I probably need to start a series titled “Hypocritical Strength and Conditioning Beliefs” that covers all the things strength and conditioning coaches say that completely contradict what strength and conditioning coaches say. Today’s article stems (a bit) from these sentiments.

Strength and conditioning coaches love to talk about “stacking small wins”, about “playing the long game”, about not working solely for instant gratification, and about how progress comes from consistently doing things well over a long period of time (“the process”…I’ll hit on that one another day). Inherently, none of these things are wrong (in fact I strongly believe that a consistent and disciplined approach over a long period of time is the best way to achieve sustained success). However, my problem comes with strength and conditioning coaches having what I’ll refer to as “Make or Break” sessions that directly threaten someone’s long-term progress for short-term gain.

Essentially, the whole point of this article is this: one session will never make you, but one session can certainly break you. “Make or Break” sessions often come with mantras like “push through the pain” or “you’re just being soft” or “we have to see what the athlete is made of”. Don’t get me wrong – there is DEFINITELY a time or place to push past your limits and do hard things. For this argument, I am more referring to if an athlete has a nagging injury (think hamstring or knee discomfort), has an important game/match approaching, or is in the final phase of training prior to reporting to a camp. There are times where training and development are important. In these times it is necessary to push the athlete past their comfort level in order to elicit the adaptations we are trying to achieve. I am not afraid of hard work, not should you be. However, a lot of times strength and conditioning coaches let their egos get in the way of listening to an athlete or doing what is best for him/her. You want an athlete to be peaked because you want them to do well in their sport, not because it makes you “look good” as a coach or programmer. Sometimes an athlete needs a push, and it’s our job to do that. However, sometimes an athlete needs to be pulled back, and it’s our job to do that too. Even if the athlete does survive one of these sessions and does not get hurt, I don’t think it benefits anyone to even put them in that situation. For example, if an athlete has put in a great off-season of work and is about to report to Spring Training, but his hamstring is a little sore/weak on a given day, my job is to send him off to Spring Training healthy, not to prove that he shaved an extra tenth off his sprint time. Therefore, he may be told to sprint at a lower intensity on that given day, or may even be told to not sprint at all. In this “Make or Break” scenario I am certainly not “making him better” on that day, but I can definitely break him that day and screw up his timeline for Spring Training.

This is something to think about when designing programs for athletes – you want to push them to the point of adaptation. You want them to get the most out of their training and time with you. But most importantly, when they leave you and go to play their sport, you want to make sure they are in a position to showcase themselves and their talents, not be teetering on the edge of breaking simply because you wanted to “push them a little harder”. The reality is that most of the time training is simply coming in, punching the clock, leaving healthy, and doing it again the next day (and the next day and the next day and the next day…).