Why Strength Training May Not Improve Athletic Performance

You’ve been putting in week after week and month after month of diligent training, and you’ve seen clear improvements in the form and function of your body. You’ve trimmed off unnecessary body fat, added obvious lean muscle mass, and you simply feel like your body is running more smoothly.

As wonderful as this sounds, on the occasions when you’ve been asked to contribute to your company’s softball team, you haven’t felt like your gains have translated into harder-hit balls or greater base-running speed. During pick-up basketball games, you haven’t been able to leap any higher, nor have you been able to soar through the air and spike the ball during friendly games of beach volleyball.

So what’s the deal? Why is it that your resistance workouts haven’t been making you a better athlete? Here are four reasons why this might be the case.

You don’t train on your feet

When you perform resistance training, it’s entirely possible for you to complete every rep of your workout without ever performing a single movement standing on your feet. Not only can you train every single muscle fiber in your upper body from a seated or a reclined position, but you can also piece together a very efficient machine-based lower-body workout without ever standing up.

The downside to this is that in nearly all sports settings, your body learns to apply strength and power — the essence of athleticism — from the ground up. Because of this, if you haven’t taught your body to administer force while you’re standing upright, it will be very challenging for you to properly apply that speed and strength in a setting that requires you to move in a coordinated manner.

You train only for strength, but not power

The difference between strength and power makes a huge difference in the field of play, but because many people who are focused on outward physical improvement only use resistance training to build lean muscle in a targeted way, they fail to prioritize the development of power.

Simply stated, strength is the maximum amount of force you can create, while power is your capacity to generate that force quickly. 

To put it in a practical sense, your ability to hold a steady block during your football game would require continuous strength, but aggressively shoving an opponent out of the way is a display of explosive power. Your strength may help your feet to stay rooted to the ground when someone tries to shove you down, but it’s the power in your legs that helps you leap higher and run faster.

If you find that the force you can administer is steady, but not explosive, you should make sure you dedicate a portion of your training specifically to the generation of power by the sudden application of all the force you can muster against an object.

You don’t apply resistance to functional movement 

Resistance-training movements are usually optimized to isolate individual muscles or multiple groups of muscles along their most efficient paths for development. In essence, your muscles develop their size and strength along very rigid and familiar paths, where resistance is often applied in the same direction and pattern every single time. 

The problem with this scenario is that your strong new body is not accustomed to contending with resistance in a three-dimensional way. If your sport requires you to swing an object, you should practice swinging heavy objects. If your sport requires you to jump or leap, train yourself to leap against resistance so that you can finally become less earthbound.

You don’t back your training with healthy choices

Hypothetically, if you’ve been exercising with a mind toward improving your athletic performance, there are reasons that you may not become significantly more athletic that have nothing to do with the quality of your training. Instead, it has to do with everything that you’re doing — or not doing — in between your workouts.

Specifically, if you’re not resting adequately, or you’re not consuming the foods necessary for your muscles to feel properly fueled and empowered to rebuild themselves in the wake of good workouts, this can quickly lead to plateaus in physical growth and athletic development. What’s more, it can also cause you to feel as if you’re short on energy and motivation.

Creatine, protein, and other supplements that optimize muscle recovery when combined with rest can be crucial to helping you transform your resistance training efforts into tangible athletic improvements.

Don’t train in vain

The great thing about athletic potential is that nearly everyone can unlock it, and if you already have a resistance-training routine, you’re clearly on the right path. All you need to do is make a few small tweaks to your workout routine, and possibly to your nutrition plan, and you should start to see clear evidence of athletic improvements in no time.

Summary

1. There are many factors at play during resistance training that determine how well your physical improvements translate to improved athleticism.

2. By failing to train on your feet, you can limit your body’s ability to apply its strength and power during sports events that require you to stand upright.

3. If you don’t train for power — which involves the sudden application of force upon an object — your gains in muscle may not translate well in areas like running and jumping.

4. Because most bodybuilding movements are performed along familiar paths, your body may not be prepared to apply force in the patterns of motion required by your sport.

5. Failing to support your training with optimal nutrition and recovery may limit your development of strength, power, and athleticism.

6. Making a few small adjustments to the style and method of your training can make all of the difference in empowering you to display more athleticism in a sports setting.