NFL Strength Coach Debunks Everything (mind blowing) 

I once asked my high school wrestling coach: “What’s the best exercise for wrestling.” He said: “Wrestling.” Spot on😃

I was Mark’s intern in Jacksonville. His understanding of all the requisite sub-components of this profession, along with his ability to coach/teach both trainees as well as other professionals make him so invaluable to this field. I’m glad to see an updated interview out there. Thanks for doing this.

Great video, glad to see you guys covering this stuff.

Jay and Coach, great interview and discussion again. I took a class from coach at The Citadel. He is a first class teacher and gentleman. I hope you two will continue to have these discussions for us again in the future. Outstanding!!

I listened to Mark speak in Atlantic City about 10 years ago or so. Very informative lecture, and very practical. Nice to hear him again on this channel. Kept me engaged the whole hour and a half. I stumbled upon this channel accidentally, I'll be back.

Was a great interview!! Thanks Jay and Mark

Great conversation with one of the best. Thanks for having Mark on the program. I’ll see him in March at the annual REC CONFERENCE in Minneapolis.

trained my son in motocross. The largest gain was not the strenght he gained from training but the confidence he gained. It allowed him feel confident in himself when lined up at start gate. you cannot think consciously your reactions are slow. Subconscious is where your reaction has to come from, threw practice of repetition.

Great interview, thanks for sharing. Subscribed.

1st video of your channel I've seen and Good Gracious, How informative it was. Mark is ahead of his time. I agree with him 100%.

Thank you for the interview.

Great podcast excellent information. Thank you. !

You’re right, you are absolutely right it’s just somebody trying to come up with their own version of being able to go and make money at a high-level by telling a professional athlete what he needs to do which I totally disagree all comes down to mechanics and just going through the motions it’s almost like a dance to be fluid and flow the right way you go through the motions very slowly and then with repetitive action you increase the speed to where you want it to be. I’m so excited I’ve run across this channel.

Love this guy! Great chat with him.

Great show...I' subscribed. Thank you.

Thanx! Appreciate this interview.

This was great. Thanks, Mark!

Awesome interview Jay. I didn’t think Olympic Lifts really transferred. This video was very helpful for me. Especially, the core exercise part.

Much respect for the work you do. Super impressed.

Very interesting and informative this all makes sense when explained by mark and jay I just don’t understand why more are not onboard with this science has proved it is safer and better but a lot in the industry have blinders on and don’t want to know

Great talk guys! I wish he talked about how many exercises for body part in a workout, frequency, what’s too short or too long as frequency goes. He was about to and you got sidetracked.

Gentlemen, thank you for the in depth discussion. Unfortunately you have fallen victim to severe confirmation bias. On one hand you say we should not listen to a guy because he has a PhD (while showing goofball PhDs doing silly exercises, implying that PhDs are useless)...... but then cite research studies done by PhDs that support your beliefs. You are not reviewing the research, you are selecting the studies that agree with your claims. As someone who comes from the scientific world- If you want to appear as a science based channel, you must cite all the variables and the strongest studies on both sides of the argument. example for your topic here: How do you build the ideal body size for your sport while increasing explosive power? Considerations: Must assess age, genetics, gender, and sport of the athletes. Does the athlete need more speed, more strength, or more size?... What PEDs are the athletes taking? What stage are they at with their physique development? These are just a few variables to consider before designing a program. The very question of "what is the best program for athletes?" is flawed from the start as it does not specify the variables involved. This is the problem with RU-vid- the audience wants the fast food version of training. If you want to learn about how to train average athletes you do not look at what NFL teams are doing as their job is to do everything possible to avoid injuries. This is correct when you are dealing with the most talented athletes in America (who are all heavily geared up.) To learn about athletic power & speed development (for average humans), you must study biomechanics, physiology, and the equations of power (which you mention). You will learn that too much HIT training makes the average CLEAN athlete slower due to the longer time under tension. Average athletes do not have as much fast twitch muscle and thus respond negatively to long duration TUT. A guy with NFL talent on heavy gear can basically do anything and still dominate (you used Warren Sapp as a good example). To compare these guys to average athletes is just silly. Also, Olympic lifting is not dangerous. (Check out the University of North Dakota Football Olympic lifting program- amazing coaches there). In fact elite Olympic lifters have some of the lowest rate of injuries. Really what you are saying is that O-lifting is dangerous if you don't know how to coach it (which is true). Football guys struggle with the overhead work due to shoulder issues. This is why they stick with power cleans which is the best weight training exercise for explosive power (if you are good at Math, you can calculate this using the equations for relative body power / watts per kilogram of body weight). For part 2 of this discussion- Bring on an intelligent researcher for HIT training and another researcher who works on explosive power training. Let them battle it out. Think they will tell you training athletes on gear is dramatically different than training clean athletes. Also, they will discuss the size principle of motor unit recruitment. If you avoid explosive work, you will not be able to lower the threshold of and or optimally recruit the largest motor units (on demand in high power scenarios like cutting, starts, jumping etc). The physiology of this is very complicated and thus warrants an entire discussion. Thanks again to you and Mark. Hope these suggestions help to organize the next discussion.

