Article : Periodised Training

by Chris Rowat (aka Blane)

 

It is my opinion that every person who practices Parkour should spend around half of their training time conditioning and strengthening their body. I place equal importance on both conditioning and technical training and believe that unless the traceur finds a way to balance these two aspects then they are limiting their potential. If up until now you haven't started or even planned a regular strength training regime then I suggest you start today as it will only compliment your ability to move and improve your Parkour.
If you already spend plenty of time each week trying to get stronger and improve your technical side but find your progression is slow or becoming stale, then this article is for you.

Around six months ago, a little before my third year of Parkour training was complete I hit a serious plateau in my progression and no matter what I tried, I could not seem to step my game up to the next level. All around me people were learning new things, getting faster, stronger and improving whilst I had trouble improving with any significance. Although I had always included conditioning and strength training in my weekly regime, I decided it was time to really focus on developing my body.

So controversially, I stopped trying to push my technical level any further and just spent some time each week maintaining my current state by drilling the basics whilst spending the majority of my time (75-80% of all training time) working on becoming stronger. It was tough to continue seeing people progress technically but I kept going and was satisfied in seeing my strength grow and grow... finally the feeling of progression was back, but in another form.

This continued for some time until the other guys in my area showed an increased interest in strength training and with some planning, Hell Night was born!!

So on the 28th September 2006 on a cold, wet night I led a group of eager traceurs through a gruelling 4 hours of non-stop strength training that quickly became known as Hell Night. The goal was to push the body, mind and will to their limits and work every major muscle group in the body, with specific emphasis on upper body development. It was a massive success and we all realised that we weren't as strong as we thought we were. Every Thursday we would meet up regardless of the weather and make the night's activities harder than the week before with more reps, tougher challenges, and longer routes.

The true sign that this was working was that I was finding it more and more difficult to challenge myself on my other strength training days. I completed my hardest workout of the week without breaking a sweat and knew that it was all thanks to Hell Night. Around 14 weeks into the programme I was really happy with my strength levels and wanted to ease back into the technical side to see how it felt and I can only describe it as refreshing. I quickly got my ability back to its best and suddenly this whole new world opened up to me full of possibilities and potential. I was stronger, faster, leaner and found myself a lot less limited in terms of what I could do and how I could move and control my body.

The point in all this is that I've learnt a lot about my body and the way it likes to train. I'm not saying this will work for everybody, as we're all different and react better to different forms of training but if you find yourself in a rut, then consider giving this method of training a try...

If you agree that strength training and conditioning is just as important as technical training then you'll likely agree that you should spend an equal amount of time on each. My current method of training takes that idea a bit further than rotating on a daily basis, and allows more time for each to develop on their own.

How does three months of strength training followed by three months of technical training sound?

That's six months in total of strength training and six months of technical training per year... Keeping our delicate 50/50 balance in check, but spending more time focused on each half of the game at one time. This would allow you to make more noticable advancements during each period and allow you to plan what areas you're going to focus on in advance, be that a certain technique, a certain muscle group or a particular weakness.

At this moment I believe my strength level is greater than my technical level. With my current strength I know there is a lot more things I am able to do that I couldn't before. So for three months I'm going to take advantage of this situation, and bring myself up to an even standard for both. Then after three months if I've caught up, I'm going to maintain that technical level whilst developing my strength again.

So a year's training would consist of:

-Three months of strength development whilst maintaining technical ability.
followed by:
-Three months of technical development whilst maintaining current strength level.
followed by:
-Three months of strength development whilst maintaining technical ability.
followed by:
-Three months of technical development whilst maintaining current strength level.

A friend of mine told me this idea of 'macrocycles, mesocycles and microcycles' is an established training method used in many sports and practices... so I borrowed a climbing book from him and discovered that this 'periodised training' idea was almost identical to the plan I had come up with without any prior research. It emphasised concentrating on 4-12 weeks of training in a particular area of climbing, whilst devoting a suitable amount of time each week to maintain the other areas. Reports were positive and it seemed that everyone who tried this agreed that it allowed them more time to focus on their weaknesses and improve in a more systematic manner.

After further research I discovered that a macrocycle is the longest measure of goals and training periods and is typically defined as a 6-12 month period. Within a macrocycle, we have mesocycles and microcycles, lasting around 3-4 months and 1-4 weeks respectively.
So my personal goal will be to have a macrocycle consisting of 12 months and 4 mesocycles each lasting 3 months.

Since our technical ability is determined in large by our physical condition, I would recommend beginning this programme in a strength mesocycle to ensure that when the technical mesocycle begins, you can tap into this new potential and make greater gains.

Some of you might worry that without constantly pushing your technical side, any strength gains you make would lead to your 'vision' being compromised and that you would lose the ability to judge what you can do and what you can't. This entered my mind too but I recently discovered an interesting capability of the brain that was new to me...
During my strength training period I wasn't trying to push my standing jump distance any further, I was just maintaining it with jumps that were large enough to require quite a lot of effort - whilst doing lots of weighted pistols and calf raises. When I was happy with my strength development and I went back to technical training, I was expecting to have to build up my vision so that my brain could remember images from my eyes and relate that to how far I could jump. Surprisingly, when practicing at an old area that I had trained at many times before, I looked at a jump that was always way out of my range and I just KNEW I could make it. I didn't even have to try it at the side of the walls, my brain knew exactly how much stronger my legs had become and I knew could make the jump with about an inch to spare. This was interesting because I had previously thought the only way that vision was improved was by gradually capturing images with your eyes and the brain remembering whether you made the jump that distance or not - but it seems as though there's a more complex process of the brain knowing how strong the body and muscles are.

-Blane

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