Is there a secret to playing better lacrosse?
There are basics you have to have. For example, you have to have stick skills, lacrosse intelligence, and many athletic qualities to be successful in girls lacrosse.
But if you’re not training to get stronger, you’re missing a big component of becoming your best self – as an athlete.
You’re a lacrosse athlete, right?
Do you think you need to be stronger?
I know what you’re going to say.
“I need to run in lacrosse and I need conditioning (whatever that is).”
Yes, you need to run a lot, that’s a part of the game.
But you need so much more.
Let’s talk about a few of these qualities needed for the lacrosse athlete to be successful.
RUNNING.
For some unknown reason to me, everyone always thinks that they need to run to get fit.
Hmm.
The irony here is that you have to get fit to run, you don’t run to get fit.
“You get fit to run, not run to get fit.”
Running is absolutely a major part of lacrosse and you have to be able to run (and run a lot) to be ready for game day.
That’s a fact and I’m not arguing the point.
But, to be more durable and to run more effectively and efficiently, you need to have foundational strength.
This is not opinion, but scientific fact. I will sharing some of the science here about improving running economy with runners in future articles.
Frankly, this should be common sense.
A stronger body will move better, faster, and more resistant to injuries than a body with weaker muscles and soft tissues such as ligaments and tendons.
In most cases, stronger is almost always better for runners.
There are some caveats, of course.
CONDITIONING.
Lacrosse players need to be highly conditioned.
Let me ask you this though, what is conditioning?
Can you define it for me?
This is one of the most misunderstood and, frankly, haphazard terms in sport performance.
Running?
Running a lot?
Sprinting?
Let’s define it.
Conditioning is the ability to successfully do what is needed and required for the athlete’s sport.
So, conditioning for lacrosse will be completely different from conditioning for Volleyball, Softball, or Cross-Country.
All of these sports are different and require different energy systems and aerobic demands.
When you do conditioning, you have to ask – “what you are conditioning for?”
Does that makes sense?
Conditioning has to be context specific.
Now back to strength.
When training athletes, training is usually referred to as “strength and conditioning programs” – which usually means that strength training is done in addition to a conditioning program (that is hopefully designed for the sport).
Let me just say that strength helps build conditioning.
What I want you to understand here is that developing strength helps every other physical training quality.
SPEED.
Ah yes, speed.
Speed is king in lacrosse – and in most field sports.
As a lacrosse athlete, you need speed, speed is what you need.
Keep in mind there are many different types of speed.
We have:
- linear or max velocity speed
- multi-directional speed
- speed endurance
- acceleration
- deceleration and more…
To be fast, you have to produce FORCE off the ground.
To produce force off the ground, what do you need?
You need foundational strength. That comes with squatting, deadlifting, unilateral leg exercises, and more.
To get faster, the solution may be to get stronger – or certainly have the baseline strength needed to run fast.
I’ll be sharing more specifics on the best ways to accomplish this in future articles.
Can you be too strong?
You can, but…
It’s highly unlikely.
Of course anything is possible with bad programming.
WHY THIS MATTERS
Strength helps everything else.
Strength training helps the lacrosse athlete be a better athlete.
As I said in the beginning, if you’re not training for strength, then you’re missing out on your potential.
Coach Scott is the creator of Disruptive Lacrosse and a high school girls lacrosse coach specializing in dodging, speed, footwork, and player development.
With a background in strength & conditioning and movement science, he brings a unique, high-performance approach to training the modern female lacrosse athlete.
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