Awesome interview Jay!

Awesome interview!

Jay and some future podcast go over" Grip strength" how to do it and how important it is !!! PS.. interview was just off the planet huge formation👍👍👍👍❗

This was awesome and not what I expected.. never judge a book by it's cover. Great content!

Great video, wise coach. It scares me how many people are so clueless and claim to be experts. Personally Im not expert but its not that hard to see through the bullshit nowdays.

Good show and a great guest thanks

Great interview! It's cool to know he trained Mike Alstott with HIT Training. Alstott looked like an athletic bodybuilder bulldozing opponents.

I think the genius of h i t training especially with the rep Cadence Jay promotes, is the elimination of injury potential, and the strengthening of bone and connective tissues. I'm way more interested in longevity than impressing people with Goofy workouts that have no real world translation to better performance

This interview was incredible!

Mark is a wealth of knowledge, at 66 years old have found out the hard way on what is good for you long term and what will leave you worse off. Man is smart listen to him.

Hey this guy is the real deal! I never felt a workout that intense for Jay's Pegram before I definitely felt the burn 👍

thanks Jay and Mark

This is such an interesting subject. As an Fyi, The Nautilus system of HITT machines from the 70's/80's were a set of machines that Arthur Jones invented were used by the Miami Dolphins in '72 during their perfect season,

Jay, I can see through your genius plan - you want to get involved in a football team, make it win and become a legend

jays reaction to Marks mention, that Tom Brady was training with HIT principles is hilarious :D

I had motor learning/development…maybe 3-4 courses and didn’t know how to use “transfer” most of that info to real life. Helped me more working with my autistic son but they didn’t do a very good job of connecting motor learning or biomechanics to training or rehab…

Mark and Jay are brilliant! It seems some people just simply love wasting time in the gym.

Jay, dude please think about adding timecard to your video posts. Big fan of your work.

good pod bro

..excellent discussion. i also thought of hurts..

I have to admit you were right, this is an amazing video.

Re: injuries in HITT training. It depends what kind of exercises you are doing and your age. I did Cross Fit for 18 months as a Very fit 55 year old and I did have joint issues just from all the strenuous Olympic lifts you did along with other high intensity body weight exercises. As A.J. Foyt once said about racing engines: There is only so much HP per hour any engine can withstand. I was in near world class shape and looked fantastic, but after 18 months I had to quit to save my body.

This was a great interview! I'll be sharing this with a former pro quarterback I met at the gym, who's currently an offensive football coach at a local university. If he likes what he hears, perhaps he'll share it with his strength coach too. By the way, the only question I wish Jay would have asked is how many exercises per muscle group Mark used with his athletes, with the one set to positive failure protocol. I personally get great results using two exercises for each muscle group, but believe one set likely would work just as good. Thanks for the great content, Jay!

Jay you know I love HIT but would want to know what you’d say about Basketball players and how the skill acquisition for that sport transfers so well to other sports? I’ve coached kids who’ve never played a sport like football in their lives but can often walk right on the field and play if they’re b-ball players.

WRT the question at 20:50, one good general overview is the book "If You Like Exercise Chances Are You’re Doing It Wrong" by Gary Bannister.

I would love for you to sit down and have a discussion with Garage Strength GS and Knees Over Toes KOT…. GS is big on Olympic lifting movements, power movements and KOT is about the increased pressures of a joint builds stronger joints and everything that supports this. The KOT specifically calls out increased performance through his training. You also mentioned injuries may have started in the weight room ….then you say weightlifting builds stronger bones, tendons and ligaments, so why wouldn’t Olympic and power movements do just that, build back stronger?

Can you please show me where to find more information about the High Intensity Training that Mark uses? I'm a strength coach and want to understand more about why he doesn't like Olympic lifting and what exercises he does use. Thanks.

