Jeremy Jacobs - Associate Director of Sports Performance, Head of Football Applied Sports Science

welcome to the Moffitt method podcast

where long time strength conditioning

coach Tommy Moffett explores everything

from the art of coaching and proven

performance Sports Nutrition and mental

training now welcome your host coach

Tommy Moffett

welcome to the Moffett method podcast if

you're listening for the first time

please take a moment to subscribe to the

podcast and share it with your friends

before we get to today's guest I'd like

to take a moment to talk about the

Moffett method strength and conditioning

program the Moffett method program is a

culmination of my 34-year coaching

career in high school and college we

offer a remote coaching solution for

your organization sport teams and school

our product includes a 52-week

year-round lifting and running program

with over

180 instructional videos

if you are interested or know of someone

that may be interested please contact us

through our website

themoffettmethod.fit or you can email us

at info the

moffittmethod.fit for more information

our incredible guest today is coach

Jeremy Jacobs at Duke University

this is coach Jacobs second podcast with

us the first one was released a few

months ago as soon as that episode was

completed we had already started talking

about recording another one

there was so much that we didn't get to

talk about we decided to jump back in

and do it again I hope that you enjoy

what's up coach

coach thanks for having me back I

appreciate it good deal

good deal man I'm excited uh we got to

talk about family and all before we

started but with this episode here I

didn't want to have a lot of um

you know stuff at the beginning I just

wanted to jump right back in okay so

here we go so you've been at Duke

um two off Seasons now

how did it go for you guys this year and

how did the off-season differ from the

one that you did last year

yeah so there are a lot of similarities

and then obviously quite a few

differences so the first year

um coming in taking over a new program

with a new head coach a new team

we started much slower in the weight

room so we had I think the start of last

year

um 8 to 10 new incoming freshmen and

they started on the same program as

everybody else because we started

everybody on at the bear The Bare Bones

we emptied the bar whereas technique it

was everything from scratch where this

year

we had about the same amount of early

enrollees uh but they were on a

completely separate program and then we

were able to kind of Advance with the

returning players we had you know data

on them for an entire year we knew what

their numbers were

um you know there was from our bowl game

to us training again it was only about

three weeks and so you know there wasn't

a whole lot of D training going on

um we trained really hard through our

Bowl prep and so

um we were trying to you know some of it

was performance wise let's let's make

sure these guys are set up to play well

in the game but then also let's make how

do we train enough to make sure that

there's not a huge gap for when we get

back and and are we hitting a heavy

enough load and credit to our guys we

had a we had a ton of guys set PRS in

our Bowl prep in the weight room

um and you know I don't know if I shared

this last time but in our in-season

program last year from Camp until the

end of Bowl

um both prep we had 136 PR's in the

weight room between the clean squatter

bench so our guys trained heavy through

the season and I think you know we'll

get into this

in the podcast I think the the velocity

and and tracking that allowed us to do

it safely and allowed us to take

advantage of players good days when they

felt good in the weight room

um and then as as our players saw that

they came in there's so many times where

guys like coach can i max out today and

be like no like you have to tell them no

you know which which is funny but also

how many times you have guys walk in the

weight room and that they see a certain

percentage you prescribed they're like

don't put that load on my on my back

today like it was just a a

philosophy shift of of guys coming in

and wanting to get after it rather than

us trying to convince them

yeah and a lot of that has to do with

the carryover uh from the head coach and

how you practice you know it's the sum

of everything that y'all do that allows

that to happen now this spring uh while

y'all were training did y'all do some of

the similar stuff from the End season

program last year during spring ball how

did that go

yeah so same mentality we we now we we

had a year of spring Ballinger coach

Alco where we knew we could go back and

look at and

um you know I talked with him a few

times before spring started to where he

was like look I'm not changing anything

in the spring like this is this is what

we're going to do here's my out you know

so our practice load didn't undulate

very much you know practice looked like

practice for the majority of those

um and you get away with that because

you have a day off in between practices

so yeah but we were like look we took

kind of I think last spring uh a more

cautious approach saying hey we didn't

know what his expectations were we're

this spring we're like nope

he knows what we're doing and we're

going to be aggressive so we had

um

a heavy day in the weight room we had

um kind of like a

um

uh middle of the road day but it was

also a heavy bench press day so one

heavy day would be like heavy cleans and

heavy squats uh that would be the

furthest away from our scrimmage days or

game day on a Saturday for Spring ball

and then we had a heavier

um

but also kind of a dynamic day with a

with Olympic lifts and a heavier bench

in the middle of the week but then we

had a true velocity day on our Friday

prior to our Saturday scrimmage or or

game so

um I made sure that we tracked those

days

with perch and I wanted to see

um kind of how we handled these common

loads throughout the course of a four to

five week training block through Spring

ball and it was really neat to see

um like our velocity day didn't change

from the first time we did it to the

last time we did it to to watch those

guys get better at moving the loads um

you know just our our velocity today we

can get into this but we were showing

you know a nine percent Improvement in

just the mean velocity from when we

started to when we finished and that was

in squat correct that was in squat yep

that was in squat so and we can talk

about how I know how we did that but it

was a

it was cool to show the progression hey

look not only did your mean velocity but

I also for the first time looked at Peak

velocity just because

Peak velocity is a component of peak

power

so I wanted to see if our Peak power is

going up like and our load is staying

the same then obviously our Peak

velocity needs to be moving faster so

how much have we improved that over the

the course of the four weeks on top of

so I looked at all all three of those

main metrics at the same loads across

time and then you can go back and show

the coaching staff hey look I I took it

to a staff meeting

and said here's here's what our training

loads were at a certain percentages of

squatting and

um and then you can break that down to

the individual

um right we we created a a very

competitive environment in the weight

room

um so it was it was pretty cool to see

how those guys responded to it and it's

changed my My Philosophy on some of

those um

like themed events you might do in the

weight room where they might seem a

little hokey or something like that if

you see it uh if you come from like a

tradition you know you come from an

Olympic lifting background or or that

environment where it's a sterile

no music barbells Clank into the middle

of a training Hall

um to a place where you're you're

putting a theme essentially to that day

uh but getting these guys to come in and

attack the workout has has shifted my

thinking and how important that is yeah

uh it's you know we live in a results

driven world and you work in a results

driven uh profession so any way that you

can get results

sometimes it's not a bad idea to get a

little hokey

and we train early here too so you gotta

factor that in you know these these kids

come in and you know our first lift

group might be six a.m yeah so

you might have to create some external

stimuli to get them to have the same

juice that they might have you know if

they if they train in the afternoon yeah

that's awesome man well we're going to

get into it

um so we touched on this a little bit

before we started but spring is done and

I'm sure that the Blue Devils are

getting ready or in the middle of finals

yeah which has got to be a tough time

there

um how does coachell go and Coach feely

handle this time you know the month of

May and uh wins the team Gonna Come Back

yeah so we have

um this is the first time I've seen this

so

right after this the way we started

Spring ball a little later which what I

liked about it is it was after spring

break so we didn't have this nine-day

pause in the middle of training and

practice

um so we didn't have to worry about

getting guys back in some assemblance of

shape when they come back off of spring

break because we know what they're doing

on a Spring Break

um you know I know what I was doing at

that age on a spring break so

um they're no different and I know what

I'm still doing on spring break no doubt

so so not having to take that into

consideration is helpful but what's cool

is it pushes our spring season later to

where when we finish our spring game

we're done like the guys don't train

they're out of the building uh they do

exit interviews with Coach Alco he meets

with every single player he meets with

Coach feely meets with every single

player

um in those meetings and there's you

know we put together an evaluation sheet

and so every player walks out of the

spring knowing where they're at in the

program

and hear the things that we think you

need to improve if you want to change

where you're at in the program and so I

like that that there is no secret of

depth chart of what we think or you know

they walk out of the building in the

spring having a clear plan of if I want

to do change anything about this I have

a plan going forward in the summer and

then we close the weight room we

legitimately turn the lights off close

the weight room and say

you need to get away from this building

we need to get away from this building

because when we come back you know it's

for real now we're getting ready for the

real season so

um we you know we get about two and a

half weeks to

spend some time with our families and

get out and and they get away and they

go see their families once they finish

school

um and then uh

volunteer so there's a discretionary

period here where they can come back as

they start class May 15th

um so it's earlier so

um so when they come back there is

discretionary workouts and

they they are voluntary in the sense of

like there is no if you don't show up

there's nothing we can do about it but

last year you know

the whole team came back and was here

