Max Strength Before Power

Power is what wins games.

Strength is what gives you something to win with.

In 2019 I wrote: max strength is important, but power is what wins games. I still believe it. But people hear power wins and go straight to the fast work: jumps, throws, light bars moved quickly. They skip the part that makes any of it possible. Power is built on strength.

What power actually is

Strength is how much force you can produce. Power is how much of that force you can produce in a short time. An athlete with a small strength base has a low ceiling, and every power session is spent bumping against it.

Raise the ceiling first. Then teach the body to reach it fast.

What the base gives you

More force to draw on. The fast work has something to work with.

Protection. Jumps, landings and sprints load the body hard. Tendons and joints need a base before anything explosive is added, and that base is built with heavy, controlled work.

Faster to force. A stronger athlete produces force earlier in the movement, which is exactly what power training is trying to build.

What before means

This is where coaches argue. Before does not mean a beginner is banned from jumping or moving fast. Children sprint and jump before they have ever seen a barbell, and they should. Before means priority. Early in a programme, strength is the main work and speed is kept alive on the side. Later the balance shifts, and power becomes the main work with strength kept alive on the side.

Strength never leaves the programme. It moves from the front to the back.

The mistake I see most

Someone arrives wanting to be explosive. They get jumps and medicine ball throws, and for a few weeks they improve, because anything new works. Then it stops. Their strength has not changed, so their power has nowhere to go. They are not failing. They are capped.

This is not an athlete rule. It is a human rule. The desk worker who wants to move like an athlete at 40 follows the same order as the sprinter: technique, then strength, then speed on top of strength.

You cannot be explosive with force you have not built.