I was an athlete myself on 5 foot eight. I boxed in the heavyweight division at 200 pounds. I was very muscular and I could run like a deer at 5 foot eight I could stand under the rim and jump up and grab it with both hands and hang there on a 10 foot rim, 1988 I got edged out for the all New England that fight would’ve sent me to Nebraska for the Olympic trials

The biggest issue I have with this is he's talking about strength and conditioning for athletes who've already developed their S&C program at a high level for about a solid decade. So no shit it's less important to have them do hard strength and power training when they've already got that as a background. You don't do professional athlete's routines without their background and needs.

As a life long physical training devotee and “weekend warrior”, and about to close out a 29 year career as a firefighter paramedic, at 67, … the pictures of those crazy movements were terrifying. That individual not only embarrasses education but physical training as well. Re the whole idea of transfer…I have, and this is anecdotal, never experienced transfer in the strict meaning of that term. What I have experienced is the ability to learn and relearn different physical skills more quickly due to my level of physical fitness and ok awareness of where my joints are in space as i perform a movement. For example I have never noted an improvement in my deadlift that could be connected with kettlebell swings, nor vice versa. Overall physical conditioning coupled with specific skills acquistion seems to be the optimal protocol.

I agree there isn't enough emphasis on the important metric of injury; therein volume should be carefully administered (along with mode). I would advise caution with correlation and causation with the weight room and injury. Please don't lump all PhDs in with Steedman, as a PhD in Ex Phys he doesn't represent the majority of the "educated". Good talk on blood flow, specificity of training foolishness, genetics...my own philosophy of training has changed over the years as I continue to see young people crushed in high school weight rooms and as a former Oly-style weightlifting coach. These young athletes could see improvements in performance and most importantly stay health with the ole full body 1x20 training (HIT). A great interview, loved the talk on 'core'; I have been dispelling that crap for years! Just keep in mind that the type of training does influence how the muscle adapts: sacroplasmic vs myofibrillar hypertrophy, HIT likely plays to sacroplasmic hypertrophy... great talk on recovery; people major in the minors. Thank you for the interview Coach!

The similarities between this subject and diet is interesting. Mainstream narratives about diet are so completely off base, and the realities of a proper diet are wholly controversial. The evidence is crystal clear though.

I believe Coach Marks advice on rep speed number of exercises performed and frequency are different than Jay's or Drew's recommended. Correct me if I'm wrong

I bailed after 5 minutes. No time to listen to an hour and a half of rambling, to try to get one or two helpful points.

I just started watching this... about a month and a half ago at 47 years old I pulled the biggest deadlift of my life. Granted I haven't try to deadlift anything since high school. I was a rock climber a surfer I fought in the cage. But 650 apparently is good for an old man even in the NFL. So let's see I'll start watching

Steve Wetzel with the Vikings used HIT as well; around 1998.

It is not the weight room that injures the athletes, it is the program design that cause injuries. You don't rehab in the weight room, you rehab in the training room. It is up to the strength coach and the athletic trainer to return an injured athlete back to the field in pre-injury form. They do not need to change their weight room...they need to change their program design.

I know it's not your demographic, but what do you think of Dr Sullivan's Greysteel channel? He bases it on Starting Strength with intensity over volume, and suggests intensive cardio such as prowlers as an adjunct.

Well said Mark. 100%

Hey Jay Vincent what’s your thoughts on “Knees over toes Guy” program?

I think that a lot of commenters are missing the basic point this strength coach is making. There is no need to weight train football players like Olympic power lifters or bodybuilders, especially after a certain age or experience level. And the myth that maximum strength equals maximum speed and power has been around far too long.

Please have Mark on more. His wisdom never stops pouring out. He needs a voice in the world today and you could help him.

I'll add one more thing after watching further. There are plenty of studies, most that I have seen, that show favorable adaptations to performance by intervention with accommodated resistance. This is in response to the annoyance you show at the chains in the racks. Accommodated resistance has enough research for you to not try to discount it, if we are going to stick to evidence based approaches to training.

Glad to hear olympic lifts don't really translate well. Especially when I wanna hit and kick harder. The striking specific training is tough enough, without learning such technical and demanding lifts. I did not notice much improvement after doing them for a year. The basic compound lifts are enough and more feasible IMO.

Would like to here what he thinks about Herschel Walker. His program is all bodyweight even when he played in the NFL. Also his diet in college was 6 to 7 Snicker Bars at night. He eats one meal a day in the evening and almost no meat.

