How to Build High Performance Recovery Sessions (HPRT): Explosive Exercise Selection

If you missed the first installment on building high performance recovery sessions, you can find it here: Part 1.

Let’s get back into it! 

The main focus of the high performance recovery session is to finish the exercise portion of the session with an explosive movement of some kind. 

A Clean with no catch is an excellent choice for the explosive component of an HPRT session.

These would be exercises like speed deadlifts - but it’s important to note you generally want to drop the bar at the top to minimize the eccentric loading. A box jump would be a good choice, too, as the eccentric loading is minimal. Stay away from any movement with a high eccentric loading like depth drops, broad jumps, vertical jumps, and weightlifting movements that involve the catch. Even medicine ball throws will work, as long as the eccentric damage remains low. 

Usually, I will pair this explosive work with upper back work. Honestly, it’s just a nice opportunity to get in extra pulling volume. There’s no secret key to using a pull paired here. 

In my experience, if the athlete is recovered enough to use something like a speed deadlift, you can realistically go up pretty heavy on these as long as you try to keep the speed high and drop it at the top. 

How do you decide if the athlete is “recovered enough”? This is well beyond this post’s scope, but you can look to HRV, using any variety of apps that generate a recovery score, the 10-second finger tap test, and good ol’ subjective gut feeling based on knowing your athletes really well. 

If I’m working with a big group or a team, I’d probably choose to use MB throws or box jumps, as they take much less 1-on-1 coaching. If you do choose speed deadlift, keep in mind the state that their bodies are in when you are deciding if you are going to stick to lower percentages or go higher. The intensity can really vary, but the main goal is to squeeze out some high effort speed and power production. 

A good guideline that I tend to stick closely to on speed work is Prilepin’s chart, which gives you guidelines on total volume at certain percentages of 1RM. This isn’t something set in stone, you can play around with this and decide what works best for your athletes. Typically staying a little more on the conservative side works best, in my experience. 

After finishing the explosive portion, we do a little more light aerobic activity for three to five minutes, and then back to the breathing drills for at least 3-5 minutes to bring them back into the relaxed state we found at the beginning of the session. Finally, the session is finished with stretching and SMR, as needed.

It’s easy for these sessions to take an eternity! But keep them to under 60-min.

The whole idea for an HPRT session is to get the athlete’s CNS firing again so they start to feel normal and ready, not just loosened up from a warmup and stretching. 

Sample Session:

A well timed and planned HPRT will get the individual feeling like an athlete again. This is typically why I will use this kind of session right before practices if the athlete is feeling run down. 

“90/90 Breathing w/Hammies 2x5
90/90 Breathing Pullover 2x5
Breathing Bear Plank Mtn Climber 2x5

Rock Walk x2 ea way
Banded 1/2 Kneeling Ankle Mob x8
Banded 1/2 Kneeling Dorsiflexion x8
Goal Posts x8
Kneeling Bench T-Spine Mob x5
Hip Hurdle Mobility x5/way

5-min Versaclimber
MB Slams x10
5-min HICT on Bike
MB Side Throw x5/side
A1 Sled Push 3x1
A2 Carry 3x1
B1 Trap Bar Drop DL 4x3
B2 Inv Row 4xAMRAP
3-min light bike
3-min Relaxation Breathing Position on Roller
Roll, stretch ”

— Sample HPRT Session by Sarah Walls

I used a similar system to get my athletes in the college setting ready for strength sessions, they would do an olympic lift variation as the last part of their warm-up to really get their CNS primed and ready. This takes them from not being ready for practice at all, up to maybe 80-85%, where they can still have a productive practice. 

The HPRT approach does not have to only be reserved for elite athletes, it can be used for high school athletes with a competition the next day, or even hard-driving trainees that enjoy training very frequently but who have a tough time recovering from big workouts every time (think powerlifters, CrossFitters, bodybuilders, and weightlifters). 

This is a versatile method that can be used both as a standalone session, or right before practices to make sure the team is primed and ready. So give this a shot before your next hard practice/session and see how it works for you!

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How to Build High Performance Recovery Sessions (HPRT): Breathing and Mobilizations

I don’t play favorites. 

Except when it comes to recovery methods! 

We all know what it feels like the morning after a truly exhausting training session or competition: Super Garbage. Yes, that’s an actual term I use when checking in with athletes. That next day feeling can leave you feeling like it’s hard to just walk from the couch to the kitchen. In fact, it may take most of the day or longer to feel somewhat normal. 

As hard as it is, the best thing to do is go through some kind of warm-up via light movement and stretching. After this most people tend to feel much better and then can get through the rest of their day without an issue. Do they feel great? No. But can they “make it”? Yes. Okay, that’s not too bad.

But what if it were possible to tweak that time-tested formula and leave the session feeling loose, recovered, and ready to - dare I say it? - PERFORM again?!?!

It is possible.