for that you know so

um culture you know we liked you know

and we like to say you know this is

optional but winning in the ACC is also

optional so yeah you know there's just

certain things and the guys buy into

that and they also if they're on campus

for classes anyways there's no way

they're going to see their teammates

train and they're not going to come

train so you know we as a strength staff

we're rolling you know mid-may because

we're going to have the majority of

these guys in here which gives us a

10-week training summer that's awesome

so you yeah so you can get a lot done

and get them ready

um to go now why does school are y'all

on quarters or semester no semesters

just ends it ends earlier you know they

start a little earlier in January and

then they end you know their finals is

the first week of May but then they have

two different summer sessions

is there a break between the summer

sessions yeah there's a weak break and

then also we give them the entire week

of Fourth of July off right yeah so so

we'll roll hard for for seven weeks take

a week off then we have three weeks

three weeks when they come back so you

can really

which changes

if we're you know traditionally when

you're going to Max somebody out it

changes you don't have to do it at the

end of the summer you know you can get

there and then you can almost treat like

you can take those last three weeks and

peek into your Camp if you want to

um

so yeah you know when I first started

training

um

and maybe Tennessee was on a different

schedule but when I first started

working at the University of Tennessee

if I remember correctly we had 11 or 12

weeks you know in the summer

and it just seems like over my career

that time got shorter and shorter and

shorter you know the last

five years at LSU we had seven weeks and

I think that's the way it is for most

people so to have 10 weeks is amazing

yeah we can get some real stuff done

yeah shoot yeah man and I like training

for uh seven weeks having a week off and

then spend that last three weeks you

know really dialed in on hippo versus

having to cram everything in you know

um the way you have to do it so

um

that's enough of that okay so

let's let's talk some training here and

uh our last episode leaned heavily

toward velocity-based training okay

um

and the reason is is because you're good

at it and uh it's great to bounce things

off of you about it and uh

so I want to set a baseline here because

we didn't do this last time but I want

to compare

traditional training means

where you're using percentages of one

RMS or not using percentages but there's

this you know form of linear

periodization that we followed

and then compare that to what velocity

Based training is

and what are some of the advantages of

velocity-based training over more

traditional means of strength training

okay so can you touch on that for us

yeah so I think uh I'm going to start

this so I was looking through my phone

um

for a picture weeks ago and I realized

it's impressive how many different

quotes I have screenshot and saved in my

pictures uh but one I I wish I had who

it was from or what it was a picture of

a whiteboard

but it said everybody cleans squats and

benches but it's a standard with which

you do those movements that count right

I think that's a thing that you see

plenty of people

and so in especially in the strength

coach social media space kind of get

preachy about what they believe

um but then you might see a video of

their program and it it kind of

invalidates maybe what they're preaching

uh and I think the simplest way to talk

about velocity Based training is it's

just a it's a way of Simply measuring

the intent of your training that's

that's what it is and so

um

there is no guesswork uh tracking data

has certainly taken off and started in

the whole GPS world uh in soccer and

running and all that other stuff and and

that's still very much important in what

we do today and this is just I think

taking that same idea and then bringing

it to the weight room so you're taking

the guesswork out of how your guys are

handling your program

um and so I think the biggest thing is

in traditional training you are you are

married to the numbers that you

prescribe and then a lot of the times

the only way that you can actually

um

progress or or

announce that you've made any changes

positively is you have to have another

testing day in a traditional 1rm or 3rm

or whatever and if those numbers don't

go up then it says that your program

didn't work and that might not be the

case

um yeah so based off of your central

nervous system there's an 18 swing on a

daily basis of your one rep max right

that's a that's a 36 percent Gap in from

one end to the other so if I train and I

test and I squat 400 pounds today that

doesn't necessarily mean I'm gonna squat

400 pounds tomorrow if I test it

tomorrow maybe I squatted 410 or maybe

it was three nine whatever and so how do

I

quantify those changes on a daily basis

well when I get a feedback from a

velocity

I can see whether I'm handling this load

the way that I want to handle it and I

think that the the the feedback also

through research has shown there's

Improvement in performance when you give

feedback right and I think that's you

can you can look at um you know we've

talked about other people that uh on

podcasts and stuff like Tony holler and

some of the stuff that he's doing

as a track coach in high school and he

has what record record Rank and publish

right that was something that you know

and I think that is something that by

doing that you're quantifying your

training and you're also once your

athletes see a numerical number that

they handled something whether it be a

speed where they're running on the field

or speed on a barbell they have

something to attack the next rep and I

think that intent changes your training

from rep to rep and you get a much

higher quality

training um when you have that feedback

and that's I think one of the biggest

advantages velocity-based training can

give you versus traditional training

um and we've talked about this I almost

don't even like the term

velocity-based training sometimes

because I think people get stuck that it

always means fast and it doesn't always

that was going to be my next question is

there a better name for it

um you know what that's it I haven't

spent a lot of time I've spent more time

complaining about it than thinking about

the solutions that's my fault but but

um yeah I think that getting you know

um

that's a good question I'm gonna I'm

gonna I'm gonna spend some time on that

we'll get off this because I think

there's a better way to attack it you

know I don't know if you're going to

change the term velocity-based training

yeah of How It's stuck now but it's not

always how fast the bar moves what do

you need to understand too in most

sports power is a very important metric

that you're looking at and producing and

velocity is just a simple component of

power

um

and so you it's a very important

component and that's where I think that

having it you know is very vital now

there's also like a velocity-based

training Continuum right some people if

you think of the old tendo unit you just

use as a simple feedback that's a very

basic way and then some people on the

very other end use it to to manage every

load that they do with the athlete every

cutoff set that they do how many reps

they do per set

um and so you can get really really

nitty-gritty with it to where you don't

ever have a percentage on the bar or a

load prescribed

um and so you know I think Logistics

drives everything that we do

if you're dealing with 110 football

athletes

um you know sometimes if you have a

limited time constraint you might not be

able to do that true nitty-gritty

velocity Based training and if you're in

a one-on-one private training session

you have one client I think you can go

down a rabbit hole and really dial in

their training to maximize what they

have in the tank every single day and I

think that will show up in their results

if you can do that with them

yeah so when you were talking about the

36 percent swing yeah and a person's 1rm

I'm at the bottom of that 36 percent

that's you said that I laughed and I was

thinking yeah I'm at the bottom of that

36 right uh training's not going so well

um

so that was funny do you see me live yes

hey Father Time's undefeated right yeah

Amen to that

ah I tell you what what is going up

though and I feel good about it it's my

way

my body weight is going up I'm maxing

out we're cultivating Mass yeah oh my

God I can't stop eating I wake up in the

morning and think about what's for

dinner I mean that's the exact opposite

the way it's supposed to be all right

let's get back all right so

all right remember I said I was going to

set a baseline here so uh we didn't do

this last time either so I want to talk

about

uh the velocity zones and I'm going to

say five okay uh me personally I kind of

like to separate absolute strength and

circumac strength

um I don't know if you've seen that on

some of my stuff before but

and and the reason why well let me just

say this let me back up all right let me

get to the question all right so I want

to talk about the five velocity zones

and the specific quality or training

adaptation that each Zone represents

okay and so we'll start with absolute

strength all right and I'm going to

finish what I'd started there before I

finish my question but you know to me

absolute strength means the greatest

amount of weight that you can put on the

bar and move it one time

but at 0.5 meters per second which is

the cutoff for absolute strength I could

do that five times and so I call that

Circle max strength uh you know and it's

something that I got from the text but

I'm going to let you talk about all of

that so let's talk about

what absolute strength is the meaning

the velocities behind it and I'm just

going to open the floor up for you and

let you roll

okay so yeah like I agree with you this

is something that the absolute strength

being at 0.5 meters and slower you know

we've discussed moving let's just take

back squat for example moving a back

Squad at 0.49 meters per second or

moving a back Squad at 0.34 meters per

second is drastically different yeah uh

and the training effect I think

neurologically and neuromuscularly with

with the actual muscle is different

um you know if if you're going to truly

one rep max test guys which is what we

do here as well

um that is a trainable skill and they

have to the bar has to be loaded for

them to ever get good at moving heavy

loads like that and I think there is a

um a psychological component to doing

that as well which I think is important

I think

um you know something that we do here

um and I don't want to give Coach field

all his Secrets because I don't want him

to get mad at me but this is one thing

that I think we have a a PR Bell here

which is I really enjoy this so it's an

old boxing Bell like a ring bell that

you have to go over and you don't ring

the bell

um when you PR you ring the bell before

you're about to attempt your PR and I

think there's a drastic uh psychological

