Top 10 List For This Summer's Training

 You need to have a solid plan. You cannot just show up at a local gym every once in a while and expect to get results or gain an edge on your competition so I am going to help you by giving you some ideas but if you have a certified strength and conditioning specialist anywhere near you or an expert on athletes and particularly wrestlers who are a different breed you should use them.

1. Start each session with foam rolling and stretching. You need to be flexible, I know I've said it before but it wouldn't be possible to leave it off this list and too many 3rd place finishers do. Everyone out there has wrestling somebody that was so flexible they couldn't take them down or turn them, that could be you or at least you could be closer to that and remember every advantage you can get you need to take!!

2. Make sure you warm up properly and differently each day, appropriate to the workout you are going to do. Again, please don't be the guy who rides a bike for ten minutes or walks on the treadmill watching TV. This is what a 3rd place finisher does not a champion. Some ideas would be doing more shoulder and rotator cuff warmups on bench days and stretching chest on days where you are doing chinups and not chest. (Make sense?) Don't want to stretch out a muscle you expect to work too much.

3. Use agility ladder and footwork drills for warmups, don't forget to be a good athlete too! You can gain an edge by being a more mobile, better athlete. You should be able to move your feet quickly and in different directions without being off balance and confused.

4. Train hard! I don't mean to be too obvious or funny here but really this isn't a bodybuilding show we are getting ready for or football for that matter. You need to have everything from strength to power and agility and unreal endurance and power and strength endurance. Your training different energy systems and need to go hard every time you are in there, but don't over train. I will try to help with this here too.

5. Have some days more intense than others with the understanding it's all intense all the time, all of it has a purpose so be purposeful. You need to have heavy days and you really need to push some serious weight, relatively speaking. You must at all times being giving maximum effort but still some days need to be shorter in duration and with different focuses.

6. Train for injury prevention as well as training for strength and power which in itself is doing that I understand but I mean more specifically train problem areas for wrestlers and all athletes. Make sure you have trained all the small muscles in your hips and really pay attention to your abductors and internal rotators and this can be done as part of the warmups on different days along with rotator cuff exercises.

7. Train Heavy, you are at an advantage here over some athletes who need to add size, you don't. Usually, a wrestler wants to come back at the same weight if possible based on growth and health. You can train with heavy weights low reps and not be concerned with hypertrophy really. Of course, you want to add some muscle to look good, I know, and you need more muscle to be stronger too you might be thinking and I know that's true but again wrestling is unique here and it's really an advantage in the training time.

8. Train for Power in every way you can, don't forget upper body power movements. Too many guys don't train any power and even more, only do plyos and or Olympic lifts, you must train power in your upper body too, both pushing and pulling.

9. Conditioning is an obvious need here before we finish up and it sucks and everybody knows that so shut up and just do it!! You need to out work everyone else and push yourself to new levels here and make sure you leave it all out in the gym. You need to be using battling ropes, tires, airlines, sleds or prowlers, sledgehammers, plyo boxes and so on.

10. Recovery and Nutrition, I realize nutrition is something that I am not an expert in so I will just say to eat healthily and seek advice from a professional but make sure they clearly understand you and your sport and your needs. You cannot give 100% if you don't eat right and recover with proper sleep and things like foam rolling or the stick. You must take the eating, sleeping, and recovery tools seriously to make the most of your time there in the gym or else you will not reach your full potential.

Finish Strong!

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