Sport skills are initiated by applying force with the feet against the ground. You need to select lifting exercises and conditioning drills that apply force with the feet against the ground such as the squat and hang clean, hang snatch, or push jerk. The more force your athletes can apply against the ground, the faster they will run and the more effective they will be in sport skills.

2. MULTIPLE JOINT ACTIONS

Your strength and conditioning program should be based on exercises and drills involving multiple joint actions to improve athletic performance. Sport skills such as jumping, tackling, or running require multiple joint actions timed in the proper neuromuscular recruitment patterns. Otherwise you have no coordination or the ability to generate explosive force. Isolating on single joint actions might work for body builders to improve their appearance, but athletes need to concentrate on activities involving multiple joint actions to improve performance.

3. THREE DIMENSIONAL MOVEMENTS

Sport skills involve movements in the three planes of space simultaneously: forward-backward, up-down, and from side to side. When developing a running program, explosive exercises, similar to specific sport movements should be used. Agility, rather than straight ahead speed, is the factor that impacts most performance. It is important for athletes to be quick, but they must be able to control their bodies and execute change of direction quickly on the field or on the court to be effective.

4. TRAIN EXPLOSIVELY

Strength gains are not only determined by the size of the muscles, many times an athlete will get stronger because of an improved ability of the nervous system to recruit motor units. The more fibers a motor unit consists of, the more force it can generate. Through training the body learns to recruit more motor units so that more force can be generated. 

5. PROGRESSIVE OVERLOAD

The load or amount of weight lifted for each exercise is the most fundamental component of a strength training program. The application of the load has a crucial impact on maximizing performance and keeping injuries to a minimum. Overload happens when the body responds to training loads greater than normal. The overload causes the muscle tissue of the body to go into a catabolic state or to break down. The body then adapts, through good nutrition and rest, by compensating through the development of more strength or endurance. Intensity and volume are the key factors used to progressively increase the overload. The use of heavier loads increases the intensity; adding more repetitions increases the volume. Each method causes specific adaptations. Increasing the weight and keeping the repetitions low develops strength and power; increasing the number of repetitions and keeping the weight lighter causes improvement in muscular endurance and muscular size.

6. APPLICATION OR PERIODIZATION

Strength will eventually plateau and even diminish if the same combination of sets and reps are always used. An alternative approach is Periodization or Cycling. Cycling uses different combinations of volume and intensity, or Phases, each translating into different responses by the body. Your program should go from high volume/low intensity to low volume/high intensity.

7. SPLIT ROUTINE

Most strength training programs usually include three workouts per week, not three successive days, but three alternate ones. For example, Monday-Wednesday-Friday schedule, or Tuesday-Thursday-Saturday program. This approach gives the muscles a one day rest on the off days. Some programs work 4 days heavy upper Monday, heavy lower Tuesday, off Wednesday, light upper Thursday and light lower Friday. With the split-routine, you get at least two full days of recovery from each exercise.  

8. HARD EASY SYSTEM

Although some scientific research disputes this philosophy, we believe you make more progress over longer periods of time if you do not work at maximum loads during each workout. The Hard-Easy System eliminates over training and mental burnout. With it, there is only one hard workout per week for each type of lifting. The other day is a light workout, in which both the volume and intensity are reduced.  

9. TRAIN THE CORRECT ENERGY SYSTEM

The primary objective of conditioning is to improve the energy capacity of an athlete to improve performance. Many coaches and athletes are confused or misinformed on how to implement the correct conditioning methods for a particular sport. For effective conditioning, training must occur at the same intensity and duration as you play in competition in order to develop the proper energy system predominately used.

10. INTERVAL TRAINING

Your conditioning program should be based on interval training principles. Interval training is work or exercise followed by a prescribed rest interval. The Coaches who make the rest interval too short, cause the force to be reduced, and in this case slow twitch muscle fibers are trained rather than fast twitch fibers.