difference in that so he's all about

teaching them how to perform Under

Pressure because when the bell rings the

entire weight room stops and everybody

comes to that platform for that athlete

to max out and so now they have to

perform because every Everybody in the

room is staring at him

um and I think that that psychological

component of getting under a heavy load

maintaining posture and position and

moving it well which is also just as

important

uh I think is is really quality training

and so when you're talking about

absolute strength get back to your

question

I think there is two zones there

um I think there's also

um

there's there's these things within

velocity-based training called minimum

velocity thresholds and so you have to

Once what it means is once the bar slows

down below that threshold the likelihood

of you completing that rep or the next

rep is goes way down to almost zero

percent and those many minimal velocity

thresholds are different for each

exercise so for back Squad it normally

hovers around 0.3 meters per second

so getting an athlete between that .31

and 0.39 is a drastically different

training effect than 0.4 to 0.49 even

though it's still considered strength

and so

I think you know I think it was in prep

and he was talking about like the best

way to develop strength is around 80

because it was something that you could

also come back and return

safely to numerous uh you know training

above 90 percent there is a cost to that

it's from a neural perspective that you

know that's why you have to programming

for um

you know and maybe not every week that

you touch that percentage but that is

how you're going to actually get

stronger is touching those loads it's

you can take that back to speed and I

think of the same way is if you don't

run at your max speed then you're not

getting faster at your max speed I don't

care what percentage of your max you're

running you need to run as fast as you

can if you're going to change that and I

think the same applies in the weight

room for absolute strength

um so I think

um

what it I think what it does allow you

to do is when an athlete has a good day

and let's say you think they should be

below 0.5 at certain percentages

um

you can also maybe they're above that

and you need to load them heavier and so

instead of what I would consider wasting

a strength day because they never really

touched it you can make sure now because

you have that feedback that hey look we

need to add load to this guy

um

yeah when y'all are training

let's say

the the velocity that day is 0.5 or

below and uh an athlete is at 0.59 do

they have the ability to add more weight

themselves or is that something the

coach at that station does

uh well the coach will be in charge of

making sure that they're loading it

um but what's great about our guys is

they'll there they'll tell you hey coach

I'm like look at this and and so we're

monitoring that and then also

this is something that now it's tedious

but it's I think it's worth it every

week when we go through and print the

next week's sheets we talk about each

athlete individually as we go through

their sheet oh yeah and we'll we'll

adjust their Maxes on their sheet based

on how they're they performed so they if

they let's say the last time they maxed

out they squatted 405. they're maxed the

entire training is not going to stay at

405. it's going to get moved a little

bit up and down each week based on how

they're performing so hopefully we can

dial in

their speeds the next week when they hit

the bar then when they test again

it will be compared to the previous

testing time that they tested if that

makes sense so not so yeah the movement

yeah right so we'll we'll continually uh

change and adjust Maxes based upon how

they're performing

um

and and I think that allows guys you

know they don't even know any different

they just look at their sheet it says

they need to back squat 375. they don't

realize that if it was based on last

week's perspective uh percentage would

be 365. they just know okay this one my

sheet says load it and I'm and it's

crazy to see when you give them we saw

this at LSU when you give them exact

velocities how close they can actually

get to it and you say you got to move it

at 0.48 they move it at 0.48 like

they're you know it's impressive and

that's the great thing about

using the products now

so let's talk about the actual product

that you use you use perch and and you

can actually set the velocities that

they're supposed to hit

within the program so and correct me if

they're at it if they're let's say you

tell the team that you want to be at

0.45 meters per second in squats today

if you're hitting 0.45 it's green

correct is that how it works blue yeah

okay

all right and then above that it's green

and if it's below that it's uh red okay

so if let's say the prescribed velocity

is 0.45 and I'm at 0.5 then it's going

to be green yeah it'll show it'll show

that you're faster than that zone yeah

and then you can also

we can talk about this more too is the

um

the velocity loss thresholds you can set

there too so if you're doing something

um you can set how much percentage of

the of the best rep of the set

uh once it drops below a certain

percentage of that velocity it will show

up a different bar which means okay

we're cutting the set at that because I

that's why I set that threshold yeah how

often those

yeah so mo more so in uh hypertrophy

phases if we're trying to like hey look

this is a time we want to this is this

is where it's good if you program we've

all been a part of uh we've had athletes

where and I know I know you have because

we talked about this back in the day

when you had tendo was you have some

athletes who uh it doesn't matter the

load on the bar from 135 to 500 they

move at the same speed like they just

can't get their body to generate uh

their rate of force production is just

lacking and that's something we need to

work on we've also had athletes that

everything they do is fast and then they

hit a roadblock once they get to a

certain number and the bar they they

fail so you you might see their

squatting and they CR you know they

stand up at 0.42 and you're like all

right well that's not your one rep max

we're loading it and you put 10 pounds

on and they fail the next rep and you're

like well that doesn't make any sense

you know on on their load velocity

profile it's going to show how they they

just don't handle the heavier loads so

they just need to get stronger and so

kind of you can individualize where guys

need to go and what they need to focus

on because there was an app that you had

years ago that

before you were implementing vbt on a

mass scale you took you said he did

everything on attendo just because he

needed to work on his rate of force

development yeah we had a couple of guys

yeah and so that you know I we've seen

that in some of these guys that they

just um traditionally it's more of like

lineman well they just they're strong

and they're great at moving us

everything at a certain speed but

they're not very Twitchy and then some

of your skill guys they do everything

well until they hit a certain load and

then they just fall off a cliff and so

okay we need to keep that guy Stronger

Yeah the two guys one was a sinner

and one was a linebacker and after the

first day of practice the head coach

said these two will never play

and I almost fell out of my chair I'd

been training them you know

uh all summer long and uh first day of

training camp they were freshmen and uh

the head coach said these guys will

never play

and so I just sat there and he goes they

they're not powerful they can't generate

four they can't generate power and I was

like well I'll show you so I went back

to the staff I mean I went back to the

weight room and I told our guys I said

when these two train I don't care what

exercise it is we're going to teach

those guys and develop the ability

to be powerful and uh one

and I'm not kidding you now but I don't

want to embarrass anybody or give anyone

a reference of time but one became an

All-American

uh and then the other one though I'll

tell you the linebacker became an

all-americans because we've had enough

All-American linebackers here to take

you a little while figure that out but

then the center went on to play

uh three four years in the NFL and

actually started at one time so uh yeah

yeah all right so I so yeah yeah so well

that's what that's the benefit of it you

know there's there's so much more that's

going on on the cellular level okay

within the organism than just moving

away fast

and there's rate coding there's

synchronization there's all types of

adaptations you know I listen to

Somebody the other day and I think it

was uh Travis Mash

and someone else was doing a podcast and

they talked about like five or six

different types of muscle fibers when I

was in college there was type one type

two and that was it

uh but there's so many different

adaptations that take place when you're

training that you just can't rubber

stamp every kid that comes to the weight

room and or football practice and says

this kid will never play because and

this kid is going to be an All-American

because there's just way too much going

on there so I just took it as a

challenge and said all right boys let's

go to work

is

um

when you get a new freshman group in

your class

um

you don't know where they're starting

what's their starting point yeah and so

when I had the new freshman that came

this last this spring

um I let the velocity guide a lot of the

loading when we started and so you can

you stare at this stuff long enough you

start knowing like what it should look

like and what it doesn't and you know

there's some guys you know the Olympic

lifts are different the technique is

going to be the barometer a lot of those

new guys but

some of your strength movements

especially squatting like we were able

to dial in where they were going to be

at

from a from a Max perspective really

early on so now we're training them

optimally wherever they're at and this

is what's you know this is cool

High School strength conditioning has

come so far and is continuing to improve

um and obviously having a something like

the mafa method is going to help a lot

of schools as well but shout out shout

out but but

um what's cool is you see these kids

some of these kids that came from a

really good high school program were

able to step in day one had good

technique and all right well we're not

gonna slow cook them the same way that

the other kid that came in that has

never touched a barbell you know right

uh and those two guys there's two guys

in particular I can think of that came

out this class that they were able to

enter their first Spring ball in you

know in an ACC school and contribute

right away they were physically prepared

to do that and if if we didn't have a me

a ways of measuring it I probably

wouldn't have been as aggressive loading

them as I was

um and and they got much better than

both of those guys one of them was a

running back he put on he's put on 18

pounds since January as a running back

and the tight end put on 11.