When he speaks of high-intensity training protocols, exactly what is he referring to? Is he referring to HIIT Training?

I was a personal trainer for years in the late 90s early 2000s and I taught one set to failure, less is more and I got the same reaction from the other trainers and managers.

@goldenera I don’t understand. I listen to the 1h30 interview and Still don’t know how you would train. Except of saying Intense, the whole video was bashing other methods through historybut not teaching us how. Can you please tell me where to look ?

would you recommend lunges and bulgarian squat ?

Is there a book about this training method? Does it apply to the general population for overall fitness or is it just pro athlete specific?

I'm a wrestler. This video helps.

So everyone is doing it wrong but did he ever say what he does or recommends

SO GET TO POINT how should you train what is recommendation

What was the neck strength tester called?

The unbalanced load (barbell rows) reminds me of an old school saying, “trying to be too cute”.

I think the interview would have been better pointing out the old way good and bad points and what exercises are causing damage vs what is better.

What headphones do you use? ❔

When I was in high school I ran a 5 second 40 at 155lbs. At 32 I ran a 4.5 40 from my belly at 225 pounds. So keep sprinting, strength does help speed. And yes, back then I was already doing HIT for couple of years. I performed this while I was in a Federal Agency Academy and have documented proof by way of certificate rewarding me because I broke the academy record at the time.

Clowney (I believe is pictured in one of the Joel Seedman posts) had an off year in 2022 - probably a coincidence though.

How many times a week are you supposed to do HIT? Also, if Olympic lifts, bodybuilding, and powerlifting workouts are not recommended, what sort of workouts are you supposed to do while doing HIT?

Top NCAA Football teams, like the University of Michigan, players enter the locker room after practices by walking through an cold/ice plunge. These players use cold/ice plunges on a very regular basis, but there is evidence that this masks initial signs of an injury by reducing inflammation and masking pain while also limiting the benefits of the adaptation phase during heavy lifting/training cycles. Are NFL Teams using cold/ice plunge baths as often?

It is absurd to talk about NFL training without highlighting the use of PEDs. Also, in the NFL you are dealing with the most naturally fast athletes in America (most on heavy gear). Once they reach the NFL the emphasis shifts to injury prevention. If you don't teach explosive strength/ sprint work / plyometrics to average athletes they have little chance of making large improvements in athletic power.

Can anyone recommend good exercises based off this discussion?

Interesting discussion - Thanks for doing it! Mark says around 12:30 that there is no evidence of increasing strength and performance. If you look at throwers in the hammer or shot put (track and field) you have to incline press over 350 to have any kind of shot at reaching the podium if not more. In Bobsled, you need to be able to squat at least 440 pounds in order to make the team because you won't be strong enough to overcome inertia to push the sled. There are physical attributes in most sports (including football) that are needed to be achieved in order to at least compete. Those physical attributes especially strength is what Mark has spent is whole professional life trying to help his athletes achieve, so I am not sure what he is saying here.

HIT is the future. I've been doing it for a few years now with great results with minimal time in the gym.

Love the shit talk on Lincoln, Nebraska. GBR

If progressive overload is the main driver of strength, how does HIT approach stalling? What if you stall at a certain rep / weight?

Visual processing for QB's must be important.

Does more running and flexibility training, lead to less injuries...

Forgive my ignorance. But what is “high intensity training?” I assume it is with lighter weights, but there must be more to it.

I would say this is a way bigger issue in youth sports/high school age athletes.

So I guessing hiit training with isometrics?

Basketball in the 80s saw a much more muscular player than previously. Do you think it helped players compete and perform better?

Aside from football, would this program benefit martial arts and boxing?

Great topic. Science, bro-science, genetics. With all of the money spent on sports, it is embarrassing how poor we are at properly training athletes. I don’t think it needs to be so complicated. The SAID principle is the best: want to get better at an event, train that event and rest. Strength train as an adjunct. Also, I am no expert, but it seems to me that training to failure has its own risks. In my own experience, I have made good strength gains stopping well before failure.

What the deal with Bucs wideouts having repetitive hamstring injuries they fight through all year? Namely Chris Godwin and especially Mike Evans (every year)

Never confuse schooling with education and always scrutinize those who do.

According to him Olympic weightlifting doesn't increase speed and power correct. Well how come Olympic weightlifting are very fast when they lift weights and can jump very high. 😂😂