(0:00) I’m Brian Kula, Kula Sports Performance. I operate a sports performance facility in Denver, Colorado. (0:07) We train athletes professional to youth across the state of Colorado.We work with some athletes (0:12) nationally, work some NFL, NHL, MLB youth athletes to increase their speed, their strength. We’re here (0:20) today to get Christian McCaffrey going for training camp. We’re going to take him through (0:24) a little bit of an explosive central nervous system workout today and get him ready to go (0:29) for training camp.My name is Ben Velasquez. I’m a sports physio. My background is in engineering (0:35) and sports performance.I would say that what I do is basically bridge the gap between injury (0:42) and being athletic ready or being game ready as they say. What I’m doing with Christian is focusing (0:49) on his specific warm-ups and specific recovery. So we break it down into units where he has to (0:57) do certain postures and certain performance drills prior to warm-up and then certain drills (1:02) after for recovery.So today we’re going to be warming him up with specific drills. (1:07) All right, ready roll. I’m in? Yep.Start with global. You want me to get a mat? Nah, it’s all right. Cool.(1:18) Check your head position, crisscross the arms. Good. Relax your shoulders a little more.Relax your traps. (1:27) Relax your jaw. Relax your abs.Flatten your lumbar spine. With your shoulders relaxed, raise your chest. (1:39) Good.Now tuck the chin a little more. Tailbone away. Eyes down.Good. Just exhale and start (1:51) with your right leg and left arm. Good.Just a gentle push. Start flowing through it. Bring it up.(2:02) Tailbone down and transition. Good. Bring it up.Low back flat. Perfect. Transition.(2:18) Good. Bring the right leg to the midline a little more. There.Bring it up slow. Exhale. (2:25) Transition.Good. Bring it up slow. Exhale.Good. Two rounds is good. (2:37) Good.There you go. Breathe. Straighten out the arm a little more.Bring it up slow. (2:46) Good. Last leg.Push the right arm a little straighter. Bring it up slow. Good.Bend the knee. (3:00) Come out. Very good.Sit up. Face stick front there. Put your feet on the ground.(3:10) Bend the knees just a little more. Just a little more. There you go.Come right up on the sit bones. (3:18) Rest your hands on your knees. Good.Relax your shoulders. Relax your traps. Raise the chest.(3:28) Good. Hold that. Tuck the chin.Just below the belly button. Start with your tailbone. Push (3:34) it to the ground.And then to the front. Boom. Belly button to the ground.Pushing my fingers. (3:42) Pushing my fingers. Pushing my fingers.And to the front. Release your hands a little bit. (3:47) Pushing my fingers.And to the front. Good. Again.Pushing my fingers. And to the front. (3:57) One more.Pushing my fingers. And to the front. Very good.Go standing. (4:06) Face that way. Put your right hand on the rack.There you go. Get a little closer to the rack. (4:14) Right foot nice and straight.Left hand on the hip. Bring this leg off the ground. (4:23) Lock your left knee completely.Look straight ahead. Downfield. Good.Pressure inside heel, (4:32) outside heel on the right. Now just lift up the big toe. Just the big toe.Lock the knee. (4:41) Really lock it. Good.Shift the pressure to your navicula. To me. Good.Shift the pressure (4:51) to your cuboid. Good. Now outside.Hold it. Now inside. Hold it.Lock the knee more. Outside. (5:05) Now inside.Start letting go of the rack. Outside. Now inside.Straighter. Outside. (5:16) Inside.Very good. Left foot. Lift the right leg up.Straight ahead. Lock the knee. (5:30) Pressure.Pressure. Big toe up. Just the big toe.Hold that. Lock the knee. (5:39) Pressure inside.Establish it. Pressure outside. Establish it.Lock the knee. Pressure inside. (5:52) Good.On this side think figure eight. Pressure outside. Pressure inside.Pressure outside. (6:02) You feel me? Yeah. Pressure inside.Lock the knee. Start letting go of the rack. Pressure outside.(6:09) Yes. Pressure inside. Lock the knee.Pressure outside. Very good. Switch legs.Keep your hand (6:19) on the rack now. Get a little bit more forward. Move forward a little bit.Sorry. Take the left (6:27) leg off. Look down field.Big toe up. Pressure. Pressure.Fixed. Unlock the knee. Tuck the tail.