um and so their numbers are going up but

now we're gonna by time we start fall

Camp we're gonna forget that they're

freshmen they're just going to be a part

of the team

um and I think that's a cool way as well

when you're in that environment with

with people maybe with lower training

age that it is a tool that allows you to

monitor your program much better than if

you didn't have it yeah all right let's

talk accelerating strength yep and uh

you know where they fall in the

velocities and

um

just you got the floor yeah so

accelerative strength so this is good

wait a minute for a second not one of

the sexy

qualities that you often hear about you

know because it's kind of in that gray

area it's in the gray area but it's also

probably if you looked at your training

you might spend the most amount of time

there when you're in a

um hypertrophy phase or you're in a

strength building phase when if you're

looking at like the the Vermeil

hierarchy of of training which still

holds a ton of Merit in all of our

training today right once you get out of

the work capacity phase and you get into

strength you're probably spending more

time in accelerative strength than you

are in just absolute strength and that's

because you're going to be spending time

at 75 and 80 percent in that zone

because your zone is 0.5 meters per

second to 0.75 meters per second

and I think the best way to think about

it is it's the best Zone to move heavy

weight fast

that's where you're gonna and you're

gonna develop so many training qualities

at the base of the pyramid that I think

the the better you are in your

accelerative strength Zone the better

your absolute strength is going to

eventually become that you can build

upon it

um it's also the safest time or space to

be in there so while you're developing

some of your work capacity qualities of

just getting volume in the weight room

and we know if hypertrophy is your goal

then volume is your king in that world

you're going to be able to get that

volume from that zone because the load

isn't heavy enough where technique is

going to break down and if your

Technique breaks down a little bit in

this Zone you're probably still safe

enough to stay in the zone and keep

training

um and then also from a hypertrency

hypertrophy Zone I think the it's your

maximal recoverable volume that is the

most important thing what it can I

absolutely do and recover from that's

going to elicit the best result and I

think being in that accelerator strength

zone is probably where you get your most

bang for your buck in that training

yeah especially with young kids very

safe zone for introducing you know the

strength exercises all right now the

next zone is a sexy Zone you hear about

this one a lot a lot and it's strength

speed so tell us about you know the

thresholds for velocities and the

benefits of training here okay so the

next okay so the next two zones right

they take two words in the

interchangeable so you have strength

speed and then speed strength and I

think whatever

whatever the first word is is the

emphasis of the word and of the training

so in in strength speed strength is

still going to be your your main goal

but your your velocity is 0.75 to 1

meter per second

on the zone and it's probably going to

be your biggest power Zone this is why

it's a sexy Zone because when you're

training true power

uh you're going to be in the strength

speed zone

and I I think the best term I've ever

heard for this is torque

this is where this is your torque zone

so if you're talking about speed

strength it's like punching somebody in

the chest and if you're talking about

strength speed you're talking about

putting your fist through someone's

chest so if you're like that that is

that's kind of made sense to me and so

when you're moving a barbell

um like that that is what your goal is

and this is also where you know Louis

Simmons who obviously made vbt in

America popular this is where he spent

his Dynamic effort

method in this is where he was using

that 0.8 meters per second 0.85

this is where we saw most of our power

produced in a back squat was in this

Zone because you can load it heavy

enough so the force is high but the bar

can still be moved fast enough so if you

have a higher Force plus a higher

velocity obviously your power goes up

and so we spent a lot of time and this

is what's cool about velocity-based

training too is you can take an exercise

like back squat and you can turn it into

a power exercise or you can load it

heavier and turn it into an absolute

strength exercise and so you know part

of our in season training there at LSU

was was a back squat was turned into a

power exercise on a Monday and our you

know we are in this strength speed zone

during the season

and we found our absolute strength

through other exercises

um and I think the guys handled it well

and you can watch them move loads faster

over time and it's another way to

quantify results so instead of having to

one rep max test them you can show your

guys hey look this is you used to move

250 pounds at this speed now you move

250 pounds at this speed or

you're at the same speed but now you're

moving 275 at that speed right and they

see that and they and they recognize

that there is progress being made

without

necessarily testing him

that makes sense yeah no all right let's

speed strength okay so now speed

strength so speed strength you're going

into

1.0 meters per second to 1.3 meters per

second and this is mean velocity I think

it's important to to talk about

um this is where your Olympic lifts come

in this is if you're an Olympic

weightlifter this is where you would

live with the cleans and jerks and

snatches

um this is why those exercises have so

much value still in training

um because you just don't move a barbell

this fast in any other way in a

controlled setting

and so

um you know this is where if you want to

talk about the difference between Peak

and average velocity because that's

where for those movements you're gonna

you're gonna look at different metrics

um and why would you but the the speed

strength speed being first speed is the

component that is probably most

emphasized so there's still power in

this and you know we would talk about

this where there's two different types

of power right there's there's High

force and slower velocity and there's

higher velocity and lower force and so

you're getting you're you're getting uh

more and more velocity as these

movements go on this Continuum and less

force uh but you're gonna all I think

these the speed strength and the

strength speed zones correlate to sport

more than any other zones that you have

and that's why they're so important to

train on a regular basis and this is

where like with the Olympic lifts

because they live in this Zone

um you can train this Zone year round

because you're constantly having those

movements somehow

um in and out of your program

yeah and moving a heavy load at those

velocities no doubt yes that's where

when we talked about the uh the velocity

loss thresholds and stuff like that or

your minimal velocity thresholds how

those are going to change per exercise

um if the barbell moves slows down too

much in a clean you're just not going to

catch the clean uh and if same thing

with a snatch if the bar just slows too

much you're not getting under the

barbell in the snatch and so there are

certain velocities that you have to

obtain and that's why you know comparing

um you know weightlifting to power

lifting you know weight lifters

that translates to sport there's so much

more explosive just because of how they

train at at these speeds at such a

regular basis

um

and so it's it's a it's a very important

Zone and and I think it's something it's

how you

training the muscle tissue

in this I think it's important from also

an injury prevention standpoint is

you're getting them to sequence and code

at a certain and stretch and and

contract at certain speeds that I think

carries over to the field a lot more

than some of the other training

all right now you touched on Pete uh

Peak power here or in Peak velocity you

know when you look at the chart you know

knowing that these are mean velocities

it kind of throws you off when you start

seeing Peak velocity and the main power

versus the peak power can you explain

the difference and why there is a

considerable this uh difference in the

two velocities

yeah so the the mean velocity is the and

the the average of the velocity over the

entire concentric phase of the movement

the peak velocity is the instantaneous

fastest speed that that bar reached

during the movement in the concentric

phase

and so you're taking a snapshot in time

with Peak velocity versus uh the entire

length of the movement now this is why

it's important in the Olympic lifts

uh first and foremost athletes come in

different shapes and sizes and so

um a perfect example I I think about

this um

back at LSU

um I don't want to name names here I

think a phony and lifting next to Derek

Dylan and it's funny because I talked to

both of those guys this week on the

phone

um and all right so give them uh give

everyone uh like a perspective on this

all right all right so so Stefan

Sullivan okay he's six six but he has an

over 80 inch wingspan so he his arms are

long he's tall and he's he's Dynamic at

that size as well and then you have

Derek Dylan who ran a 428-40 when he got

ready to go so he's fast

but he's 510 and so when you put them

next to each other there's just a huge

difference so if you watch Derek Dylan

lift he was super sudden and dynamic

with the ball when the bar touched his

hip he was underneath it it was like Wow

and if you watched phony it was a little

more methodical but he was pulling the

bar so much longer that if you looked at

their average velocity and their P

velocity phony beat him every time and

they just happened to lift next to each

other almost every day and so the amount

of smack that was being talked from

phony because he was beating him all the

time and Derek would tell me my machines

broke

and it was just a it was like a it was

like a case study in real time of why

these things are but if I compared their

Peak velocities to each other they were

much more similar in nature

um it just so happened now this is my

own I don't know you want to call it

research you probably can't call it that

uh in a true scientific setting but

staring at this for so long

within the Olympic lifts I do think that

average velocity has value because I

think there's a technique component that

you can tease out when you see a really

slow average velocity

but their Peak velocity still were you

know a 2.3 or whatever it's right where

you want it to be so they're still

moving the bar dynamically at some point

in that movement

but somewhere that bar Slows To I was I

would call it their hitch and their

giddy up it's some somewhere there's

something going on in their polls

that the bar is slowing down to a point

that's going to affect probably the

quality of their lift and so it allows

you to go back and kind of maybe take a

video of them lifting and and you can

start dialing hey where are you poor at

and we can get better at that one thing

and it probably will carry over to just

the entire clean and you'll see your

numbers go up

um but yeah so Peak velocity is is going

to be what's most researched in the

Olympic lifts or dynamic ballistic

movements

uh just because you can compare athletes

of different sizes to each other uh more

commonly so

and it's also like the component like I

said peak velocity is the component in

Peak power

and so I want to see I think that's

going to play a role if you're looking

at Peak power and wattage where they're

producing it at you got to kind of stare

at their Peak velocity as well

all right last but certainly not least

is starting strength

