08/08/2013
Specific Metabolic Conditioning
Juan Carlos Santana, MEd, CSCS
How many times have you heard the old cliché, “I’m starting a jogging program to get in shape”? Or, how many times have you seeing soccer, or football conditioning programs begin pre-season training with 2-5 miles runs, 3-5 times per week? Most coaches, trainers, athletes, weekend warriors and fitness aficionados still prescribe “long steady distance” (L*D) training for ANYONE trying to create a “training base”. You can see this when football player, regardless of position, are asked to run the famous 12 minute run for maximum distance, or 1.5 miles for time. All in the name of showing the athlete’s ability to successfully engage in strenuous practices, “to be in shape for camp”!
To those of you who thought running long distances was the best way to get “in shape” for sport participation, I introduce you to the concept of specific metabolic conditioning (SMC). The concept of SMC is centered on the training theory of specificity. Specificity dictates that you adapt to the specific demands of the training stimulus. If you train long and slow, you increase your endurance at slow speeds. If you train for fast repeated sprints, you increase your ability to repeat sprints. What you train for is what you get – it’s that simple!
To properly prepare someone’s metabolic machine for a specific sport, one must first look at the physiological demands of that sport. This is often referred to as a “needs analysis”. What is the work to rest ratio? What are the distances covered at one time? How many and what kinds of changes in directions are necessary in a work bout (i.e. play, point, exchange, etc.)? How often do the changes in direction take place? How much and what type of strength is needed? Is the sport power or strength dominated? What kind of body positions does the sport require (i.e. the activity’s biomechanics)? These are just some of the questions that must be answered in order to prepare a “common sense approach” to metabolic conditioning.
Let’s look at some very general guidelines for most field, court, racquet and combative sports. These sports require near maximal intermittent work lasting under 5-7 sec, followed by 15-30 sec of light recovery work. This work to rest ratio of approximately 1:4 can last for 2-5 minutes and is usually followed by some kind of rest period that can last 30 seconds -2 minutes. Most distances covered in these sports are less than 20 meters with 2-10 changes in direction per work bout. Does this sound to you like long distance training? It shouldn’t, because it’s not!
Most sports are power dominated; they use short high intensity intervals. Their quick bursts of action require immediate fuel, thus they can’t rely on aerobic metabolism to provide their high rate of energy demand. Short, high intensity intervals and require the ability to quickly restore immediate energy supplies so that another burst can be performed. Furthermore, in rare instances when high energy is required for about a minute, lactic acid must be buffered, removed and used for energy. If lactic acid production becomes excessive, it will shut down muscle contraction and you will stop, or slow down, what you are doing! Both, the ability to quickly recharge the immediate energy stores within the muscle, and to buffer lactic acid, are NOT improved significantly by steadily jogging a few miles! If you want to create these very important adaptations remember “specificity of training”; train in repeated, short and intense bursts with incomplete recovery – the way it happens in most sports!