(6:42) Start letting go of the rack. Good. Hold that.Really tuck the tail. Cross the arms across the (6:50) chest. Tuck the tail.Good. Very good. Play with the knee.Shift it to the rack. Hold it there. (7:02) Shift it to my head.Tuck the tail. Shift it to the rack. Good.Shift it to my head. (7:13) Switch sides. You get where we’re going with this? Yeah, for sure.Good. Put this hand on your hip. (7:25) Really tuck the tail.Scoop it. Perfect. Tuck the chin a little more.Big toe up. Pressure inside. (7:33) Outside heel.Unlock the left knee. Tuck the tail more. There.Start letting go of the rack. (7:42) Good. Cross the arms across the chest.More. That’s it. More.Good. Breathing. (7:52) Good.Play with the knee. That’s it. More.Play with the knee to me. Good. Back to the rack.(8:02) To me. Very good. Relax.Put both feet down. Face me. Feet as wide as your hips.(8:10) Turn them in. Good. Bring the arms up above your shoulders.Chest up. Chin in. Look down.Feel. (8:24) Everything above here stays quiet. Tuck the tail.Untuck it. Tuck it. Untuck it.Tuck it. (8:39) Hold it. Translate.Neutral. Translate. Neutral.Translate. Neutral. Translate.Neutral. (8:55) Translate. Neutral.Translate. Neutral. Relax.Good. Go seated facing me. Come (9:06) right up on your sit bones.Cross your legs Buddha style. Good. Relax your (9:15) shoulders.Relax your traps. Relax your jaw. Good.Come right up on the sit bones (9:23) and interlock your fingers. Palms on your chest. Just your chest.Thoracic spine. (9:29) Up. Relax your traps.Yes. Just your chest. Better.Tuck the chin. Just your elbows. (9:40) Chest.Good. Chin in. Three reps to me.Don’t move the spine. One. Back to you.(9:47) Chest up higher. Push. Two.Relax your right shoulder. Push to me. Very good.(9:58) Back. Tuck the chin. Three.Close to your face. Chest up. Two.Tuck the chin on the (10:09) way down. There you go. One more.Three. Hold it up there. Three reps.Three. All (10:18) the way up. Chin in.Elbows back. Two. One.Very good. Hands and knees. Head here.(10:32) There you go. Separate the hands a little more. Separate the knees a little more.(10:37) Good. Put your apex right on the top of the floor. Good.Separate the hands a (10:45) little more. Go chin in more to me. More on top.More on top. Now elbows to me. Hold (10:56) them there.Chin in like you’re holding a piece of paper between your chin and (10:59) your chest. Pick a spot with your eyes. No rotation.No side bending. Chin away. (11:08) Chin in.Chin away from my finger. All the way. Good.Chin in. Chin away. Good.(11:18) Chin in. Give me more range now. Like you want to go to your nose.Go. Go. Go.Go. Go. (11:24) In.Chest to your neck. Go. Go.Go. Go. Go.Go. Go. In.Good. More chin away like you (11:33) want to go to your nose. Go.Go. Go. Go.Go. Go. Go.In. Good. Just side bending now.(11:39) Stay on top. Neutral. Neutral.Very good. Neutral. Do that side again.No rotation. (11:53) Better. Do that side again.Better. Now rotation. Just rotation.Good. Neutral. (12:05) Back to center.One more each side. Very good. On your belly.Go this way. Yep. Tuck the chin.(12:25) Put your arms at ten and two. Push your hips down. Tuck the chin more.There you go. Push (12:34) the fingertips away. Squeeze the shoulder blades tight.Squeeze them together. Keep them there. (12:42) Fifteen reps straight up.One. Two. A little higher.Four. Five. There you go.A little bit (12:50) higher. Very good. Sneakers on.Christian, we’ll do a couple of reps of overhead squat with no (13:28) weight. And then you snatch progression. Ben, explain proprioception.Proprioception is a (13:47) fancy word that means information. It’s the information. There’s information that’s ascending.