Get Better at Your Winter Sport

You've heard of sports-specific fitness training for football, basketball, baseball etc..., but what about outdoor winter sports? Snowboarding, Skiing , Ice Skating?

Although these activities are nothing more then fun recreational hobbies for most of us, why not get better them? Or more importantly, why not prevent injury?

Sports-specific training is centered around getting better at movements that you perform in that sport: moving quicker, stronger and more efficient. Depending on my client's sport, I incorporate resistance, CORE, balance, flexibility, agility and posture training to our training in ways that mimic movements they will see in their sport.

For a basic example, I outlined some fundamental ideas for training specifically for snow boarding:

• Focus on closed chain exercises for lower body: squat, leg press and lunges. When you are on a board, your lower extremity is considered closed, therefore you want to strengthen those muscles. The amount of resistance and reps/sets will depend on the fitness level of the individual as well as the where that person is in their sport e.g off season strengthening, in season maintaining. Since the snow season is just beginning, I'd recommend any where from 12-20 reps per exercise, for 1-3 sets (depending on fitness level). As far as weight is concerned, you don't want to be sore for your sport so stick on the lighter side or just body weight
  
• Once you get a solid base, incorporate multi-directional motion and unstable surfaces to simulate downhill conditions: trampolines, foam rollers, wobble boards, balancing discs and stability balls, muscle endurance in a crouching and up-down squat position, body weight and tubing resistance
• Proprioceptive training: adjust to changes in terrain and maintaining balance on either one or both legs is essential to keeping the body upright: unilateral movements, shuttle runs, line drills, obstacle courses and multi-directional hopping and bounding and around cones or hurdles
• Core and upper extremity: posture, good biomechanics specific to your sport e.g flexing & curling your abdominal while standing. Train core in every session with variety and high reps, pushing and pulling motions

You know what they say, if you are not getting better, you're getting worse -make this winter your best

Do you currently train for your winter out door sports? If so, share your workouts below by commenting on this entry