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Screensize: 640 x 480 800 x 600 1024 x 768 1280 x 1024 UserName: Password: Format Mode: Basic  Help  Prompt  Format: Font Andale Mono Arial Arial Black Book Antiqua Century Gothic Comic Sans MS Courier New Georgia Impact Lucida Console Script MT Bold Stencil Tahoma Times New Roman Trebuchet MS Verdana   Size 1 2 3 4 5 6   Color Black Red Yellow Pink Green Orange Purple Blue Beige Brown Teal Navy Maroon LimeGreen Message: * HTML is OFF * Forum Code is ON Smilies [quote][i]Originally posted by Rapid[/i] [br]Earlier this year I was listening to Bill Ripken of MLB Network talk about defensive infielders and what he considers important. One of his main points was how guys that make the game simple are often the most valuable. This thought stuck with me so much that I wrote it down. In my experience as a strength and conditioning coach people are always trying to find the secret program or the magic exercise to improve x, y, or z. They’ll ask “do you have any specific programs designed to increase my base stealing or my throwing velocity?” While these are excellent goals, its important to understand that there are no magic programs or exercises. There are specific methods and exercises that develop special or sport specific strength, but these types of things are very complex and challenging. They must be earned from a training perspective! If you can’t handle your body weight for a set of 8 pushups, you probably aren’t ready to throw a ton of innings, do a weighted ball program, and train like a power lifter. Push-ups might be a simple looking exercise, but if you do them well and have a qualified coach watching, it isn’t just a chest exercise. You’re going to get core stability, quality scapular excursion, and upper body strength development. Similarly, learning how to do a quality deadlift is extremely valuable in terms of creating strength and force into the ground. Mastering things like a basic deadlift and push up builds patterns and true, long lasing strength. Simply getting stronger and understanding technique/mechanics can go a long way for people wanting to increase speed. Getting stronger and learning how to control and manipulate the hips and trunk absolutely is going to help increase throwing velocity. It’s much safer and much more useful than arbitrarily hooking someone up to a bunch of bands and yelling “work, work, work!” The answer to the above question is yes, absolutely. All of our programming is geared towards increasing performance. We at Rapid Sports Performance believe in building fitness, strength, and work capacity so that each of our athletes has their needs met. We go after their immediate needs, and most of the time strength is the lowest hanging fruit. Strength is the foundation for power, speed, health, and longevity. It’s not about the fanciest exercise or the shirtless Instagram picture. Training to become a monster in the weight room and on the field doesn’t happen overnight. It comes with hard work, consistency, and dedication. Move the needle a little more every day. Remember Bill Ripken’s take on it, “never confuse simple with lack of substance.” Simple works. Get with a coach who has your best interest at heart, and knows how to put you in a position to be successful. We hope this is helpful! Have a great week, and as always feel free to comment with questions or topic requests! All the best, The Rapid Team www.go-rapid.com Andrew Gordon, MS, CSCS Andrew.Gordon@go-rapid.com [/quote]