Why Strength and Conditioning Is Making You Slower
In recent years Strength and Conditioning (S&C) coaching has exploded in popularity, everyone seems to be wanting to do it and everyone is claiming to be a ‘Strength and Conditioning Coach’, whatever that means.
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So what even is ‘strength and conditioning coaching’? Some define it as building physical qualities in athletic populations, others say anything that improves physical performance… which asks the question of why it’s even called ‘strength and conditioning’, like, why emphasise just those 2 qualities of physical performance. These are, of course, extremely basic and oversimplified definitions, and the job involves immense detail, expertise and knowledge to perform at a high effort quality to benefit the service end user.
Strength and conditioning coaches need technical knowledge in a wide area of expertise and knowledge… physiology, sleep, nutrition, recovery, training, programming, biomechanics, to name a few. In addition, they need ‘softer’ skills, empathy, communication, understanding, negotiating, problem-solving, adaptability, emotional intelligence, reflection, pedagogics, motivation, etc.
Coaches should always put the service end-user first, in this context we will use swimmers. The swimmers are the ones that we are helping to perform in the water, we must select appropriate training, programme in a way that aids the pool sessions, doesn’t wear them out, and keep them improving. It should never, ever, be about the S&C coach in those sessions.
However, in the real world, there is ego, obsession with status and logos, and just this raw drive to get to the top roles. S&C coaches now tend to now interfere too much in the athlete’s journey, making their progress more about gym performances than the sport, demonstrating what skill set they have to the world and shining the spotlight on themselves rather than their athletes. This can be seen in swimming all the time, coaches trying to stand out by posting ineffective and inappropriate exercises rather than keeping to the basics, trying to replicate swimming strokes and skills on land to gain an audience and make money. Maybe this is the ego coming through, people like to make others believe they are outstanding, clever and skilled. This leads to a coach centred approach, making the athlete largely dependent on the coach to learn, improve and perform, and unfortunately it’s the athletes that suffer as a result.