Ty Peterson MS, USAW
Certified Sports Performance Coach
Sport Specific Conditioning
Conditioning for your sport requires a laid out plan.
It is important to keep in mind things such as the movements of the
sport, the time duration, and the different exertion levels needed at different
times during the competition.
For this article I will focus on specific conditioning for basketball (although
the same concepts apply directly to all sports).
Basketball is an amazing sport that challenges athletes physically on all
levels. There’s forward, backward,
lateral, and vertical movements going on at all times (in most cases while the
athlete is going full speed). When
developing your conditioning program for the sport of basketball you must keep
in mind that simply running around a track or running a few 100’s will not get
you in the best shape for the sport.
During four-quarters of a high school basketball game you could expect to do
anywhere from 90 to 180 seconds of flat out sprinting per quarter.
The rest of the time is filled with ½ to ¾ speed running, shuffling,
backpedaling, and jumping. When you
plan out your conditioning, you need to keep in mind that although it is
important to sprint it is not necessary to sprint long distances.
Mix up your sprint, ¾ speed, and
jogging intervals to mirror what you would do in an actual game.
Some example workouts of this type of training using a football field or
track might be; (all exercises are to be done after a proper warm-up)
·
5-20yd. sprints
·
10yd sprints, 10yd ¾ speed (repeat the
cycle down the field
·
15yd sprints, 20yd shuffles (switching
direction of shuffles after first 10yd), 20yd
sprint
·
10yd sprints, 5 max jumps, 10yd back
pedal (repeat the cycle down the field)
·
Shuffle 5yd, sprint 10yd, reverse shuffle
5yd, sprint 10yd
This is just a sample of some workouts you can do.
The key is to
