport, position, and physiology. Even within a singular sport, different positions require very unique movements and skills in terms of physiological demand. Compare a quarterback to a lineman in football. Compare a catcher to an outfielder in baseball. Through these comparisons it becomes clear that very different skills and types of strength are required by these individual athletes even within the same sport.
Is this App Safe for Youth Athletes?
Yes, athletes of any age are safe to use our training app. While the original programming was based on collegiate and professional strength and conditioning programs, our exercise pools use the human development model to select exercise variations based on a variety of factors specific to the athlete. For example, the deadlift is a pillar for lower body strength development across all athletes that train with us. Different variations of the deadlift will be selected for you based on age, ankle mobility, training experience, etc. It is also important to note that our programming has to be relatively conservative in nature. This is the case because this app is designed to be offered at scale. When you consider the potential reach of this training program, it’s important that unnecessary risk in specific types of lifts or exercises is limited. It is for this reason that you will find that we take a “safe” approach when it comes to specific debates that take place within the strength and conditioning community.
How does this App approach Training Athletes that Vary Widely in Age?
Our apps age-related decision making is primarily based on the human development model. The human development model is a physiological approach to training the human body based on its biological age. What we have found through research in this field is that the human body greatly benefits from specific modes of training depending on what stage of human development it is in. For example, pre-pubescent athletes respond incredibly well to plyometric and complex training compared to traditional strength training (Peitz et al. 2018). We prescribe this complex training to our younger athletes in an educational manner. First by providing easier versions of complex movements, and scaling up the difficulty as the athlete becomes more experienced and comfortable. An adolescent or adult athlete with similar profile settings will experience more difficult and demanding movements with slight alternations to workout structure as a result of their higher biological age.
Training Strategies Built on Science.
We are not testing theories here. We are gathering information from the cusp of human physiology and applying it to our performance training.