so starting strength um

this is simply put it's

how do you produce speed by overcoming

inertia okay so it's everything above

1.3 meters per second Super ballistic

um if you're starting from nothing and

all of a sudden so this would be

teaching somebody to change direction at

the bottom of a squat going back up to

concentrically right teaching them how

to how to get out of that that bottom

position this is something that

um I think when you're training all of

these at qualities that they all need to

be in your program

um and this is one component of of doing

something this might be a med ball throw

this might be you know you might it's

hard to do stuff with a barbell this

fast

which was really cool to see some of our

guys with some of our velocity squatting

is I was seeing numbers in the one fours

you know with some of these guys because

some of our velocity days we lightened

it enough where we were squatting 30

percent you know in an in-season setting

before or a game

uh and that's normally where you're

going to see some of this starting

strength zone is going to be around that

30 percent or lower right so then you

got to ask yourself okay if I'm going to

light move this light of a load do I

need to do with a barbell or should I do

it with a different implement or

something like that

um and what's cool is when you see all

this speed and this is

kind of a different caveat but there is

you know the fastest you're going to see

a barbell move in the weight room and a

peak velocity is probably about around

three meters per second with a snatch

with a lighter snatch and that's the

fastest you can move a bar which is why

that movement is so awesome uh and still

has so much tremendous value in the

weight room but when you go look at Max

sprinting you're talking about guys that

are sprinting between 9.5 and 10 meters

per second

so like there is still nothing from a

central nervous system development

standpoint that will ever beat getting

an athlete to Sprint a Max Sprint I

don't care uh and that was once you

realize that these bar velocities and

velocity-based training is the same

metric as running speeds and you start

adding you know meters per second to

meters per second and you do realize how

drastically different a true Sprint is

um that that's why it still has it's

it's still the peak of the pyramid if

you will the tip of the Spear of speed

all right so you mentioned this earlier

how much work have you all done with

load velocity and or force velocity

profiles using the perch

yeah so with perch because you know we

don't

um

we've kind of I kind of did it backwards

so instead of doing it at a traditional

way where you would basically have

somebody

conduct a one rep max test but you would

just track their velocity as they got

closer to their 1rm the cool thing about

load velocity profiling is it's very

linear all the research is very very

linear you can it's a it's a straight

line from when you start at you know 20

of your 1rm and work your way up to a

hundred percent of your 1rm

and so what I did is I had just

accumulated so much data from our

players at from 30 to their Maxes that I

could go back in and then create the

load velocity profile

um with more than just one testing day

like you truly have

um a considerable amount of reps at each

percentage

and it came out to be very very linear

um yeah and and you also have to take in

to account

what are you emphasizing in your

training so with our velocity day for

let's just for spring you know we did uh

between 40 and 50 with our percentages

that we're working between so 50 was as

heavy as we went and so because we put

so much emphasis at that zone when you

look at our load velocity profiles well

we performed really well at 50 if we had

done it at a different percentage we

probably would see some of those

percentages have an uptick in speed just

because we spent some emphasis there the

same thing with when I was tracking 80

over the course of all spring the reason

I chose 80 from a strength movement is

just because we hit it more often than

we would hit 85 or 90. so I would

accumulate more data so that way even on

those days that maybe we hit 85 or 90 we

still kind of trained through 80 percent

so I would get data at 80 every time

um you can see how they got better at

those those qualities but because I we

would emphasize certain days you might

see a spike in

um in some of those velocities and then

also if you track it over time

you know there's certain times of the

year that fatigue is a component and

volume is a component so if I have if

I'm doing 85 percent for sets of three

well that bar is going to start slowing

down from a fatigue and I want it to

that's the whole reason that's what

we're trying to train for we're trying

to create that

um and so if I was trying to compare

maybe an in-season 80 versus a hard

Training Day in the middle of the summer

well the hard training day is probably

going to look much worse but how much

volume was I doing per set versus a

single or a double in an in-season

program so all of those are going to

play so like you got to look at the sum

of everything that you're doing yeah so

in some of the reports that I'm

creating now I will put I call it my big

picture note at the bottom and I just

spell out where are we at in the program

what did we do today or this week how

many what's our volume like so that way

in a year from now and I look back I

have the big picture note of why we

handled the loads this way and I'm not

trying to guess why were we better in

this month versus this month do you

include the RSI with that from any Force

plate data is on that sheet

on my not on my sheet no but um because

I have a different Report with our jumps

yeah on that um but it is interesting

yeah so we were talking about so uh I

kind of mentioned this the first time we

had talked where in an in-season program

we had selected 12 guys that jumped

every day and so this spring I had 12

guys that we jumped every day that we

practiced so they jumped three days a

week and uh they'd come in in the

morning and they had a five to seven

minute warm-up that we had and then they

got on the force plate did three counter

movement jumps and and left

and I attracted overall Spring ball and

it was what was really cool to see is

the majority of the guys

after our velocity squat day on a Friday

how much better they felt coming into

the building on Saturday for our

scrimmage or games

um and for particularly we had a running

back and a tight end if I could show you

the graph it was like a a perfect they

would they would go here and then they'd

jump their jump after

um

it was a distinct wave the jump after

the velocity squat day the next day

there was you know there's about a 24 to

48 hour training effect from doing that

and

um on average like the tight end would

jump up 12 on his RSI and would gain he

would gain over an inch in his jump

height off the plate and for jump height

I'm looking at the in inches but I'm

using the impulse to momentum uh

equation and how they get this so

um you know he's he's jumping higher and

way faster after that day and he would

always say how much better he felt now

we are also they got a little more sleep

going into that day too so there's

certain other components that we're

tracking as well but

um

but it was cool to see those guys some

guys would come up to me because they'd

feel tired in the middle of Spring ball

and say look I just need to get to

Velocity squat day and I'll be fine and

I'm like hey look man if you if you

believe that yeah I'm in you know yeah

isn't it it's amazing I would say just

remember that this fall you know when

it's when it's when it's Thursday or

Friday and we play on Saturday you know

remember how this made you feel because

this is going to be something that

you're going to come in and do prior to

game day yeah and the guys believe it so

and and we you know same thing we we uh

we record it we publish it make sure you

guys see it we put it up in the locker

room

um and and they they coming at so it

just like they do with the velocity

stuff on the field hey how fast I run

today we get that question all the time

how fast I run because we publish it we

publish all their speeds then they come

to us and how fast did I squat today and

so it's a it's a cool buy-in but see

yeah and so that's what I was going to

say that you know coaching coaching is

part sales you know

um and uh in creating an atmosphere

where people can see that the things

that I do are improving my performance

and it only increases buy-in and it adds

value to everything that you're doing

and it perpetuates itself over and over

and over again that's so awesome all

right so you touched on you know you

were talking about sets and you know

reps I'm sorry we're talking about the

three reps at 85 percent in season

versus you know the the load that you

were handling during the off season so a

lot of velocity-based training has to do

with specific loads uh that you need to

train at and then specific adaptations

at those loads but there isn't a lot

said or included on the velocity charts

for reps

okay at particular velocities so

you know this just this question just

kind of popped up

um how do you control the Reps uh or how

do you manage how do y'all I should say

manage the Reps and the volume that

you're training at and is there a

correlation between particular volumes

or particular rep ranges and velocities

yeah I think um you're gonna you know

you could talk we can talk a little bit

about some of the Velocity loss

thresholds you can set and how those are

going to affect

um training and adaptation and fatigue

but then also just from a general

we still program

um

with their with the system of you know

certain percentages have certain rep

ranges and we're going to stay in in

those

um and that's gonna you know so we know

that like in an off season setting if

it's week three of the summer program

like we're we're

loading you and there's going to be

enough volume in that program to elicit

a response

um and and you know you and I have

talked about this I think

we've gotten so deep down this Rabbit

Hole of the minimal effective dose where

I think sometimes that is incorrect I

think what you know I said earlier your

maximal recoverable volume I think is a

more important metric because

you know I can speak specifically about

football but you need to build a level

of robustness in the system and the

tissue to handle that because you know

your football is the one sport that the

only day that you feel good is the first

day of training camp

and from that point on you play the

entire season from a deficit there's

there's aches and pains that just go

into it and it's a sport where you know

in track and field

if you don't feel right you're probably

not going to run until you feel right

well in football you're still playing on

Saturday you know and you know you would

talk about this where you get in a car

wreck and then you spend the week trying

to knock the dings out and then getting

ready for another car wreck it's not

it's like not NASCAR yeah football is

like NASCAR you spend all week fixing

the car and then you run it out and you

crash It and Bang it and

on Monday

so if you don't build a level of

resiliency in your training in the

weight room

that for the tissue I think that your

drop-off as the season goes is going to

be greater than uh you know you know if

you have built that through the weight

room and so as far as our volume goes

it's calculated out

um and then sometimes in a let's say a

hypertrophy setting we might have

um some volume at the back end so this

is something that you know Travis Mash

talks a lot about with velocity-based

training which is really cool where he

has his weight lifters work up to a

single at 0.45 meters per second on