(13:54) That means from the joints, the ligaments, up to the brain. And there’s information that’s (14:01) descending from the brain back down. They share information.Proprioception is the (14:07) information that comes subconsciously from the joints, the ligaments, from the fascia to the (14:15) brain at a very high speed. To give you an idea, pain, the difference between a pain signal and a (14:23) proprioceptive signal, proprioception is about 300,000 times faster. So it’s very important in (14:31) allowing the athlete to know on a very deep level where he is in space.Okay, let’s do a set of (14:39) squats with no weight, buddy. Just yourself. Set up your feet in your normal position.Good. Just (14:46) do three reps like a rhythm. Try to tuck the tail, abs tight.Good. Big toe up in the shoe. (14:56) That’s right.Chin in at the bottom. Now use your breath. That’s it.Just a couple more. Do two with (15:08) arms overhead now. Good.One more. Very good. Now you can grab the bar and go through your (15:17) snatch progression.I would start with like three reps of just high pull. Okay. Slow? You know what? (15:26) Do them fast but mirror it on the way down.You know how to mirror it? Yep. Okay. Good.Feel the (15:42) ground with your big toe at the top. See it? There you go. One more.Good. Take a second and just do (15:53) three overhead. Push on the bar like it’s really heavy.That’s it. Control. Good.Keep the bar. Do (16:15) three power snatch from the hang position from here. Just above your knee.Good. One more. Good.(16:41) Relax. We’ll do two more. You’ll be ready to go.How are we on time? Good? Hell yeah. We’re good. (16:49) Yep.Just a few seconds. Two more of those? Two more. Sets of three? From the ground or right (16:55) above the knee? From the ground.Okay. From the ground, the last set, finish full. Okay.Do one (17:01) more like that and then finish full. You’re ready to go. Then you can warm up with your weight, (17:08) wherever your weight you guys decided that’s gonna be.So above the knee for this one? Yeah. Above (17:13) the knee. When you mirror it, Christian.So this is me, right? I did a rep. Boom. Mirror it slow.(17:20) Keep it close to your face. Okay. Right down to the starting position.Really close on the way (17:27) down. That’s it. Real slow now.Two more. Good. One more.Good. Very good. One more set full.Ready (18:01) to go. How do you feel from yesterday? Good. Good.I feel pretty good. No, you look fast. Like spring.(18:10) Yeah, that’s what I was gonna say. I’m glad I didn’t lift yesterday. Glad we moved it.It looks (18:13) fast. We’ll roll. Yep.Now go full. Don’t think about it. Yeah, just go.Boom. Very good. Okay.Now (18:49) I’d warm up full all the way down. All the way down? Yep. How many? Three more? Wherever you’re (18:56) gonna start at.Maybe I would put a… Start at like 95? Or even lighter? Lighter. Yeah. Yeah.(19:03) Lighter. Tens on each side. Just do a couple full.Catching all the way. All the way down. Yep.(19:18) So now we’re jumping into this is first set of snatch. No, solo warm-up. Still warm-up.Where’s (19:33) his weight at today? Approximately. It’s a high-strength in this case, so keep it fast. So I’d say we’d probably start your first set at about 95 pounds.Yeah. 25. That makes sense.5 of 3. 5 of 3. And go off of that. And then vertical jump contrast in between. Okay.Oh, okay. Yeah. Okay.Good. So yeah, this is it. And we’ll go about 90 seconds recovery.Okay. About 30 seconds before the jump and then another minute before you lift again. (19:58) Perfect.This is your warm-up. 3? 3. Catch, full, fast, keep it tight. Fast.Good. How was that catch? It was pretty good. Fine.Yeah. Yeah. That’s why I’m looking from this angle.(20:30) Look good. Better. Looks good.It’s real good. It’s hard when it’s light to get down. This will look better because you’ll be able to catch it lower.