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User:ITasteLikePaint/Exercise program for cheerleading

< User:ITasteLikePaint

I have been asked by many people to develop strength and conditioning programs for cheerleading. However, since every cheerleading program is different I have decided that it is better to simply educate coaches in basic strength and conditioning principals and leave it to them to develop their own program specific to their program. ITasteLikePaint (talk) 05:43, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Dangers

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Any strength and conditioning program no matter how well put together, how well supervised and how well managed, carries risk of injury or death. Always be sure that you know and use good technique for every exercise and use a competent spotter to reduce these risks.

Basic Principles of Exercise Prescription

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Every exercise program should follow these basic principles.

Overload

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The adaptations to training, gaining muscle, getting faster or stronger, or becoming more fit, are your body’s responses to the increased demands that you are placing on it by exercise.

Your body will rise to meet the demands placed on it, but no more. If you want to become stronger, you have to lift more than your body is comfortable lifting.

You can do this a few different ways. You can increase the number of times you workout per week, you can increase the amount of exercise you do in a workout by increasing the number of exercises you do, and you can increase the amount of weight you lift or how fast you run depending on the type of training.

Specificity

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You must train whatever you want to grow.

You cannot make your arms stronger by exercising your legs and you can’t become more aerobically fit by lifting heavy weights.

Specific Things to Work On

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Hypertrophy

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Hypertrophy is increasing the size of muscle cells. More muscle does not necessarily mean stronger, stronger muscle means stronger, but if you have more muscle to make strong you will be stronger than if you had less muscle. It is therefore, a good idea to start off a strength or power training program by focusing on hypertrophy.

To maximize muscular hypertrophy, weight lifting exercises should be done at your 12-14 repetition maximum (how much weight you can lift with good technique 12-14 times. Abbreviated “RM”). Do at least four sets per exercise per weightlifting session and 12-14 reps per set.

Hypertrophy takes six to eight weeks to begin, before that, your body is learning how to better use the muscle it has, so the portion of your training program that you dedicate to hypertrophy should be between 10-20 weeks long.

Unlike the exercises you do for strength and power, the exercises you do for hypertrophy do not need to be exceptionally specific. As long as you are targeting the correct muscle group you will see the gains that you are looking for. For example, while the triceps pushdown doesn’t replicate a motion that is used in cheerleading, it can be effectively used to work the triceps for hypertrophy.

Remember that more muscle also means more weight and so it is generally a good idea to reserve hypertrophy training for bases. Anybody who might fly anything should not engage in hypertrophy training.

Strength

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Strength is your ability to do apply a force over a distance. Put simply, the stronger you are the more weight you can lift.

Maximal strength gains come from doing three to five sets of your two to six RM of each exercise in a weightlifting session.

Strength exercises need to be more activity specific than hypertrophy exercises but don’t have to match exactly to be effective. For example, a narrow grip bench press is similar enough to the overhead pressing motion commonly performed in cheerleading to be effective for strengthening this motion.

Power

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If strength is your ability to apply a force over a distance, then power is your ability to apply a force over a distance quickly. Being able to jump high requires lots of power.

Research has shown that for maximal gains in power, you must combine both power lifting and plyometric exercises.

Power Lifts
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I have met several female cheerleaders who were trying to break into co-ed stunting and who were desperate to increase their vertical jump. Some strength and conditioning coaches shy away from power lifting because they feel that the increased technique that some of these lifts require and the increased chances for injury isn’t worth the gains to be had from this type of training and instead focus solely on plyometrics. However, there has been research that has shown that power lifting alone is more effective than plyometrics alone at increasing vertical jump, with the best results coming from a combination of both power lifting and plyometrics. If you choose to incorporate power lifting into your training regimen, be sure to do so safely as mentioned in the Dangers section.

To increase power, do three sets of two to six reps of your 10 RM for each exercise and do the repetitions fast with explosive movements.

Power exercises have to be very similar to the motion you’re trying to make more powerful or the training won’t transfer to the motion. The push press is a good, specific exercise for bases that will translate well into almost any stunt that they have to lift over their head.

Plyometrics
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Plyometrics are exercises in which a muscle is loaded and then contracted in rapid sequence.