their training sessions and then they

find other volume after that but they

always touch strength and I think that's

really cool and that's something we

essentially try to do here is we try to

touch 80 or above regularly but then if

you want to get volume you can get it in

the back end either in the same movement

or a different movement of that um those

same

muscle group but we've allowed we did

use some velocity loss threshold stuff

meaning

um how one athlete handles the volume or

their volume set at the end of it versus

another one is going to be different and

so maybe you know this athlete did eight

reps at that percentage but this athlete

did 13 because that's just he kept

maintaining the same velocity and so

with the velocity thresholds

what it states is the the less

percentage of velocity loss you're going

to have the less fatigue and muscle

damage so if I'm trying to keep an

athlete super sharp and ready to perform

then I might put their velocity loss

Threshold at 10 meaning when for

whatever their best rep is per set when

it drops 10 percent

um then I'm going to cut the set and

we're going to wait and do another you

know give some time between our sets but

if I'm really trying to to elicit a

fatigue or an adaptation then I might

put 20 or 30 percent on my velocity loss

and so that athlete is going to fatigue

over a greater amount of reps per set

and I'm going to create a bigger

stimulus to that muscle right now I need

to know that there's going to be a a

compound effect that I need to give them

time to recover from that type of

training differently than the other

stuff but that's one way that I could

use velocity from a set and rep range

where I maybe I don't know how many

perhaps they can do because maybe three

by eight for one athlete is easy but

three by eight for another athlete at

that percentage is super hard and I

think having velocity loss thresholds

now allows you to train those those

athletes very similarly based on how

their central nervous system functions

um and then I think this is also

something

where you can talk about cluster sets

and you know Cal Deets talked about this

in his book and

um in triphasic but cluster sets there

was a study that was shown where one one

group did uh six sets of six reps and

another group did a cluster set of two

three times for six sets and so they

would do two reps take a break do two

reps take a break do two reps take a

break to get their six reps in

and their power production over the

course of all of their sets was

considerably higher than the one that

did six by six so you can get more

quality training through a cluster set

um based off of that because your

velocity will be maintained throughout

that with a little bit a little bit of

break and some of the other teams that I

trained

um I I

kind of dabbled in this with their slow

eccentrics and so when you do a slow

eccentric movement obviously when you're

taking that velocity component out of

that

um it's really hard on the concentric

portion of the movement

so it's harder to load that super heavy

if you're going to have a bunch of

volume in your set and so I would do

cluster sets of singles or doubles but

then I was able to load them at about

eighty percent of their 1rm in their

slow eccentric and so

um it was a way that I could manage the

volume with the velocity and then

maintain quality over the course of

their training rather than having their

technique break down so much because of

fatigue

foreign

knowledge bombs

you've done well all right so

this is something that you you touched

on briefly early on

do you notice a difference in the

velocities at certain percentage of an

athlete's 1rm between exercises so for

instance bench and squat

no doubt 100 so uh this is I've realized

that um for instance so this chart isn't

this chart isn't like um

it's not a one size fits all yeah not a

one size fits all no no

go ahead go ahead well and and training

age is going to play a role in this too

you know if you have somebody who's a

very accomplished lifter

right somebody who's a very accomplished

lifter

um they're going to be able to grind a

set out and so some of these velocity of

the zones will actually shift slower

than what's prescribed if that makes

sense

yeah I had to let the dog out Aaron just

came home so Ben wants to go see Aaron

there you go

all right so say that again I am so

sorry no no no so take it um

the more accomplished or the higher the

training age is of a lifter some of

these velocity zones are going to shift

slower because they're going to be able

to grind out

um

sorry say what's up yeah come here

it's Jeremy

what's up dude

hey Jeremy I can't hear you man I know

hey it's great to see your face though

yeah he said it's great to see your face

no he's got back straps yeah that's what

that is yeah yeah you can cook it

I was going to ask you about that good

to see you Jeremy you too bud

he's in Arkansas now no no that's Rodney

said Arkansas he silly dude yeah come on

all right Ben I want you downstairs yeah

all right sorry about that God bless

yeah sorry about the uh Interruption

there hey real life

yeah yeah really live yeah he just got

off work so

he came in to see what's for dinner

well backstraps is a good start yeah

it's a good start

um

okay so get back on track

um

the better a lifter is at lifting the

more accomplished they are as a lifter

they're higher their training age their

velocities can shift to slower than what

the prescription is to hit their quality

of their training quality so somebody

let's say they're a really accomplished

power lifter they're going to be able to

grind out a really slow clean or a bench

squat or deadlift like you're going to

see some slow movements I think about

what Jake would lift and we would put on

the perch and he could you know

um

he could grind out a heavy bench press

and then the velocity would be like a

one a 0.16 you're back yeah you know

we're same thing on deadlift so yeah so

the less training age somebody that

they're just not going to complete that

movement they're going to fail the rep

um but also I've you know bench press

for instance doesn't produce a lot of

power you know you can you can lighten

the load enough but it's just the way

that you're set up on there uh if I'm

trying to produce power in an upper body

exercise I'm probably going to choose

something different than than what I'm

going to look at also you know you gotta

look at how far the bar moves so if I'm

looking at a push press versus a jerk

um the push press might seem fast just

because you're pushing it longer where

somebody who's really really efficient

at a jerk the bar might only move what

six to 12 inches off the back by time I

snap underneath it so it just doesn't

have enough movement

for it to to show up is super super

powerful but we know that it is when you

look at that you know we're comparing

we did a comparison one day I know in

the weight room where we were looking at

somebody doing a loaded barbell jump

versus a split jerk and it wasn't even

close to the the power output that

you're producing in a jerk versus a

loaded jump it just you can't you can't

mimic

um taking 300 pounds and snap it in over

your head and standing the weight up on

it in another way you just you can't no

um and uh and so yeah those those

velocities I went off on a tangent that

day if you remember I went on I do I do

uh because we had and and people don't

do jerks and you can generate as much

power in a jerk as any movement but

you'll go do something else that's not

nearly as efficient plus there's a lot

of other benefits to catching that bar

overhead just from head to toe yeah head

to toe it's a great movement it you know

and you know it's my favorite lift and

so not enough people use it I agree I

agree and you know there's a lot of talk

about deceleration trading and all that

other stuff and you know people are

loading up barbells and taking a step

forward to do deceleration which is it

totally works I'm not saying it doesn't

work yeah

but just do a split jerk and you see

what you're doing from a unilateral

perspective and staying it's uh you have

to be strong and dynamic to do that

movement

um

in a full range of motion yeah um but

yeah that's a different that's a

different tangent

um as you go down but and another

component thinking about some of this

velocity-based training stuff too is you

know the the coach's eyes certainly

still important and I'm not trying to

devalue that but you it's really hard to

discern you know 0.4 meters per second

and 0.35 meters per second uh with the

naked eye but when you have a device you

can dial that in

um certainly a lot you can it's the

concept of you know in in the military

of aim small Miss small you know you're

you're just tightening up your pattern

much much tighter in your training and

how you program versus just kind of

hoping that you can

um see what you think you want to see

have you gotten validation for

velocity-based training

from using some of the other

technologies that you have in the weight

room can you cross-reference some of

those things

I think for certainly with our like our

velocity squat Day this year and

watching their jumps and watching guys

um their RSI modif mod go up their jump

height go up

um watching uh their eccentric braking

rate of force development and their

ability to turn on the hit the brakes

that definitely has has a a value in it

uh

and and uh I think mostly the force

plate is going to be the best way to

reference that

um and I think that's where the fourth

plate is is so important because you can

it's kind of your metric for everything

that you do whether you run you're

fatigued from that or you fatigue from

practice are you fatigue from the weight

room the force play can tease out a lot

of that stuff

um and I you can't trick the force plate

with just how fast it's taking

measurements and time

um you can't fake and and so you know I

reached out to other people in the

sports science realm in NFL

organizations and other college teams

and and people that are better at the

force plate than I am and just getting

what their feedback and what they look

at and a lot of them still just go back

to the raw data like if somebody's

really good at the force plate they want

to go back and actually look at the jump

from the raw data perspective yeah

because that tells them so much more

about the jump than maybe some type of

metric

and what's cool about the force plate is

I don't think

the force Plate's value isn't capturing

a jump a moment in time it's about

Trends and watching an athlete you know

their Trends over time

and how does training affect their

Trends over time or the volume and

fatigue of the field work or whatever

they're doing I think that's where the

value comes in is you need to jump

enough or do enough testing on the force

plate that you can really kind of

inference is there an issue going on or

is it just daily CNS undulation of of

training and

um and then it's you know what else are

this is the athlete doing in their life

yeah they you know are they sleeping are

they eating

um are they studying hard are they

partying I mean all that's going to play

a role in how they jump not eating

eating too much

yeah yeah so there's you know it's the

sum of everything and that's where I

think all of this technology like none

of the the force plates or the even the

velocity-based training stuff a single

training session doesn't move the needle

it's just it's tracking it consistently

over time I think is how you make your

biggest bang for your buck and

um and and that's where I don't think

when people start down this journey they

don't need to make wholesale changes to

their program just because they

implemented a piece of technology they

need to keep doing what they're doing

and the technology will take care of

