Athletes try to peak for events. Do cops, Firefighters, or Tactical need to?
Key Takeaway
I’ve been reading through an excellent book, Special Strength Development For All Sports by the late great Louie Simmons. In the beginning of Chapter 6 on page 89 Louie goes into the textbook training periods for an athlete: Accumulation, Intensification, Transformation, and then Delayed Transformation. Our previous articles discussed Accumulation and Intensification. We are now going to discuss transformation and delayed transformation.
As stated in the earlier articles, on page 163 Louie lets John Saylor write about how he applies the “Westside” principles to training combat athletes. Saylor was the coach of the U.S. National Judo Training Squad at the Olympic Training Center from 1983 to 1990, and was a 3-time National Judo Champion and a 2-time Pan American Medalist.
Coach Saylor frames his system within the same context as above, except he applies it the MMA world. In my opinion it is a bit more applicable in the first responder and tactical realm, and ironically it is extremely similar to how I have to come to frame the way I program.
The key here is when and if first responders really ever need to take their training to this phase when simply training for consistent performance on the street.
Transformation and Delayed Transformation - Powerlifting
Transformation is the phase of training where the intensity is raised dramatically and the exercises used start to become extremely sport specific for an event. Like Louis discusses on page 89 this is where the powerlifter really concentrates on movements that enhances their performance on the big lifts and drastically raises intensity.
After this phase is delayed transformation, or when you begin a taper and allow for the body to recover prior to competition. The amount of time needed for this phase varies on the strength of the athlete and the type of competition. The stronger you are, the longer this will probably need to be.
Transformation and Delayed Transformation - Combat Athlete
On pages 190-193 this is where Coach Saylor uses these concepts to discuss the application to the martial arts. It follows a very similar pattern, except now we start to look at energy system training that is specific to MMA or similar events.
Your training starts to look like the event. An example could be your interval training/Sparring rounds start to be as long or slightly longer than the rounds you’ll face in competition. When you strength train you only use exercises that you know enhance your total body strength/power the best and more importantly don’t beat you up. Extra accessory work goes away. Competition is the focus; not necessarily building the general engine parts. That work should have already been done. Then as competition nears you taper down the intensity and volume to let any residual fatigue subside so you’re ready for fight night.
Transformation and Delayed Transformation -
Tactical/First Responder
How does this fit for the Tactical or First Responder who often has to try to be prepared for an unknown event, at an unknown time, at an unknown place? I would argue unless they’re getting ready for a SWAT or SOF selection there really isn’t a compelling reason to drastically raise training intensity to the point where you need 2-3 weeks of a taper to really show off what you built. In fact, even within the context of selection preparation you should really only need a small taper.
The reason? You’re just not a traditional athlete peaking for an single event. I say that in the sense that athletes often peak for a single event or a series of events. Team sports usually can’t even do this well.
Think about an NFL season. You really think those guys are peaking to a 100% of their readiness once a week for several months? Of course not. Not because they don’t want to but how could you reasonably expect someone to be able to make this happen? Injuries, stress, sleep quality…the variables are endless.
Of course the player are taking it easier as game day gets closer but it is impossible to hit your best that often. Instead, I would argue their preparation and fitness base is to such a high level their 80-90% of their best allows them to play at incredibly high levels even if they aren’t fully recovered.
Closing
As a Tactical/First Responder if you truly worked so hard for 2-3 weeks that you need another 2-3 weeks of a taper to recover…how are you supposed to perform on the job to a high level when failure is not an option? If you’re so fatigued from training how do you think your physical performance will look on a no notice foot pursuit like cops deal with everyday? Or how does a firefighter run up several flights of stairs during multistory structure fire to rescue civilians?
I guess a Police Officer could see if that drug dealer from his 1:00 a.m. traffic stop would wait a couple weeks before he runs from you so you can REALLY show him how hard you’ve been working…but I doubt he is going to cooperate.
Now, this doesn’t mean you can’t ramp up the intensity a bit and then take a slightly easier week before you test yourself on some lifts. That is reasonable. Or just generally tapering for a few days because you want to see how much you improved your mile time. This difference here is in dose, time, and common sense. Questions, reach out.
References
Simmons, L. (2015). Special strength development for all sports. Westside Barbell.
