Today’s show is with athletic performance coach and long term athletic development expert, James Baker.  James is one of the co-founders of the LTAD Network, and is currently a Strength & Conditioning coach and Performance Support Lead at the Aspire Academy in Doha, Qatar.  James has a unique blend of skills and experience as a S&C coach, PE teacher, sport scientist and researcher.

So many times in sports performance, and particularly in the sub-set of speed and power training, we look to focus on the most high intensity methods we can possibly utilize to achieve adaptations in athletes.  Or perhaps, we inquire to the optimal technical or tactical methods for the sport in front of us.

Unfortunately, we don’t tend to look much at the entire, long-term process of an athlete achieving their best possible result in a sport, as well as being well balanced outside of their sport specific ventures.  To give athletes the best training experience, we need to have a thorough understanding on how they might respond various training methods along different points in their athletic journey.

Look at the long term process; look at the love of movement and play outside of one’s specific sport, better understand the entire umbrella of what it means to be both human and an athlete

On today’s show, James will discuss the difference between early specialization and early engagement, and the need for athletes to love and appreciate other forms of movement and play as their sport career unfolds.  He will also take on free-moving sports like parkour in relation to ball sports, and then deliver some great ideas on progressing plyometric and strength training means over the course of an athlete’s development.

For those of you who don’t work directly with growing athletes, realize that by learning more about how young athletes develop, you can learn a lot more about the mature athlete in front of you, and the process that led him or her there.

Today’s episode is brought to you by SimpliFaster and Lost Empire Herbs.  For 15% off your Lost Empire Herbs order, head to www.lostempireherbs.com/justfly



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Timestamps and Main Points

5:02 – What key changes James feels could help young athletes as they go through the levels of sport without burning out

8:49 – The importance of athletes learning to love and appreciate other forms of movement practice outside of their primary sport

14:23 – James’ thoughts on early specialization versus early engagement in a sport

22:05 – Thoughts on early specialization and mental burnout in sport

24:44 – James take on using other/alternative sports in the course of a traditional sport training program

31:01 – When to incorporate, and then intensify strength training in young athletes

34:23 – Standards to “earn the barbell” in the training of young athletes

40:00 – How an athlete’s peak-height-velocity timing will impact whether or not strength training will be helping them to benefit explosively as an athlete

46:45 – How athletes who have less muscle mass may respond less favorably to strength training to improve speed and power outputs across a full spectrum of age ranges

48:07 – How peak-height-velocity will impact an athlete’s reactivity and ground contact times

51:06 – Plyometric progression ideas for young athletes in regards to pogo hops and depth jumps



“The danger of athletics is kids wrap up their identity with being a sportsperson”

“If anything needs to change, it’s the support network around those kids (that don’t make the next level) and helping them transition”

“I think it’s a case of early engagement versus early specialization (especially in “high skill” sports)… getting them in front of good coaches early, but not having that be the only thing they do”

“(Regarding how early success does not correlate heavily with later success in “physical sports”) The physical qualities create a bi...