424: Rick Franzblau on Strength Mechanics for Athletic Optimization

This week’s guest is Rick Franzblau, Assistant AD for Olympic Sports Performance at Clemson University. Rick has a tremendous understanding of athletic movement, both from the technology and biomechanical aspects of the human movement equation. He has worked with a wide variety of sports and athletic movement patterns and has a unique understanding of the specific demands sport requires. Sport performance has been anchored in strength training via barbells or dumbells since its inception. The addition of needed muscle mass, power production, and slow-speed injury resiliency is a key aspect of improved performance. At the same time, each added modality to the sport movement equation has a trade-off to it. Where heavy squats, presses, and deadlifts improve one’s general force production capabilities, they have the trade-off of various skeletal restrictions and compensations that may not be in an athlete’s best interest at some point. On the show today, Rick speaks on biomechanical concepts, such as skeletal compression, orientation, reciprocal motion, and pressure dynamics, and how they relate to what he sees in their on-field performance. He then goes into training concepts related to squatting, Olympic lifting, waterbag training, and more, and how strength means can become an ideal fit for an athlete’s structure and needs in their sport movement mechanics. Today’s episode is brought to you by TeamBuildr’s Gym Studio and Athletic Development Games. Use the code “justfly25” for 25% off of any Lila Exogen wearable resistance training, including the popular Exogen Calf Sleeves. For this offer, head to: Lilateam.com TeamBuildr is an online software for coaches and trainers. Use the code “JUSTFLY” for a free 30-day trial of the TeamBuildr software. For a Gym Studio 14-day free trial, head to gymstudio.com View more podcast episodes at the podcast homepage. Main Points 4:35- Sport-Specific Structural Attributes in Athletes 11:03- Tailoring Sprint Variations for Optimal Performance 20:16- Enhancing Athletic Performance through Internal Rotation 24:39- Optimizing Athletic Performance through Body Mechanics 38:05- Enhancing Athlete Performance with Water Resistance 48:44- Enhancing Performance Through Relative Motion Training 57:47- Anterior Pelvic Orientation Impact on Athletes 1:03:16- Pelvic Pressure and Box Squat Performance 1:06:54- Late Bias Development in Single Leg Position 1:13:57- Targeting Weaknesses for Effective Strength Training 1:16:18- Pelvic Pressurization for Enhanced Weightlifting Performance 1:17:26- Seated Squat Jump for Targeted Strength Quotes (8:50) "There are no solutions. There are only trade offs."(Bill Hartman) - Rick Franzblau (19:31) "It's just understanding, like, there can be more low-hanging fruit in terms of trying to achieve a shape that will help you either with power production or distributing load a little bit more evenly." - Rick Franzblau (33:56) "That is something to be careful of, too. Is like, oftentimes people look at the example of the best in the world and the adaptations that they developed, but the other million people that try to do it that way, they broke along the way in the process." - Rick Franzblau (38:24) "Player development is not matching the hardware with the software." - Rick Franzblau (52:38) "Everything is just kind of dumping forward because of the shapes that they've created." - Rick Franzblau (1:00:39) “So because they're not going to have the ability to descend that anterior (pelvic) outlet. So you work foam, rolling techniques, stuff like that, to reduce some of the areas of the muscle, the muscles that are holding the anterior orientation. If it's bow legged representation, you may have to, you know, be very specific of that in terms of undoing some of the muscle tensions and all that. But then eventually you may be working to like a. A really high box squat at first. That may just be like a goblet hold or something like that” (1:01:27) "You got to have the strategies in place to understand, like, you know, is this a limiting factor or is this a potential threat down the road? If so, how am I going to intervene? And to what degree?" - Rick Franzblau" (1:11:30) “Where a lot (narrow ISA’s) do great if you put them on blocks of, and you kind of work above the knee, like, in second pull position is like, actually, that'll work really well in terms of them, like, capturing an outlet position and pressurizing correctly” (01:16:21) "I try and hold on and muscle that second pull for too long is, you know, I'm probably not using the best strategies to pressurize that pelvis and all that. So if I can actually drop back under on weight is like, I've, I've, you know, I've solved some, some good, um, you know, issues and adaptation for some of these narrow athletes." - Rick Franzblau About Rick Franzblau Rick Franzblau is the director of Olympic sports strength and conditioning at Clemson. He is responsible for the supervision of the assistant strength coaches, graduate assistants, and volunteer interns. Franzblau oversees the strength and conditioning for all 14 of the Olympic Sports that train in the Jervey weight room. He is directly responsible for the strength and conditioning efforts of the baseball, men’s soccer, and track and field teams. Prior to becoming an assistant coach, Franzblau worked as a graduate assistant at Clemson, where he worked with football and Olympic sports. During his time at Clemson, Franzblau has worked with 10 ACC champion track and field squads. He has also worked with 8 individual NCAA champions and 7 Olympians in track and field. In 2013, he worked with Brianna Rollins, who set the American record in the 100-meter hurdles. In 2015, Franzblau worked with Matthew Crownover, the ACC pitcher of the year, who was also one of 4 Clemson baseball players drafted in the first 6 rounds of the MLB draft. Franzblau also worked with golfers Ben Martin and Corbin Mills, who participated in the prestigious Masters’ tournament while still competing at Clemson. In 2014, Franzblau also assisted with the ACC champion men’s soccer team. Franzblau graduated from Colgate University in 2006 with a degree in history. At Colgate, Franzblau spent 3 years as a student assistant strength coach after his football career was cut short due to injuries. He is a certified strength and conditioning specialist through the NSCA and also holds the SCCC certification through the CSCCA organization. Franzblau has also taken the Myokinematic Restoration, Postural Respiration, and Impingement and Instability courses through the Postural Restoration Institute.