(21:17) Okay. I got you. I got a stopwatch.You got a stopwatch? Yeah. You’re going to jump over here. Huh? You jump over here.You want to go up onto a box? You can if you want to. Yeah. I mean, we could go.Go high box jump? Yeah. Bring those over. 18.We’re probably going to need the 24. (21:43) Bring a 12. We’ll step it up per set.Where do you want to put it? Just right here. I’ll stand behind it. Okay.Perfect. (22:07) So Ben, explain the purpose of that warm-up based on the lift that we have now. Like, what is your, just what’s your take on? So, I mean, I know, but like why, why do all of that before you Olympic lift and before you get going? (22:20) So there’s a couple of rules of sports science, the warm-up and of therapy, of exercise alone.The warm-up should be as efficient and as short as possible. You want to warm up, get his heart rate up, get his respiratory rate up. In terms of what we did, we started with a general global movement.It’s called a global LDOA, kind of to work on all the kinetic chains and fix the spine. (22:46) And we did a lot of proprioception, as I explained before, and we did a little bit of activation based on what he was doing, which he was snatching, and he finished with a set of squats to kind of get globally everything warmed up. And then he’s going to warm up the specific exercise he’s doing first.But again, the second rule of thumb is the higher threshold the athlete is, the more they need to warm up, the better they need to focus on their warm-up. So if it’s a Ferrari, you need to warm it up like a Ferrari. (23:17) Ready? Three.(23:27) Position off the bottom. That’s it. Really good.Yeah. Good. Push all the way through your feet.Full hip extension. Good. (23:59) Okay, 30 seconds till we jump.Feel good? Yeah. Where do you want to go from there? Just incrementally up? Yeah. Throw a 10 on.Yeah. It’s five sets, so the second set we can. Maybe even five pound increases? Five, 10, 14, 20.(24:25) Okay. All right, here we go. Good? Yep.Good. How many here? Three. Same hinge movement.Hips back is forward. Good. Very good.Push into the ground with your feet, just like you’re doing on the snatch. That’s it. Good.(24:57) 30 seconds. Okay. (25:23) You see anything there, Ben? Pardon? You see anything there? Ah, no, that looked good.Yeah. And you know what? I agree it should go heavier. Yeah.It’s going to look better now. Yeah. Agreed.It was too light. Five sets. So we can get some pretty good weight on the bar.Yeah, he’s going to get better. (25:43) Okay, Bob, you’re up. Let’s be fast.Be fast. Good. Really good.Excellent. See? Am I swinging it at all? No, you’re straight up. Okay, good.Right up the body line. (26:30) Good. Really good.Christian, eyes up. Eyes up, yeah. That’s a good cue.Okay, you’re up. Here we go. Good.Good. Eyes up, push. Push to the ground.Excellent. (27:31) I love the contrast. Yeah.Yeah. Potentiate. We’ve made it almost a staple in our training.Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.You know, potentiation, get the explosive movement potentiated with the heavier movement. Also saves on some time, right, in your training sessions. (27:54) I’m going to go, sorry to interrupt, 135 here.Yep. Before the rest is up. (28:20) Oh, yeah.I got the wrong one. Sorry. (28:24) I got you.You’re up, Boba. Good to go? Yep. Let’s go.Be fast. Make sure you get a full extension with the heavier weight. Good.Really good. Awesome. See? (29:38) Move heavy weight fast.Yeah. Isn’t that a good way to get fast? He’s looking better with every set. Yeah.Let’s go high output. Even though this is the box height, let’s jump as if it was even higher. Okay.Big output. (30:01) You want to take a step into it on any of these or no? No. No.Let’s keep it static. Okay. Here we go.Come on. Good. Very good.Good. Ben, can you see better from over there? Is he hinging okay off the ground? (30:29) Yeah. No, it looks really good from this angle.Good. Yeah. It’s really good.Excellent. Where do you want to go? Ten? Five? What do you think? How’d it look? Felt good. I think you can go ten.I’d put a ten on there. Yeah. Mm-hmm.Good with ten. Mm-hmm. Yeah.You got two sets left, right? Yeah. Second to last. This is it.(30:56) Yeah. Just stay here. Last two sets.Are we five sets jumps too? Yeah. Yep. It’s 90 seconds or good.Good. Mm-hmm. (31:31) Good.Quick transition. Yeah. Very good.Quick transition under. Good. I see.(32:05) Good. Really good. One and three felt better than two.One and three? Yeah. Yeah. You had more tension at the start on one and three.Softer on two. It was just a little bit softer there. Yeah.And lift up your big toe on the right foot. Okay. Yeah.