itself to validate what if what you're

doing is maybe heading in the right

direction or not

all right so we're talking about Force

plates uh let's talk about asymmetries

for a second and

huh so when you jump on the force plate

you uh in this and I guess uh I've only

used two Force plates I've used Sparta

science and evolves four Stacks uh one

uh is uh

has two Force plates the force dags by

Vault has two Force plates that you jump

on and then the sparta science just has

one force plate

um

but when looking at asymmetries do you

see some of the same stuff when you

compare your jumps on the force plate

that you may see on a nordboard uh using

perch in your unilateral exercises how

do asymmetries appear to y'all uh using

the different Technologies

yeah so a couple different things so one

uh eight every athlete has asymmetries

there's no athlete that doesn't have

asymmetries asymmetries are very very

um common and normal and and it might be

what makes that athlete who they are you

know and it's going to also depend on

sport

um whether if you're a rotational

athlete in baseball if you if you're a

rotational athlete in football and

you're a kicker

um if you're a track athlete and you're

a jump you know what's your jump leg

that's going to display itself on the

force plate majorly and so you might see

some of these asymmetries and think oh

we need to fix this but some of it just

might be who that athlete is so I think

that's where like talking about tracking

over time is where you know is this

normal for them or is this an abnormally

uh what we saw especially at LSU with

our

with our unilateral work on perch is

that any asymmetries that we saw in a

non-loaded exercise I could jump on a

force blade or a North board

um would not show up once you loaded the

exercise and so once we loaded them they

had very very uh I think it was like a

one percent difference between right and

left limb on some of our unilateral work

uh I think the only place that that

really changes is if you have a real

injury you know let's say somebody's

coming back from an ACL and it's a

long-term you know they have some type

of

um

their quad atrophied to a point like

you're going to see some of that stuff

uh show up in in the velocity-based

training stuff

but something I did is you know

listening to to people who really spend

their whole life's work in research on

Force plates

um

everybody has you know this threshold of

about 10 is the norm of asymmetry and

above that you start flagging it but

really it's about 20 percent that might

be where you start you need to make some

type of training

um difference in their program to make

them more a little more balanced and so

something that I did uh we're getting

ready to implement now going into the

summer is I went through every single

Athlete on the team I looked at their

their asymmetries on the force plate and

then I looked at their asymmetries on

the nordboard

and

if their asymmetry was above a certain

threshold

um okay you're on the list and then I

would dig into that list more to where

is your asymmetry showing up on the

force plate different than the asymmetry

that shows up on the Nord board so let's

say they're just they always load to

their right and then you look at the

nordboard but their right hamstring is

actually weaker than their left okay

then they just need to learn how to load

differently and load that limp so their

protocol is going to be different it's

going to be more load focused of

absorbing Force if it's the same where

they always load to their right and

their left hamstring is weaker then

we're also going to emphasize some of

their posterior chain work on that left

side to make sure we bring their

posterior chain back and maybe that will

correct some of the issue that we see

from them

um we look a lot at their Peak Landing

forces how are they absorbing Force back

on the plate

some of the people that I've talked to

brought up some good points though that

you know in an unloaded jump just a

counter movement jump

um there's really not that great of an

eccentric demand placed on the body to

make that big of an inference in their

eccentric loading in a jump

but it does tell a story of maybe

something going on

um and even some of the guys that I had

jump on a regular basis because they're

part of the 12 guys some of them were

coming back from an injury they had the

previous season and so you'll have

certain things like Force at zero

velocity asymmetry a lot of that has to

do with what you'll see is

um one ass like it showed up in an ankle

injury and so the athlete just didn't

want to have enough dorsiflexion and so

if you went back to his

raw data in the jump you would actually

see the injured limb would leave the

plate earlier than his non-injured limb

so he would push longer into the plate

with the non-injured limb because he

didn't reflee he didn't want to go into

that plantar flexion on the injured

ankle you know so those are you know

going back to the raw data you can go

back and then you video The Athlete jump

and you can show them that and

okay then now what are we going to do to

fix in the weight room uh and that could

be Mobility it could be strengthening

and and so they'll find time now there's

an extra asymmetry card in all their

folders

um from a Mobility standpoint here's

some things that we found that your your

range of motion is lacking versus the

other limb and then from a force plate

or nordboard asymmetry here's some other

exercises you need to come in and do on

top of some of your normal training to

attack some of your your weaknesses

awesome awesome

all right so we're

um we're getting close we're we're

starting to get close to the end of this

you're doing a great job man just

knowledge bomb after knowledge bomb man

wow you got to get your sound effect

yeah well it doesn't work man I've tried

it was way too much for me to try to do

but I can do

that's it did you hear that yeah I got

it yeah

yeah that's all I can do no bomb

all right so

um I got a couple questions because you

know part of our audience uh a major

part of our audience is High School

coaches

um

and so for for many uh this is kind of

out of bounds you know because they

don't have access

to to these type of Technologies

um but it's changing there are more and

more schools that are

um that are doing this type of stuff but

not everyone can afford a tendo a gym

aware perch Elite Form and all the other

stuff that's available out there are

there any cost-effective alternatives

that you know of that a school could

purchase and and do some of the stuff

that we talked about today

yeah I think the most cost effective one

I've heard of is Vmax Pro

um Vmax Pro they're still wearable on

the bar but you just put it on the bar

and so uh and then you can download the

app right to your cell phone uh and so

you get it right on your iPhone or

whatever

um the only negative component of it is

that if you have multiple uh Vmax Pros

they don't

talk in the same system meaning when you

download the data you kind of have to

download them individually and then you

combine them so there's a little extra

bookkeeping I guess on the back end of

it but I think it's a few hundred

dollars and then you get all of the

Velocity stuff and there's some pretty

cool stuff in the Vmax Pro about

um

uh where it kind of guides you and asks

you what is your goal training today I

want to train this quality and if you

move the bar it'll say okay you need to

load the bar this much more and it'll

kind of give you some guidance into how

much to load onto the bar to reach the

parameter that you're trying to train so

it's a neat little device I've heard

I've had multiple people use it and and

they're positive about it and then if

other people ask well what if I can't

you know say I have 20 racks in my

weight room I can't afford 20 purchase

like you know can you afford two and

start start there and what I would do is

I would take my best athletes and I

would train them on it and then everyone

else would be

guided upon my best so I'm making sure

that my best athletes are trained

optimally and then everyone else I can

kind of make changes to their program

based off what their training age is in

that yeah yeah that's a neat idea and

you could take turns you know to use

annotate yeah yep rotate yeah that's a

good idea

so it's just it's a way to start and

then maybe over the course of years you

might be able to build a more robust

system uh I think something that's cool

if

a great if you just go to like purchase

social media and some of the stuff and

um some of their their people their

company as they continue to grow they've

expanded a lot of people's roles and

brought on a lot of good people a lot of

good people that have come from other

technology companies like catapult and

people who have been in that type of

sport Tech game for a long time and

um they're they're putting out more and

more educational content as well and so

you can learn a lot about this but also

perch is now starting to do this thing

where they're actually they're not just

tracking barbells or tracking human

movement I know so that's that's really

neat yeah so I've been working with with

Jacob and Nika and them there and Jordan

their their it guy about okay what are

some things what are some main metrics

of a force plate that we can maybe get

uh from a jump can you get an RSI mod

off of off of you know taking somebody's

a video of their jump and and if you

could

couple that with what you can do vbt

wise now when a weight room that maybe

doesn't have the budget they could buy a

perch and now you're getting two systems

in one essentially yeah um because you

can you can get it out you can have your

guys do jump testing and you can have

them track some some below so

um you know they've continued to evolve

which is really really cool

um yeah that would be like having a

force plate in your platform yeah yes

that's that that's like the ultimate

the ultimate goal of how do you

um and I think another thing that makes

perch you know uh

I've had the best luck with them or or

the greatest

um

uh investment of my time with them

because when you export the raw data

file it is very clean and easy to use

I've looked at some of the other ones

um that you look at the raw data file

and it is it's a mess to try to organize

that data which if you're not if you

don't come from any type of data

background which I certainly didn't I've

just learned over the years if you if

you gave it to a strength coach and he's

like look I don't have time to do this

he's just he's gonna he's gonna not use

it it's just not user friendly where

perch has been very user friendly uh

from that standpoint

okay so two questions come to come to

mind the first one who probably helped

you the most Excel wise because that's

where all this you know you started on

the Excel documents yeah it's funny I

look at I look at some of the Excel my

first ones that I handed you and I'm

like oh my gosh so terrible it's so bad

I just had no idea

um yeah well it was a group effort

really You Know Travis had gone down you

know shout out to Trav I know I know

Trav got a a shout out with uh with

Badger yeah but but uh you know Travis

had built out the program

with how we build our our program and

it's it's a very intricate Excel file

and then you know Vic had been doing it

for years with catapult data

um and then so taking that combination

and then honestly Jake and I would sit

there and we would sit on YouTube and go

back and forth of how to create shorts

uh

it had to be self-taught and

it's one of those where

um you know I'm not I think the whole

Sports Science thing

um it's it's gotten siled to where it's

like its own discipline yeah but now are

you a strength coach or a sports

scientist

I'm a straight coach I'm a straight