Plyometric pushups are a good example. You first lower yourself like a normal pushup, loading the muscle, you then push as hard as you can, pushing yourself off the ground and into the air. Then catch and lower yourself into the pushup position again and repeat.

When first starting a plyometric routine, start off with 90 ground contacts per session, divided into however many sets, reps, and exercises you want. As you train in plyometrics and depending on what phase of the season you’re in, you can go as high as 300 ground contacts in a session. Be sure to provide plenty of rest between sets and exercises.

Cardiorespiratory Fitness

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Cardiorespiratory fitness, commonly known as “cardio,” refers to your ability to sustain physical activity. If you have problems with stunts that were solid in the first quarter of a football game falling in the fourth, or if you can’t even toss hands after a sprint, you may need to work on your cardio.

The best way for cheerleaders to work on their cardiorespiratory fitness is with interval training. After a warm-up jog, sprint as hard as you can for 30 seconds, then jog again for a rest period and repeat five to ten times. Adjust the rest period to be specific to your needs. In our two examples above, our fourth quarter falls should get as long as a rest interval as they want before their next sprint but Mr.-can’t-toss-hands could have as little as a 30 second rest interval before his next 30 second sprint.

Flexibility

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Hamstring, quadricep and groin flexibility are very important to flyers but general flexibility is important for everybody. There are many different types of stretching but we are going to concentrate on the three most beneficial for our use.

Dynamic Stretching
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The idea behind dynamic stretching is that when one muscle is contracting, the other muscle is relaxing, allowing for a more effective stretch. The movement involved in this kind of stretching make it a perfect warm-up activity. You’re killing two birds with one stone: you’re working on your flexibility and getting your blood moving and getting warmed up.

Some examples of dynamic stretching are leg-swings (for the quads and hamstrings) and side-to-side-leg-swings (groin and IT Band).

PNF Stretching
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Proprioceptive neuromuscular facilitation (PNF) style stretching gives a huge instant increase in flexibility as well as increasing flexibility overtime and “contract-relax” style PNF is very easy to learn how to do. You simply stretch a muscle for 30 seconds, then you push as hard as you can against something with that same muscle for 10 seconds, and repeat.

This is a good example of PNF stretching for hamstring and groin

Have your flyers do PNF stretching after a good dynamic stretching warm-up to make sure that they’ll have the flexibility that they’ll need to hit their stunts.

Static Stretching
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This is the normal stretching that we all grew up with. You stretch a muscle until you can feel the stretch and you hold it for 30 seconds. Have everybody do some static stretching at the very end of practice and have your flyers do it every day.

The hurdler’s stretch is a good static stretch for the hamstrings.

Prehabilitation

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Many injuries can be prevented by simply exercising areas prone to injury like backs and wrists.

Try doing three sets of 15 repetitions of exercises that will strengthen these areas.

Maintenance

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“If you don’t use it, you lose it”

As mentioned above, your body will rise to meet the demands that you place on it. If you work really hard to get so you can lift a lot of weight, your body will adapt so that you can lift that weight. If you then sit on the couch for a month, your body will adapt so that you can sit on the couch more efficiently.

Once you have reached a goal, you must continue to remain active, although to a lesser extent, in that specific area to remain at that level.

Recovery

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Exercise is catabolic, or breaks down your body. Your body then, builds up what was broken down bigger, faster, and stronger than it was before while it is resting.

Without adequate rest, your body cannot build the tissues that cause the training adaptations that you’re looking for.

As a general rule of thumb, give yourself a day of rest between days of exercise.

Periodization

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“There is a time and a place for everything”

…and the day before a major competition is not the time for a hard workout. You need to change the way that you train based on what is going on in the season.

Macro-cycles

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The year is broken down into different periods, called macro-cycles, based on the goals of that part of the year.

Recovery

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Most cheer seasons last from August to April and, to be competitive, many squads train almost year round. All athletes need a period of rest. Physically, the body needs time to recover from the intense training of the rest of the year. Mentally, people need a chance to focus on things other than training for their sport. If you don’t set aside two to eight weeks a year specifically and entirely for rest and relaxation, you’re at risk of your athletes overtraining and/or burning out.

