When the Perfect Plan is Not the Best Planby William A. Sands PhD, CSCSLearn why it is impossible to account for all the training variables when developing a strength and conditioning program.

Numerous strong opinions exist regarding how one should select exercises, teach skills, establish training loads, and delineate whats best regarding many other factors in strength training and conditioning. Disagreements are numerous, widespread, and passionate.

These disagreements have led to distrust, harmful gossip, and slow-to-heal wounded egos and hard feelings. Using personal pronouns I will follow the reasoning of this article as if I had prepared a strength training and conditioning program and someone else prepared a different program. We find ourselves passionately defending our programs as better than those just as passionately defended by others.

But how do we know if our program is really better than any other program? There are bound to be contentions with predicting how each program will unfold and what effects it will have. Furthermore, there are certainly factors that neither party has considered that overrule all or some of their arguments. Lets begin the problem of determining how good our programs are.

Of course, I believe that my plan is the "perfect" one; after all, I developed it. Thus, by definition, it has to be the perfect plan. My colleague also believes she has the perfect plan. She is confident and passionate about her program, because of course, she developed it. How do we, or does anyone, decide which program is better? It would be natural to start running the programs through a gauntlet of questions:

Which program fits the environment?Which program fits the age group?Which program fits the training age?Which program fits the time allowed for training?And so forth ...

Exploring this gauntlet of questions, I made a list of the potential variables that might intrude on the construction and implementation of a strength training and conditioning program. The list includes about 50 variables, some of which are clearly more important than others.

Training Variables

1. Periodization model2. Exercise selection3. Tension type(s)a. Concentricb. Eccentricc. Isometricd. Stretch shortening cycle (speed, drop height, rebound, speed, neuromuscular efficiency)4. Exercise order5. Number of sets6. Number of reps7. Weight/resistance8. Rest between sets9. Single joint or multi-joint10. Rhythm11. Repetition(s) to failure12. Repetition duration13. Repetition speed14. Repetition ROMa. Planeb. Axisc. Variable15. Volume16. Intensity17. Densitya. Amount of total load per unit of timeb. Number of training sessions per day18. Frequencya. Per dayb. Per weekc. Per monthd. Per yeare. Per career19. Body part(s)/muscle group(s)20. Time of day21. Time relative to menstrual cycle, females22. Period of year23. Period of macrocycle24. Period of mesocycle25. Period of microcycle26. Timing in training lesson27. Age of athletea. Child/Adolescent (sexual maturity, developmental maturity, skeletal maturity, muscular maturity, neuromuscular coordination, mental maturity)b. Adult (young age 15-30, middle age 30-50, elderly 50-70, older age 70+)28. Training age of athlete29. Health status30. Injury status31. Handicap status32. Mental status33. Nutritional status34. Supplementation35. Hydration36. Closed or Open Kinetic Chain37. Environmenta. Groupb. Individualc. Homed. Alonee. Partnerf. Schoolg. Class38. Altitude39. Coach presence40. Testing or training41. Freshness/rest/recovery42. Noise/music43. Equipmenta. Free weightsb. Barbellsc. Waterd. Medicine balle. Machines (isokinetic, isoinertial, isometric, isotonic, plyometric)f. Tubing/bandsg. Body weighth. Mirrorsi. Lighting44. Audience45. Temperature46. Humidity47. Progression48. Sex49. Motivation50. Nutrition timing51. Indoors/outdoors

To compute the total number of combinations of 50 variables we use 50!, or 50 factorial. This equation results in approximately 3.04 x 1064 different combinations of variables. Clearly this is a huge number, thus, it is exceedingly doubtful that anyone can know all of the possible combinations of variables that influence strength and conditioning. It should be obvious that determining the best program for anyone is exceedingly difficult, and may indeed be impossible.

Strength and conditioning coaches might search for arguments to tout their program as the best because it prevents injuries and results in better transfer of athletic performance. With regard to safety, injuries that occur in strength training and conditioning are unusually rare (1,8,17-19,25). Frankly, sport training is almost always more likely to result in injury than the conditioning program (24). These facts make arguments about the likelihood of injuries for either program suspect. Studying and attributing injury incidence and severity when the incidences are so few is very difficult.

A second argument is that a program is going to result in better performance transfer. However, the transfer of training programs to the gym, field of play, or court is staggeringly difficult to determine. Specifically in strength and conditioning, only a few studies have actually investigated whether specific exercises and programs actually transfer to performance (5). Usually, the approach is to involve easily measured laboratory or field assessments that mimic competitive performance. Laboratory or contrived measures are rarely a good substitute or simulation of real-world competition (3,4,22,26,27). Again, neither of these arguments makes one program more efficacious than another.

How well can we predict athlete performance? The answer of course is, Not well. Talent identification programs serve as useful surrogates for this question (2,6,9,13,16,20,23). In a paper by Sands and McNeal, the ability to predict performance at the 1996 Olympic Games showed that even short-term predictions, such as for the next day, were unlikely to be accurate (21). Predictions of athletic training effects are extremely difficult, and assertions that imply this type of perspective are fanciful (7,10-15). As such, our two program developers have little evidence upon which to build a coherent and valid foundation for their particular programs.

Do any of the previous arguments and evidence, or lack thereof, make any difference in the implementation of the different strength training and conditioning programs? The issue in program design and implementation often boils down to who is going to do the implementation. If the person implementing the program believes in the program, then he/she is likely to be careful, vigilant, and able to modify exercises at any instance because he/she understands the exercises and values the programs objective.

When someone tries to implement someone elses program, the personal pride of authorship doesnt exist. Thus, the implementation is likely to be poor. A less than perfect program implemented with enthusiasm, confidence, commitment, and responsibility will beat a perfect program implemented with skepticism, laziness, apathy, and lack of confidenceevery time. Thus, a perfect program is not necessarily the best program. Rather, the best program depends largely on who implements the program.