Breaking Down Preparation Training Blocks
WPH Instructional, Tucson, AZ
The WPH is thrilled to continue the WPH Tournament Preparation Series, taking you inside the tournament preparation required to achieve optimal performance. In the WPH Tournament Preparation Series, you will learn what it takes for the sport’s best to condition themselves for the physical and mental rigors of pro level competition.
In this edition of the WPH Tournament Preparation Series, our experts and current and former pro players will discuss Preparation Blocks, specifically how they train differently six to eight weeks from an event compared to one to two weeks from an event.
Just as players have different playing styles, not every player’s training preparation will be identical. Some players will prefer more high intensity, short duration workouts, while others may prefer more sustained, endurance-building exercises. Regardless of the types of workouts and training players select and prefer, the most successful athletes have a plan and the discipline to follow their plan.
During the Race 4 Eight pro tour season, players are generally playing an event every three to four weeks, not allowing for an extended training block during the season. After an event, players will generally recover for a week, which leaves only two or three weeks before the next stop. These two to three weeks will generally be maintenance, wherein players may play a few practice matches, stretch and recover to be fresh for the next event.
The “preseason” is the time when players can make more drastic changes to their games and their strength and conditioning thresholds. The “preseason” consists of a minimum of six to eight weeks between tournaments, where players can not only tweak their on-court technique and shots, but also make strides in the gym and with their diet. Champions are generally made in the “preseason,” as every player wants to win when the referee calls the score, but not every player is willing to make the sacrifices to win two months before the referee calls the score.
Our esteemed panel of WPH Tournament Preparation Series: Preparation Blocks experts, consisting of CSCS Certified National Strength & Conditioning Coach Travis Owen and current and former pro players Adam Bernhard, Jab Bike, Kyle English and John Libby will discuss how their preparation varies from the six to eight week training block compared to the one to two week block.
CSCS Certified National Strength & Conditioning Coach, Master’s degree Health, Coaching, and Physical Education in 2011, PN1 Nutrition Certification and TO’s Corner Travis Owen
In two weeks, it’s hard to make drastic physical advancement – in 6-8 weeks you have more flexibility with programming. Lifting, conditioning, and practicing shots
It’s probably better if you just have a few weeks, to develop confidence with shots you’re struggling with and work on the mental part of the game. Progress can be made in those areas pretty quickly. Physically though, it’s not worth running yourself into the ground with two weeks until the tournament. Develop the mental part, surviving the long rallies – make a little progress each day.
With 6-8 weeks, you can really push it and have a detailed plan, take days off- that you need due to accumulating a lot of volume, for example go hard for a few days and take a day off to recover.
Whereas with a 2-week time frame, I would say focus more on the skills and mental, and less on the physical. That doesn’t mean neglect the physical, of course. But just do “a little, a lot” I like to say. Do something every day. You can make slight progress, but it’s nothing like 3-4x the amount you’d have with 6-8 weeks.
The top pros probably do not have many 6-8 week preparation blocks because they always have a tournament coming up. So I’d say it’d be better to just stay sharp between events. Kind of like MLB teams in-season. They still lift, condition, etc., but they’re not running themselves into the ground because games are top priority. Off-season is when they can really dive into more of a higher volume strength & conditioning plan.
The diet depends on the goals – more flexibility to experiment with more time. Athletes can eat more protein and lift more in the 6-8 week timeframe and see some strength changes, for example.
With a 2-week timeframe, if you try to make drastic changes, you may have some setbacks. The last thing you want coming into a tournament is feeling lethargic or having stomach issues because you overhauled your diet recently.
With 6-8 weeks, you can afford trying different things. See how it goes, everyone is different. There are always “universals” though, pretty much get enough quality protein for recovery, hydrate, and fruits & vegetables are your friends when it comes to the micronutrients they provide.
In two weeks the risk-reward probably isn’t worth it to go “too hard” with a training program. This also of course depends on your starting base. For example, if someone is untrained and tries some rigorous boot camp with a tournament in two weeks, most of the time they’ll be worse off. Too much fatigue, risk of injury, not enough energy to focus on actual sharp practices.
With 6-8 weeks, a trained athlete could push it harder in the same scenario, break themselves down, and have time to recover strong and get sharp practicing again within a few weeks leading up to a tourney.
Playing hard, year-round, is not really sustainable when it comes to advancement/improvement. There are exceptions, but most players would plateau. In a tournament you want to go hard for three days and empty the tank so to speak (if you have any left in the tank, that’s bonus). But doing that like every weekend, all year, the body would adapt to that, and limit the potential strength and power improvements that could be gained by taking some breaks from handball and just focusing on strength and conditioning, for example.
The body can also develop asymmetries if playing consistently, year-round, so taking time off to lift weights and do other things can recover from the asymmetries and help avoid potential unnecessary injury.
By taking time off from playing, your body heals from handball-specific activity, and oftentimes you’ll come back with more power. This is pretty common in baseball pitchers for example. Even if they do throw year round- some do, they’re certainly not going 100% all out, year-round. That would lead to quick plateau and/or injury.
Accumulating volume over time with weights and resistance training will help you develop more sustainable power and strength so you can then afford to take more time off without losing anything at all.
There’s lots of research on volume reduction after building it up quite a bit, as long as you keep decent enough intensity. For example 80-85% of max training with less volume- something like 5 sets or so a week, and athletes did not lose any strength for close to a month. And it could even be longer.
