Rest In Peace Strength Development
by Joe Hashey, CSCS author of Bull Strength Conditioning

"Strength programs are dead, sport specific is all that kids need" I had a local strength coach insist during a recent discussion.

To alter a quote from Mark Twain - "Reporting the death of strength training programs is an exaggeration."

A few months back I posted two well researched and scientific posts on exactly what functional training was in relation to exercise and sport performance.

• What EXACTLY is Functional Training?


• Continuum of Exercise Selection

I asked if people wanted part III, but unfortunately that post only received 17 comments so I assumed people were either uninterested or bored of reading the research. So I never put out part III explaining how to select exercises for your workouts.

But I still get these questions about creating workout programs, and making them "sport specific" from top to bottom.

Here are "facts" people send me:

"Basketball and football players should only quarter squat since they don't need to go lower than that in sports."

"Baseball players should not perform strength exercises - just arm abilities."

"Sprinters shouldn't squat since they are all based on single leg movements. "

"All athletes need is sport training. Baseball players should be in the cage, basketball players on the court...not in the gym."

"Basketball players should perform most exercises with their feet in the vertical jump stance."

Some of it actually sounds right…right? However, under the surface lies a problem with the above statements and the consequences for creating an overall physique.

What's the purpose of your primary exercise in a good off season program?

Most answers should be:

• Strength - Max Effort Method


• Size - Repetition Effort Method


• Explosiveness - Dynamic Effort Method

The purpose of your primary exercise in a training program is rarely, and should be rarely, for specific sport carry over. Let me be more specific, you should rarely take a primary strength exercise and attempt to make it into a primary sport specific exercise.

Sport specific exercises should mostly be performed as accessory lifts (secondary lifts) or accomplished through sport skill training (actually playing the sport).

Here is the Continuum of Exercise Selection from Yessis for your reference:

The reason why the primary lift shouldn't be for a specific sport movement is that strength, size, and explosiveness are often neglected, and sport skill is trained frequently (practice, pick up games, etc).

In other words, I would recommend getting stronger, bigger, or more explosive with your primary exercise and use supplemental training of specialized and sport skill movements.

I'll also add that most high school athletes still play 2 or 3 sports. What about them? It seems more practical to build overall athleticism through training than have them work on sport training for 3 seperate competitions year around.

This means that it is easier to carry over aspects developed in a weight room to multiple sports, than to apply sport to a sport (ie. training for baseball won't make you a lot better at basketball, but working out will make you better at both).

Sure there will be some carry over to sport - being big, strong, and explosive will do that - but for the general athlete, making the primary exercise "sport specific" will typically hinder over all gains.

===> Does that mean that the demands of the sport should be thrown out the window when creating strength training programs? Absolutely not.

All I am advocating for is to continue strength development.

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