30 Days of Training Female Athletes, Day 1: On-Field Strength and Injury Reduction

13 Nov 30 Days of Training Female Athletes, Day 1: On-Field Strength and Injury Reduction

Let’s kick things off with this: my ideas for training female athletes are as endless as the Walking Dead series.

When will I run out of content?

When will it all end?

Will there be a grand finale?

Nope. Not ever.

You see, this is a population so near and dear to my heart, with mountains of research continuing to come out, as well as nuggets I learn on a daily basis from the girls I work with. Truthfully, they teach me how to be strong and resilient and I am always at amazed at their feats of strength.

Young girls doing impressive things like 3 minute dip holds aside, here are some of the facets of training girls that are endless as far as information:

– Growth and Maturation
– Menstrual Cycle and Performance
– Injury Reduction
– Deceleration and Change of Direction
– Recovery and Sleep
– Nutrition
– Practical Programming

Of course, I could add other sub categories underneath these, but I’ll keep it as simple as possible before I write a dissertation.

Actually, no, let me do this:

For the next 30 days, I plan on releasing a blog post on all of the components of training female athletes.

My mission is to give coaches and parents practical action items on keeping their young girls healthy and strong.

Let’s get started with Day 1: On-Field Strength

The above video reel is a sample on-field strength workout. I understand not every sports club has access to a performance coach, or fancy facility, or girls don’t have the necessary equipment at home to get strong.

This is why I love on-field body weight holds so young female athletes can truly feel the position of the exercise.

Here is the order of movements presented in the video and their benefits:

SL Deadlift – hamstrings, glutes, core stability, balance and proprioception
Lunge – core stability, quadriceps strength
Plank – shoulder stability, core stability, glute activation
Lateral Squat – hip mobility
Deep Squat – hip mobility, posture, core stability
SL Bridge  – glute activation, pelvic stability

These can be easily sprinkled into the warm-up, or 10 minutes can be set aside at practice (or in the home 2x a week) to help female athletes improve their balance, stability, and strength.

See you on Day 2!

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