(32:27) Ten seconds. There we go. Good.Really good. Good boy. Use your arms.There you go. Good. Keep the weight there.You look better. Yeah. Keep it here.Yeah. What do you think? You want to keep it there? You want to go up? What do you think? (33:10) I would keep it there. Yeah.Keep it fast. You can go up, but no need. Keep it fast.No need. Because 90 seconds is going to be up pretty soon here. 90 goes fast, doesn’t it? You think it’s all 90 seconds.(33:31) No, it’s not. It’s not a lot. We had the jump in there, too.That’s right. That’s why. Yeah.Okay, stud. Here we go. Here you go.Don’t think about it. Just go. Good.Really good. Really good rep. (34:05) Lock in here.Be explosive. Good. I see.Come on. Big finish. Big finish.Tight. Tight at the start. Tight.There you go. Good. Boom.(34:25) Very good. That might have been your best rep. That’s pretty good.10 seconds. Let’s go. Big output.Engine go. Engine go. Good.Translate. Translate. Excellent.(35:12) Boom. Atta boy. Nice work.Good work. Get some water. Get some water.What’s he got now, coach? We got a push jerk or a split jerk and a pull up. Yeah. What number, Christian, do you think? I think 26.So 26 is good. Yeah. (35:36) You’re good there.That’s fine. That’s fine? Yeah. Insert 27.Yeah. There we go. Perfect.What, three minutes? Between exercises? Yeah. You could do, I mean, yeah. (36:03) How long do you think? A couple minutes is fine.Two or three minutes? Yeah. Get some water. Get some water.Get a snag of water. Yeah. (36:21) We’re starting a little bit lighter here.We got four sets of two. Contrasting with a pull up. So we got a vertical push.Vertical pull. Like 25, 95 is going to be too light. (36:46) Might be a little light for him.Yeah. He’s already. He’s already kind of going.Exactly. Yeah. We’ll go 25 and a 10.We’re going to start at 135. We’re going to start at like? I say we start at 135. Okay.Three sets. Four by three. Four by two.Four by two. Four by two with contrast and pull up. Okay.Keep it fast. Oh, 135. (37:23) Sure.Pull up. I know they could go right here. Yeah.Why don’t you just dump it now? I’ll pick it back up. How about I’ll put it back four by two here. Yeah.And then three pull ups. (37:45) I can even pull the bench out. We can do them inside.Okay. I’ll probably pull that for you. I got it.Thank you. The softest thing I do is not put on my own weights and not move all the other stuff around. It’s the softest thing I do.Keeps me in good shape though. It’s I know it’s wrong. I’m just not willing to change.(38:16) It saves time too. Saves time and energy. All right.Four by three here. Yes, sir. Let’s go.Good. How’s that? Look good. Yeah.Look good. First set. Fast.Yeah. Let’s keep it fast. That’s what you want.(39:01) Good boy. Good. How’s that feel? Good.Looks good. I like this grip because you feel the hole. Well, yeah, you stretch those pronators, which for you are always shortened.They’re always like this, right? Would you put on a 10 on? Okay. (39:29) Stay 90. What’s up? Stay 90.90 seconds. Perfect. Okay.Good. You’re good. Let’s keep it fast.Yeah. Hip extension. Better.A solid landing. Solid landing. Good.There you go. (40:13) Oh, I like it when he moves his feet. Mm hmm.Mm hmm. (40:26) Take a full 30 seconds before the pull up. Okay.Breathing heavy. (40:40) All right, here we go. Yep.That’s it. (40:56) Oh, good. (40:59) That a boy.(41:01) I like the pause at the bottom. Yeah, you can’t cheat it. Yeah, no, it’s good.What are you putting on coach? (41:09) Got two more, three more sets. No, two more sets. Maybe I’m going to end it like 185.So maybe we throw a five on it. Keep it fast. Yep.(41:22) Just be smart when you drop. Yeah. See what I was saying though about trying not to wiggle on the stance.The first one was. Yeah, bury it, stabilize and then come back down. Mm hmm.(41:37) Still got 30 seconds. (41:46) All right, big guy, let’s go. (42:08) Good.Very good. That’s it. (42:13) Good.(42:15) So good. (42:17) You’re better as the weight gets heavier. (42:48) Still got 40 seconds.Relax. You can get off your feet if you want. Pull ups? Mm hmm.Oh yeah, pull ups you can go now. (43:01) That’s it. (43:05) Come on.(43:08) Good. Okay. Looks good.Yeah. (43:28) My nervous system is pumping. Yeah.(43:35) We finish it off tomorrow. Mm hmm. Okay, here we go.