Hydro training is the best training medium for muscle confusion. Some folks believe changing an exercise a little bit is enough to break through the training plateau.
To prevent a training plateau, one must confuse the body. More muscle confusion, for a week, is going to stimulate the body to adapt to the new environment.
When one moves through the water, the body—the entire body—is meeting resistance plus trying to balance. This is true and effective muscle confusion. When you return to the weight room after a week of training in water, your body will have to adapt yet again (on a smaller scale, but adapt it must). Once back in the weight room after a week of hydro, your body will start developing fresh.
Many teams train during their season, as well as in the off-season. If they are not doing hydro training during the season, then their weight room training results will hit a plateau. As a coach or an athlete, do you want to keep developing and improving at the end of the season too? Winning at the end of the season is critical if you are hoping to qualify for playoffs, or you want to advance into the playoffs, or perhaps you want to achieve a .500 season during a rebuilding year instead of losing all of your games.
Hydro can help your athletes develop faster and longer than ever.
Try it! Let me know how it goes. I want to hear your stories.
If you do not have a hydro program, try mine. I have a basic hydro program you can get started with for free.
See below for a sample hydro workout:
Warmup – Zig-Zags: Start at one end of the pool and push off the outside part of one foot explosively moving upward, forward and slightly to the side. Land, and push off the outside part of the foot you landed on the same way. Continue this until reaching the other end of the pool. Ideally, you will be able to do this the entire length of the swimming pool, typically 25 yards. Complete 100 yards of this warmup.
Single Leg Shallow Water Explosions: In hip deep water, balance on 1 foot. Crouch down, then explode upward. Continue this until you “taper”. Taper being when you feel a rep isn’t as explosive as the previous rep. Rest 30 seconds and do the same exercise on the other leg. Remember the rep count in each leg. Do subsequent sets until the number of explosive reps before tapering is about half that of the first set. That is the final set for both legs. As your anaerobic endurance builds, the number of sets you are able to complete will increase dramatically. As this number changes, it also is an indication that your body is changing and, that you are jumping higher than you used to.
Single Leg Butt Kickers: Same as on land, with the vital part of this exercise being that your heel contact your butt each repetition. Work to taper (see previous exercise explaining the taper concept). Do this for each leg. When you jump with 2 legs, one leg is dominant and one non-dominant. Single leg exercises isolate and develop the weaker leg rapidly.
Double Leg Shallow Water Explosions: Same as Single Leg Shallow water explosions, except use both legs to jump. This too is to taper.
Kangaroo Race: x6 lengths of the pool. You will bound upward and forward. Rest 1 minute between each set. This is a sprint!
One Legged Kangaroos: Same as the kangaroo race except you explosively jump up and forward off of 1 leg. Do 1 leg for 25 yards, then the other leg the next 25 yards. Do 6 lengths of the pool total.
Deep Water Single Leg Explosions: In shoulder deep water, explode upward off of 1 leg. Train to taper. This exercise has a lot more water resistance so you probably will not be able to do as many reps.
Deep Water Double Leg Explosions: Same as single leg, but jump from both legs.
Static Stretching