My current favorite recovery method is called high performance recovery training. I got this directly from Joel Jamieson (coaches and trainers, check out his 8-weeks out certification), it involves taking an athlete in need of recovery and relaxing them, doing mobilizations, getting \ blood flow going via aerobic work, and finishing with an explosive movement or two. Magic.

What I like about keeping with the style Jamieson uses is that even with a typical recovery type session of stretching, athletes may feel better, but they are still not ready to do anything explosive. Or, you know, athletic. It’s like the recovery process isn't really complete so they would not be ready to go in and have a high quality practice. So adding in the explosive component at the end really gets them back as close to normal as we can. 

Some players that are seeing me individually will get a full session like this while the rest of the team comes in. Sometimes we are really pressed for time so we will do an abbreviated version. Either way the whole idea is to switch from that stressed out sympathetic state into a more relaxed and ready parasympathetic state where they focus on what’s going on in the moment. 

Really what that entails is giving them a whole bunch of mobilizations to try to attack the whole body. Generally we start with the feet, which is important for basketball players because of how restrictive the shoes are. Then we'll work on the ankle. Moving up the chain from there into the hips, t-spine, and shoulders. One or two mobilizations each area typically does the trick.

At this point we’ve relaxed into the parasympathetic state, and we have now mobilized the entire body. Then we'll go into some LIGHT blood flow work, which would be some type of aerobic activity. I'll generally break it up into five minute chunks, just to keep it from being too monotonous. We typically would do 2-4 round of 5 minute chunks, so we may get anywhere from 10 to 20 minutes of light aerobic activity. One important thing to note is that we typically stick to non-impact activities with these such as VersaClimber, bike, carries, and light throws. Remember these sessions are typically for when the players are fatigued or banged up, so less impact on their joints is a must. After the blood flow work the next series will typically be some kind of unilateral work and a carry. So for example we would do a sled push and a goblet carry. We use the sled push because it can be a little bit of strength work and it is concentric only, so it will be easier on them to recover from. 

After this blood flow work we move into the explosive part of the session, which we will talk about in part two of this article.

Since you’re here: We have a small favor to ask! At SAPT, we are committed to sharing quality information that is both entertaining and compelling to help build better athletes. Please take a moment to share the articles on social media, engage us authors with questions and comments below, and link to articles when appropriate if you have a blog or participate on forums of related topics.

Thank you! SAPT

Recovery Workouts: Good, Better, Best

Anyone who is focused on training hard to achieve specific goals through weight training, sport play, conditioning or a combination, is going to need to be smart about planning in some recovery sessions.

An appropriately planned recovery session will take a body (and mind) that may feel somewhere between achey to awful and leave it feeling markedly improved.

I like to use a recipe for good, better, best in terms of recommendations for these types of sessions.

***Oh, and it should be noted that for the scope of this post I'm only mentioning actual movement for recovery. Other components that must be considered are: sleep, nutrition, hydration, etc.

GOOD

Everyday chores can be a part of a "Good" recovery session... mopping is one of my favorites (I'm so serious).

Get out and move! Go for a walk, ride a bike, mow your lawn, take a yoga class, etc. This type of light activity will get blood moving and thus a little recovery for your body. This is an adequate option for people who are relatively new to exercise or who only train 1-2x/week but find themselves quite sore, lethargic, or achy in the following day or two.

BETTER

To be a little more precise, we want to take the body through some full range of motion activities. This helps stretch out the muscles and move the joints dynamically while also getting some light conditioning work.

Activities in the Better category could include a dynamic warm-up, followed by some light strengthening exercises, and finished off with 20-min or so of light aerobic work. This is appropriate for recreational lifters and athletes.

BEST

For the competitive athlete there is not much time to waste. The more advanced an athlete, the more it becomes necessary to find an experienced coach to help aid in every aspect of their physical preparation (and recovery!).

Daily training sessions mean recovering as quickly as possible is crucial to continued improvement and success. In the instances of professional athletes or those who like to train like them, you will want to get a very specific recovery plan tailored for you through the intense blocks of competition or preparation. This will generally include:

• soft tissue work via massage or SMR
• breathing drills
• dynamic stretching
• light prehabilitative work
• 20-30 min of HR zone aerobic work via a combination of traditional biking, jogging, etc and things like light medicine ball tosses, and calisthenic work
• explosive weight lifting movement (just a few sets and reps here, folks)

Using heart rate to efficiently manage either performance or recovery is the way to go for serious athletes. Here is a session that I conducted on myself. While this might not fit a usual "recovery" protocol, for me that's what this session was. You can see fairly even peaks and valleys staying within the zones I wanted to train that day.

This graph shows my heart rate variability during the same session shown above. You can clearly see the exactly inverse relationship that HRV has with HR through a training session by comparing both graphs.

When possible, Best recovery sessions should take place on a day when no other training is scheduled. However, for elite athletes who may be competing several times a week and practicing in between, a workout like this should be placed the morning after competition and before practice. It will require minimal energy and serve to wake the body up and reenergize it before practicing.

Any of the above options should to be tailored to fit the individual's needs, but these are the ingredients for a successful recovery!