This article is going to upset a lot of people. I’m okay with that. I think it’s good for us to challenge our thinking on everything. This is NOT going to be an article with science; it’s just going to be a collection of my current thoughts and the ideas I have floating around in my head. If you want to rebuttal with science and scream at me on social media it’s not going to hurt my feelings. If you want to have a civilized conversation with me on why you agree/disagree then feel free to reach out to me (chrismessinaasp@gmail.com). I always love to talk shop and bounce ideas off other open-minded coaches, and this topic is especially fun to bounce around.

With that being said, here we go: I think every team-sport athlete, REGARDLESS OF SPORT, needs aerobic work in their training. Before you lose your mind, this is not saying, “Only do aerobic work” or even “most of your training should be aerobic work”. There is a time and place for just about everything, and long, slow-distance work (especially running) is not an exception.

Most of my work has been in professional baseball. This is a culture that is shifting to a purely “we are a strength/power sport, so we do not need any long-distance running whatsoever” mentality. I think this is wrong. We see more and more young kids coming in who are unprepared (both mentally and physically) to handle the grueling professional baseball schedule. However, I’m not going to bash you on social media over it. Instead, I just want to share my thoughts on why in a civilized manner.

We tell athletes not to specialize early. “Play as many sports as you can while you’re young”. “Develop a pool of motor skills then specialize”. I agree with this approach wholeheartedly – the more sports you play the better at a young age. Why, then, do we have private baseball facility coaches screaming on Twitter, “I heard so and so organization still runs poles. What a bunch of IDIOTS. Come to my gym where we train you to be POWERFUL”. If you are dealing with baseball players that are under the age of 18 at your private facility, you need to pick a side: either they play many sports and you have to have them do aerobic work (soccer in the fall, basketball in the winter, baseball in the spring/summer) or you have them specialize in baseball and don’t do the aerobic work because it will make them “slow”. Either way you’re a hypocrite (unless of course you include the aerobic work).

The biggest rebuttal I hear about aerobic work is that it will make you “slow”. But this is very shortsighted. My thoughts on this really started spinning when listening to an episode of the Control Yourself podcast (essentially the Functional Range Conditioning podcast). Episode 9 is Dr. Andreo Spina talking with Dewey Nielsen. The name of the episode is “Creating a Finely Tuned Aerobic Engine”. In this episode they discuss exactly that – the aerobic engine. Two of the big points mentioned were:

1. We are not telling you to train ONLY slow. It should be a part of your training – the bigger your engine is the better your high-intensity work will be (assuming you are incorporating both high- and low-intensity work in your training). The further your aerobic threshold is pushed to the right, the better quality work everything to the left of the threshold will be (both in terms of pure quality of work and duration of work).
2. The best marathon ever run essentially featured a sub-5:00 pace. Not only can most people not run a 5:00 mile once, but this was repeated for the ENTIRE MARATHON. Imagine the engine on this guy.

Let’s get this clear: I AM NOT SAYING YOU SHOULD TRAIN YOUR PLAYERS LIKE MARATHON RUNNERS. All I’m saying is that if you have an enormous engine, your recovery is going to be better and your repeated high-intensity intervals are going to be better. (Soccer players and basketball players run up and down the field/court endlessly and still have immense levels of power when they need to for sprints and jumps. If they can handle miles on miles of running and be in great shape I think baseball players can benefit from aerobic work a bit without hampering their power-producing abilities).

For me, hockey players are the ultimate athletes on the planet (definitely a topic for another article). They are aerobic machines, lean, strong, and powerful. Their ability to recover from intense bouts of work is through the roof. We should take notes from other sports. I understand the “demands of the sport” dictate a lot of what goes on, but in a full baseball season recovery is incredibly vital. 162+ games with cross-country travel, strange sleeping hours, late-night adrenaline spikes, etc. all can cause a chaotic situation for the body. Some players shine simply because their bodies can outlast others. I truly believe more players would benefit from aerobic work (especially at the lower-levels of pro ball and high school/college). If you are a private setting trainer working with 12 year-old kids telling them not to do distance running, you are doing them a disservice later in life. Give them something to fall back on – an engine that does not quit. If we keep training kids like professional athletes before they are ready (i.e. training for pure power production without any aerobic work whatsoever), by the time they actually get to professional sports (*IF they get to professional sports…) they are going to be weak, frail, and unable to withstand the demands of their sport(s).

Again, these are just some of the thoughts wreaking havoc in my brain. These could very easily change (as they have before) and that’s okay. My hope is that you can be open-minded and be willing to have conversations about these types of topics. Too many people see things as black and white and fail to understand that the beauty in life comes from manipulating the shades of grey.