A common question we get is How To Train Athletes Who Are Never Truly Off-season? Here is Part III of this series. The Answer: add volume with micro-dosing and movement snacks. Karsten will dig deeper into this concept in this blog.
Reference Part II and Part I of this series if you haven’t yet read them.
I became familiar with micro-dosing in the 1980s. Norwegian coaches instructed their youth cross-country skiers to do dips on a school fence during recess.
Later, some of the badminton players I worked with told me they saw Chinese players who practiced their defensive movements with tennis racquets while watching their teammates play.
My best direct experience with micro-dosing was with a professional table tennis player who was a bronze medalist in Athens in 2004.
His table tennis practice exceeded 10 hours per week, 11 months of the year. Additionally, he participated in team matches or individual tournaments once or twice in most weeks. He maintained the strength and endurance of key stabilizers and antagonists with 5-10 minute sessions at the end of his table tennis practices throughout the 11- month season.
Even if they are not short of time, many athletes want to practice as much and as often as possible. Micro-dosing is a powerful tool, especially when there is no additional room or energy for full-scale strength and conditioning practices. It’s a logical and efficient approach that can be harnessed to its full potential.
What is Micro-Dosing?
The dictionary defines a micro-dose as “a very small amount of a drug used to test or benefit from its physiological action while minimizing undesirable side effects.”
Thus, micro-dosing is fundamentally about planning and executing the minimal volume of training that improves or maintains a specific capacity, for example, hamstring strength, while minimizing fatigue.
Coaches can space the minimal training dose into shorter, more frequent sessions. Such a structure is considered a distributed practice. (1)
Three steps to plan micro-dosing in a distributed practice format:
1-Identify movements or muscle groups for micro-sessions:
The sport-specific stabilizers and antagonists are the prime candidates for micro-sessions in training athletes who are never truly off-season. (See Part II in this series)
2-Identify times during the day or week for micro-sessions:
There are no strict guidelines for the time range that constitutes a micro-dosing.
Look for 3-10 minute time-pockets. Look at time pockets where the micro-session can be stacked upon another activity so that the micro-dose does not add another item to the athlete’s to-do list.
Examples:
- The warm-up for sports practices
- At the end of sports practices of games
- Any waiting time during the day
Somewhat similar to micro-dosing is “Movement snacks” which take many forms: (1) For example, carrying a backpack on the back promotes scapula protraction. This posture is often associated with shoulder injury. In contrast, carrying a bag on the front of the body promotes scapula retraction.
3-Suggest specific programs:
A micro-session is an entire session in miniature. Thus, it has a warm-up, a main part, and a cool-down.
Eccentric quasi-isometric contractions with a relatively low load work well as a micro-session:
The athlete holds a chosen position to isometric failure and maximally resists the subsequent eccentric phase. (2)
The isometric contraction acts as a warm-up. Subsequently, the eccentric phase challenges the athlete.
For example, the athlete starts in a half squat, with approximately 90 degrees of flexion in the knee joint. As the athlete fatigues, they maximally resist the eccentric contraction into the full squat.
When prescribed at long muscle lengths, EQIs increase muscle thickness, fascicle length, tendon stiffness and elasticity health and improve flexibility. (2)
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Author: Karsten Jensen
Karsten Jensen, MSc Exercise Physiology, a renowned figure in the field, has been assisting world-class and Olympic athletes from 27 different sports since 1993.
His track record includes athletes who have clinched Olympic medals, European and World Championships, and ATP Tournaments. Karsten is the pioneer of The Flexible Periodization Method, a comprehensive system of periodization that allows for adaptability and customization based on individual athletes’ needs and goals. He works closely with busy coaches, offering his expertise to optimize their periodization and program design
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References
1. Afonso J, Nakamura FY, Baptista I, Rendeiro-Pinho G, Brito J, Figueiredo P (2022)
Microdosing: Old Wine in a New Bottle? Current State of Affairs and Future Avenues.
International Journal of Sports Physiology and Performance. 17, 1649-1652.
https://doi.org/10.1123/ijspp.2022-0291
2. Oranchuk DJ, Storey AG, Nelson AR and Cronin JB (2019) Scientific Basis for Eccentric
Quasi-Isometric Resistance Training: A Narrative Review. Journal of Strength And
Conditioning Research. 33(10):2846-2859. doi: 10.1519/JSC.0000000000003291