coach in my heart like that is I want to

be on the floor yeah with the guys

whether it be doing a Mobility thing

with them after practice or yelling you

know what I mean like I want to be on

the floor coaching but the the value you

get from the data is so important that's

what started us down that road of like

all right there's enough value here that

we need to figure out how to mine this

data and get it out of it but without

spending all day

now some people in the sports science

setting have really done some amazing

things with some of this data collection

and

um and and it's it's forced me like the

things I'm pursuing now in power bi and

some of these other programs

um if you would have told me five six

years ago that I'd be doing that I would

laugh at you but now I just realized

like I've learned enough to now okay I

need to keep pursuing this

um but then there's a disconnect with

some of that Sports Science World where

they don't Implement anything they can

just they're really good at collecting

data but

no no you got to find that bridge of

what does this mean and then how does it

gonna actually make change because if

I'm just collecting data and making cool

spreadsheets but it doesn't change

anything then I'm just wasting a lot of

time wasted a lot of time you know you

know and and that's where I think

um

it's been cool here because there's been

buy-in from you know the top down of

Coach Elco and Coach feely and

um our athletic trainers you know when

we're rehabbing a hamstring and a return

to play our athletic trainers are coming

you know to to me and Coach feely asking

about their running mechanics or metrics

and how you know we're using

the Catapult data The Purge data the

force plate data in the return to play

protocol with conjunction with the

physical therapist and the athletic

trainer and you know so and then how we

monitor integrating them back to

practice is all part of that and so

um it we we have a lot of say in how an

athlete returns to play because they all

have buy-in and and from that and so you

know uh I'm constantly trying to learn

myself I want you know there's a there's

a lot for me to learn to get better in

this realm and that's something that I'm

you know going to continue you know

pursue

um yeah because you add value uh as a

coach you know and that's critical yeah

you know and I think you know like

that's what's so cool about our industry

is we have knowledge of the sport that

we're coaching from a sport coach

perspective you spend enough time around

it you know you play the sport probably

or and then you you also spend more time

with the athletes so you sometimes

you'll hear a position coach say

something about an athlete and you're

like you are so off like you clearly

don't know that kid

um and then you get to do their return

to play from an injury you get to do

their training you get to do you touch

them in every different facet of the

program uh and so when you have a coach

that then values your input you know you

have a lot to say and it's um it's been

the greatest professional sure yeah

that's the greatest profession in in

coaching there's not a in my in my

humble opinion there's not a better role

for a young coach to take than being a

straight coach because it's you you get

so much more time with some of the

finest human bands that walk the face of

this Earth

um now the other question that that came

up

um was on nordboard so did y'all so did

the staff do the nordboard and uh just

wanted to know if you're numbers

yeah I appreciated your uh your shout

out with badger on that that was that

was nice oh no I'm just kidding they

have improved they have improved now I

will say this it's funny so uh you know

I you know feely God bless him he pulled

like 520. yeah and uh I know yeah and uh

so he talks smack to every player that

doesn't yeah 520. it's funny so guys

will like get back on there like let me

try again and I'm like no you're you're

done they're like yeah they're gonna

hurt yourself and it's from his time

doing Olympic lifts oh no doubt no doubt

yeah he uh and so it's and uh like if

guys aren't screaming as they're going

down on the Nord board like they're

getting cussed at from across the room

that they're not even trying like it's

and it's impressive man we had we had 2D

tacos last year pull over 720. oh wow

yeah I'd never I'd never seen seen that

and they're competing though yeah

they're competing so you know our

our skill guys you know like our best

skill guys are above 500. um that is

amazing and and we also you know we do

Russians and razors uh we yeah you told

me about the razors yeah so we run we we

we do a Russian and a razor curl we

micro dosed it throughout their week

um all all throughout the year so the

nordboard doesn't elicit some weird new

training stimulus that causes soreness

it's just kind of so right then one day

I'll have a I have a roster that I'll

cycle through and if a guy hasn't hit a

nordboard within a couple weeks then

instead of doing Russians and razors

with a partner he goes over and does it

on the North board yeah that's what I

don't understand about people they're

afraid to do the nordboard do you have a

nordboard yes do you use it no why not

because we're afraid somebody's gonna

get hurt no that's great hello no no

it's gonna and so I started

yeah I've seen some bad

reps too yeah I mean yeah a lot of

breaking at the waist yeah yeah

um and I put the the little screen right

in front of them like they're staring at

the screen as they're going down like

they're looking at how hard they're

pulling right um

but also so I started looking at you

know

um

it's funny talk about knowledge bombs

the reading of just reading research I'm

just regurgitating other people's uh

good stuff but it's you know that the

number one indicator of a of of a soft

tissue injury is a previous soft tissue

injury you know in that same muscle so

like if you have a hamstring strain the

reason that someone the most likely the

reason they're gonna pull their

hamstrings because they've had it pulled

before

uh and so how do you get that and build

that robustness back into it what we've

seen is we put such an emphasis on it

now that a lot of times that injured

hamstring becomes stronger the strongest

non-injured side at the other side but

when you know if somebody has a

hamstring strain you need to test them

as soon as you can as soon as they can

handle some type of

test whether it be an isometric 60

degree or something on the nordboard or

get them to do some type of eccentric

work because if you don't get that

muscle moving the light you're gonna

you're prolonging its return to play

um and so what I started looking at is

we had

as an athlete got closer I would do it

on the Lord board when they were fresh

and I and their asymmetry would be like

two percent I said okay cool you're

gonna practice tomorrow but when you're

done practicing you're going to nor

board again and then I would look at

what was the fatigue rate of the

hamstring how much did that fatigue and

you you would see as they would return

to play the more the closer the farther

they got out from the injury they would

have a less of a fatigue rate in the

injured hamstrings that closer so as a

way for us to quantify how much practice

that they were going to be allowed to do

um so we weren't just going to bury them

and let them go back to practice and

whatever and and it would be so we would

give them some load cut off stuff

um

with them in practice and slowly get

them into practice in football shape

again from an injury but it was cool to

see the you know you could testing it at

different times is going to elicit a

different response but it's going to

tell you kind of more of the whole

picture

all right if I'm a coach and I don't

have anything to do velocity-based

training with okay

what uh are what is some advice that you

could share uh

that the coach could use when planning

and organizing his training to ensure

that he gets a positive response and

develops the necessary qualities to be a

strong powerful uh Team

yeah so there's enough research that you

can find on uh traditional percentages

and how they correlate to Velocity to

let's say if you didn't have any type of

feedback device you know the you know

going back to basic exercise physiology

and looking at the force velocity curve

you know I was taught from day one that

the goal of a good training program is

to move the entire curve to the right

and so you still need to start with I

think that basic of like you need to

train heavy you need to train light and

you need to train in between and I think

if you touch all of those percentages

from 90 plus down to having days where

you only have 40 percent on the bar and

teaching them to put Max intent into the

bar I think you can elicit a lot of the

same training you might not you don't

get the feedback or the competition

maybe a component of it but you you're

making sure that you're training the

entire Continuum of that curve and that

you're going to give them probably the

best

um

the best opportunity to be successful if

you don't have that

um and I think it you know how do you

accomplish that you know

make sure that you're a sprinting make

sure that you're lifting heavy weights

make sure that you have Plyometrics in

your program you know and and a lot of

those fit into these velocity

bands if you will and that I would also

add you need to have explosive movements

in the weight room whether that is your

Olympic lifts or you just move a lower

load faster you know that's how you feel

comfortable with training wise but I

think if you need to make sure that

when you're training certain qualities

the quality of your training is the most

important thing

and that your you know your central

nervous system can only adapt to so many

things at one time and so if it's

supposed to be a

strength day then keep it a strength day

and if it's supposed to be a speed day

keep it a speed day and if it's a power

day then keep it a power day and if you

keep it in that I think that's simple I

think you can probably write a pretty

good program that's especially first you

know if you're in a high school

population like

they need all that and so

um I think you could probably have a

pretty well-rounded program

well man great job

unbelievable I appreciate you coming on

no appreciate you having me again it's

fun yeah

um so you're ready to commit to a third

one no and we'll find something to talk

about we'll find out yeah yeah well uh I

I don't I don't see that not happening

that's for sure yeah but you know the

amazing thing and I said it at the

beginning as soon as we finished

recording your first episode we

immediately started talking about this

one and uh

uh it's packed full of information and

usable information for anyone no matter

no matter where you're coaching good I

hope somebody gets up yeah let's get

something out of it for sure yeah uh

make sure you tell everyone uh in that

beautiful family or said I said hello

man I will I'll tell the family you said

hello yeah and tell everyone at Duke

tell coach feely I said what's up well

um you can follow coach Jacobs on

Twitter at Jeremy underscore Jacobs

underscore

and Instagram at

jurors 3 15.

jurors 3 15 not germ s

yeah so we talked about that last time

yeah

this brings us to the end of today's

podcast thanks for tuning in please if

you haven't already done so follow the

podcast and please share it with all

your friends if you have any questions

about the Moffett method program our

training solutions for schools and teams

at all levels go to our website

themoffettmethod.fit and check it out

you can connect with us through our

website or email us at info at the

moffittmethod.fit again that is info the

moffittmethod.fit okay have a great day

be strong and we'll see you again next

week