(43:57) Rip. Let’s go. Rip.(44:04) Good. (44:09) Excellent. (44:16) Good set Bob.Yep. (44:19) I got to just plant that thing. Yeah.The first one. Eliminate that wobble. Just be strong here.Yep. And not get here. Right.Stay forward. (44:32) Like what Ben was saying, it starts in your core, like with your hips and your core set, then everything else falls into place. (44:43) Okay, pull ups.Let’s go. Strong upper back. (44:54) Good.(44:58) More. Come on. (45:00) That’s it.Good. (45:07) Okay. Get some water.Take a load off. (45:09) What’s the total timeout right now? It’s one. (45:14) What do we have next? ISO hold hamstring with a landmine curtsy squat.Three sets? Okay, focused on eccentric. Three sets? Three sets. Just three.Perfect. Low volume. Perfect.Okay. (45:32) So we’ll be here. We’ll be leaning in on this right leg.Okay. To here. Back up all the way into the eight position.Staying here. Yep. Just right here.(45:46) We’ll go lightweight to start. Let’s get you measured up here on this. I think it’s good.Is that to lay out all the way? Yeah. I think it’s got to be back a little bit. (46:00) Maybe.(46:05) Good ball. (46:35) I don’t know on this platform where the best place to stand is probably. I’ll go here and I’ll go off the platform for the set.Okay. (46:40) Okay. (46:43) So the focus is going to be on the eccentric.Okay. A little bit of a drop catch. So a little faster on the way down.Catching at the bottom. Focus on that deceleration eccentric movement. (46:54) You can hold it double underhand.It’s a little easier leaning into it. Yep. Three on each side.Let’s go down a little faster. Catch. Now back up to the eight position.(47:06) Boom. Perfect. (47:10) Good.(47:14) Drop into it. Boom. Good.And A. There it is. Good. (47:24) A. Very good.That’s it. (47:25) Good. (47:42) Go double leg and just let me measure you up here.Go full extension. Yep. Let me pull you up just a little bit.There we go. (47:54) Here? Yep. Then you’re going to pull one leg.Okay. And here we go. Give me eight.(48:05) Good. (48:08) There we go. (48:18) Good.(48:26) His garage is open. (48:29) To let the heat in, I guess. (48:31) You need one of those big ass fans.Have you seen those? (48:34) Well, I got nice AC in here. (48:36) You know. (48:39) Let’s keep the weight here.And on this set, I want to focus on a little faster eccentric. Okay. So you’re kind of more like catching.Then you’re coming up and the concentric movement can be slow and easy. Okay. (48:56) Just three sets.90 seconds. We’re up. Here we go.(49:08) Good. Perfect. That’s it.Excellent. (49:13) Good. Let’s see.(49:27) Very good. That’s it. (49:35) Okay.Let’s modify the reps here to six and be a little more explosive. And you’re letting your upper body sag just a little bit. I want you to be really engaged with that glute hamstring.(49:57) Five seconds. (50:07) Okay. Up.A little higher. Right there. Engage.Go. (50:16) Excellent. (50:23) Engage.(50:27) Good work. (50:33) One more set. (50:54) Not getting our bangers in today, are we? (50:55) What’s up? (50:56) Not getting the bangers in today, are we? (50:57) No music.That’s odd. You don’t play with music. (51:02) It’s like miners out here working in the dark.(51:07) One of those Russian dudes. He’s like, I lift underneath the stadium by myself. No one else.He’s like, so when I go to competition, my adrenaline spikes. (51:18) You’re up. Here we go.(51:24) Good. (51:28) Good. (51:31) Excellent.(51:35) So good. (51:44) Very good. (51:46) Looks like your ankles and knees are moving so well.(51:53) And the range looks good. (51:55) Yeah. Really good.(52:04) Good. (52:04) Coach, you want them parallel on this drill? (52:07) I do. I do.(52:08) Tuck your chin. (52:10) Okay. (52:10) And push through the pad like you’re stepping on a gas tank.On a gas pedal. (52:17) Like step on the gas pedal with your big toe. (52:19) Okay.(52:20) On every rep. Fire that plantar flexion. Fire it.Now tuck your chin. Now go. (52:29) Fire it.(52:33) Good. (52:48) Good work. (52:51) You’re a little rounder ball there, huh? (52:53) I know.It’s bouncy. (52:54) It’s all right. (52:55) Good work.(52:56) Good work.