Error on the side of not doing a lot of hard resistance training in the 2 weeks before a tournament, if you have been pushing hard for weeks before that. That’s the periodization of good programming. You want to come into a tournament fresh, but it’s because you’ve built up a lot of volume in the weeks/months leading up to it for your body to “remember” that it doesn’t need to lose it. Again, if you’re playing every few weeks in tournaments, it’s going to be tough to accumulate high amounts of resistance training volume without trading a little bit of fatigue. But everyone recovers differently and that’s where there’s much more to athletic development- such as hydration, nutrition, and sleep.
WPH’s TO’s Corner HERE
Current R48 #25 and Current National Masters Champion Adam Bernhard
6-8 weeks prep time would allow for a focus on drilling the areas I want to work on and steady fitness training. I try to be in the court 2-3 times a week and fitness train 1-2 times per week. It would be ideal to find a tournament to enter a few weeks out.
1-2 weeks would be: one week in the court playing and practicing as much as possible, and second week resting as much as possible – not enough time to make big strides in fitness or skills.
Current Icebreaker #7 and Clarkbreaker MVP Jab Bike
I would say having 6-8 weeks to prepare for a handball tournament is noticeably better than having just 1-2 weeks. In my short experience playing on the WPH tour, when I have 6-8 weeks to get ready, I am able to go to the gym for strength training 3-4 times a week and run more hills. Also, I can play 2-3 times a week and really push myself in those games compared to when having just 1-2 weeks. I feel like the 1-2 week training happens when tournaments are close together. There isn’t much time to train for improvement in that short period. The workouts become more maintenance ones, which is fine, but it definitely takes a few days to get right after a tournament. Every player is different, but I have definitely found differences in my tournament prep when I have 6-8 weeks compared to 1-2.
Current SR48 #3, R48 #18 and Former Professional Football Player Kyle English
This question has a different answer now at the ripe young age of 40 than did 20, 15 even 10 years ago.
There is a general body physique that I like to stay in all year long, which includes a healthy diet and a fair amount of gym time once or twice a week to stay in physical form.
That being said, six to eight weeks out before the season, gym time drops to once a week max and court visits pick up to two or three times a week to get lungs, legs, and arms in handball form.
Two weeks leading to a tournament or every week during the season, additional body health is added, such as ice baths two to four times a week to keep the swelling out of the body and the soreness down. Zero processed sugar, dairy, and meats also help to reduce body swelling. Throw in one or two deep massage sessions and plenty of stretching, and you have the formula of keeping a 40-year-old body ready for the crucible of handball.
Former Pro Tour Stalwart and Ironman John Libby
My training 6-8 weeks before a tournament consisted of trail running in the Santa Monica mountains above Malibu and ocean swimming sprints in the waves. I would run 2-3 miles of rugged hills on uneven rocky trails to strengthen my feet and calves and lungs. The uphill run burns the lungs and calves and the downhills blows up the quads and believe it or not, the shoulders as well. Swimming in the waves teaches you how to control breathing and increase body balance and stamina. Additionally, diving under large waves teaches you how to dive deep for low handball shots. I would run three times a week up until four days before the tournament. Eating correctly during training, I would cut weight of up to fifteen pounds to get down to 215lbs.
I had a huge advantage and disadvantage working as a fireman for the Los Angeles City Fire Department at busy fire stations. The advantages were we have handball courts at the stations and my fellow firemen were all very good and very competitive players. We had absolute wars 4-5 times a week at all hours of the day and night. Another huge advantage was firemen work 24 hour shifts up to 96 hours in a row. We are constantly working with heavy equipment and tools and fires and construction. We are always mentally alert on duty or else we could get hurt badly. We watched out for one another. This developed a high sense of concentration and professionalism during high stress incidents and emergencies. That’s why I never got nervous before or during a match. Additionally, I could keep my concentration while playing handball at a high level.
During the last week before a tournament, I would stop playing handball for four days before my start date. I would also take vacation days or trade days off from work to rest. The diet would consist of mostly chicken and pasta and lots of water and veggies.
Another important aspect for tournament play is the traveling. Never drive for hours the day of your match. Driving takes your legs out. Get to the tournament early and stay rested. Do not watch a lot of handball matches either. It will tire your eyes and brain out. Stay focused, stay calm, and chase down every single ball every single point!
I forgot to mention that in our fire department tournaments and daily matches we still play to 21 in the tiebreaker. That’s why we rarely lose tiebreakers because we are so strong and in shape. We will lose to more skilled players and that is ok but we will lose for lack of effort because we are trained to NEVER quit! EVER!! We always have an extra reserve in the tank when needed.
Current R48 #2 and Current USHA Four Wall National Champion Martin Mulkerrins
Workouts will vary depending on the time of year and proximity to tournaments. When there are large gaps between tournaments (6-8 weeks) there is great opportunity to increase the training load and to do more and/or more intense sessions each week. However, when it comes to that week before the tournament, I don’t want to be tired and I think it is important to “leave it in the hands” and to focus on recovery and being well rested to get the best performance(s) possible. Historically, I have struggled with tapering off and felt that I needed to be training everyday even on tournament weeks but through experience I have learned how to get a better balance between training/recovery.
Thank you to our current pros and former pros for sharing their secrets on how to prepare for tournaments.
Stay tuned for upcoming WPH Tournament Preparation Series features.
Read more of WPH Tournament Preparation Series HERE
David Fink
WPH Senior Writer