Pre-competition

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Successful athletic programs will spend some time before the season starts developing basic skills and building a good cardio foundation and since cheerleading squads don’t have to follow NCAA guidelines; cheer coaches can require their athletes to workout in the off-season. Everybody should spend the 10-20 weeks before the season starts working hard on their cardio on their own. Your bases should also be working on hypertrophy at this time. As soon as it’s reasonable, practices should start so that your squad can develop your skills for your first game.

Early Competition

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The first three months or so of the season, on top of your regular practices, your cheerleaders should be working hard on their strength and cardio.

Competition

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The next three or so months should be dedicated to power.

Peak Competition

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Whether it’s a big halftime performance, tryouts or simply the last game of the season, you’re going to want to go out with your best performance of the year. To have your best performance, you will need to recover from all the training you’ve been doing to get ready for it. Up to a month before your last big performance, you will want to start to taper your training. Start by making your training less intense with less weight and fewer reps and sets. Then you can cut back on how often your cheerleaders are required to train outside of practices, eventually stopping them altogether. Last, cut back on the number of practices making sure that practice is not scheduled the day before or of the big day.

Micro-cycles

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A micro-cycle covers a week. You can’t go hard every day of the week, you need time to recover. Mix up your weeks with light, medium, and hard days.

Exercises

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Here are some exercises you could include in your exercise program.

Bases

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Prehab

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  • Shoulder six-way (internal/external rotation, flexion, extension, abduction and adduction)
  • Wrist four-way (flexion, extension, abduction and adduction)
  • Hand flexion/extension
  • Trunk extension/flexion

Co-ed Bases

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Hypertrophy

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Strength

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Power

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Lifts
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Plyometrics
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Multibased

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Hypertrophy

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Strength

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Power

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Lifts
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Plyometrics
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Flyers

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Prehab

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  • Wrist four-way
  • Ankle four-way (dorsiflexion, plantarflexion, eversion, inversion)
  • Core
  • Leg curls

Strength

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Power

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Lifts

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Plyometrics

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Nutrition

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Athletes eating enough of a variety of foods from all the food groups will be receiving all the nutrition that they need without the need for dietary supplements.

Timing of food, however, can be important. A meal consisting mainly of carbohydrates and including 600 mL (20 oz. The size of a bottle of soda) of water or sports drink should be eaten two to six hours before exercise. Another 300 mL (half a bottle of soda) of water should be drunk about ten minutes before the start of exercise. During exercise athletes should try to drink about 300 mL of water or sports drink every 15 minutes. It is important to eat or drink 20 grams of protein and 80 grams of carbohydrate within two hours of the end of exercise to promote recovery. Two cups of skim chocolate milk is a good post-workout/practice/game drink.

Many athletes are concerned that they’re not eating enough protein to build muscle. To find out the absolute maximum amount of protein that you could ever possibly need, take your weight in pounds and multiply it by 0.8 and the number you have is the ceiling for protein intake in grams (1.8 g/Kg). Your body can only handle 20 grams of protein in a sitting so drinking a protein shake with anything more is a waste of money. Try to spread your protein out throughout the day.

Additional Resources

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Wikipedia Articles

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Books

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  • Abernethy, Bruce, Laurel T. Mackinnon, Vaughan Kippers, Stephanie J. Hanrahan, and Marcus G. Pandy. The Biophysical Foundations Of Human Movement. New York: Human Kinetics, 2004.
  • Sharkey, Brian, Steven Gaskill. Fitness & Health. New York: Human Kinetics, 2007.
  • Wilmore, Jack, David L. Costill, W. Larry Kenney. Physiology of Sport and Exercise. New York: Human Kinetics, 2008.

Research Articles

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  • Tricoli, Valmor, Leonardo Lamas, Roberto Carnevale, and Carlos Ugrinowitsch. "Short-term Effects on Lower-body Functional Power Development: Weightlifting vs. Vertical Jump Training Programs." Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research 19.2 (2005): 433-37.
  • Elliott, Marcus C.C.W, Phillip P. Wagner, and Loren Chiu. "Power Athletes and Distance Training: Physiological and Biomechanical Rationale for Change." Sports Medicine 37.1 (2007): 47-57. EBSCO Information Services. Web. 12 May 2010

Websites

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