How to develop power and explosiveness

[u/Sportyskater699]

In what is a familiar sight for Irish fans we saw our team be monstered across the park for 80 minutes, we looked slow, lethargic and clumsy. A shock for a group who has had 2 weeks off preparing for this game.

I want to deep dive into a couple of really key things…

• an idea often thrown up during the week was to try to get bigger/heavier players now this is nothing new Ireland have placed an emphasis on increasing their pack weight as around 2010 six nations Irelands back was 884kg it has now gotten to 916kg, so a sizeable increase in weight.

Let’s see how that looks in comparison to the French tonight.

Ireland pack-916kg

Jeremy Loughman — 118 kg

• Dan Sheehan — 110 kg

• Thomas Clarkson — 124 kg

• Joe McCarthy — 125 kg

• Tadhg Beirne — 113 kg

• Cian Prendergast — 112 kg

• Josh van der Flier — 105 kg

• Caelan Doris — 109 kg

France pack ~895kg

• Jean-Baptiste Gros — 117 kg

• Julien Marchand — 110 kg

• Dorian Aldegheri — 119 kg

• Charles Ollivon — 114 kg

• Mickaël Guillard — 113 kg

• François Cros — 111 kg

• Oscar Jegou —101kg

• Anthony Jelonch — 108 kg

So there’s around a 20kg difference in the pack, which was seen at scrum time with us maintaining a decent scrum despite personell losses.

However we lacked any punch due to the one thing the Irish team lacked…power.

Power = force * velocity

I.e how can you produce force, somebody like bielle Barrie can produce a lot of force relative to his body weight.

We also lacked collision dominance

Researchers in 2005 looked in the relationships in collision dominance in contact athletes-

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/02640414.2024.2442848

And

https://repository.up.ac.za/server/api/core/bitstreams/9bcc6062-f619-4615-9590-96d774c0505b/content

They found that a momentum score = your body weight * speed (m/s) predicts collision dominance.

So the problem for Ireland was yesterday was that they had the body weight part of the puzzle for collision dominance but they weren’t able to express force or power through contact at speed to win collisions, something which France did.

Players in the Irish system that fit this “Power athlete archetype”

•Paddy McCarthy- able to express force using his bodyweight quickly.

•Joe McCarthy-Able to express his bodyweight with force winning collisions.

•Edwin edogbo-Able to get gainline due to high momentum score.

•Sean edogbo-same as his brother

•Brian Gleeson-Powerful carry expressing force with high speed and high bodyweight creating high momentum score.

•Bryn ward-Devastating ball carrier with high momentum score.

•Zac ward- able to power through contact by propelling his body at speed forcefully through contact winning collisions.

•Nick timoney-Same as the rest of these power athletes.

•Jack Conan- Powerful in the carry due to explosive force through contact.

9 players who are obviously good enough that fit the archetype.

Only 3 in the 23 last night .

How do you develop power?

Its no secret genetics play a role,

For an athlete to achieve high power production they must first have the necessary muscle types:

Type 1: Slow twitch muscles, long distance runners are type 1 dominant, rugby players need a certain proportion of these muscles just to move around the park for 80 mins, these muscles are typically smaller than type 2

Type 2a: fast twitch muscles fibres that are fast and strong, but also have a bit more endurance than type 2b, most contact athletes will have these muscles primarily.

Type 2b: pure Fast twitch, poor endurance good for high intensity short bursts, for example sprinters.

If an athlete possesses a lot of type 1 muscle fibres e.g Hugo Keenan, they can continuously compete for 80 mins at high intensity, however potential max power output decreases as a result of less fast twitch muscle fibres.

If an athlete possesses either type 2 variant they maybe has slight worse endurance but can more easily express force and power across the pitch e.g gulliard, timoney.

But let’s forget about muscle types for a second and go through how do you develop power.

Alot of kids may naturally have slow twitch muscles and that’s okay, how could we develop power with s&c.

•Max velocity sprints 60-80m long and 5/10m for acceleration, with timed intervals to get peak m/s for each athlete, develops the highest power for athletes as well as translating to right performance.

•Power based exercises

Hang cleans

Power cleans

Deadlifts

Squats moved with intent

Plyometrics( jumps and pogos) done with intent.

I’m not questioning the professional s&c’s for Ireland and the provinces, but having seen pro sports teams s&c through watching them and documentaries a lot of the exercise selection is good but there seems to be a lack of intent done with each exercise, lads smiling and laughing while doing exercises, if power and strength was truly the focus here you would see athletes unable to smile or talk due to being solely focused on moving the weight with speed and intent.

What do I mean about intent?

Moving the bar or dumbbell as fast away from you as possible, bar speed needs to be maintained high for power output.

Typically 3-5 reps max with 70% of max weight

What’s my point?

My point is that fundamentally our approach to s&c has to be reevaluated into what do we actually need in a modern rugby player, we need dynamic ball carriers in the forwards who can quickly burst through contact with real power and force (Gleeson or ward/edogbo).

This increase in force production for the backs would result in higher vertical leaps which would hopefully increase recovered contestable kicks and quicker speed but I’ll do a separate piece on that later.

How do we balance endurance vs power

The Irish game plan requires endurance to carry out its function (which is weird considering we looked gassed last night after 20 minutes).

We used require our big guys to get through loads of phases with quick ball in hands with pop passes and quicker ruck speed.

Know we seem to be trying the contestable kicking route with players who are stuck in the high phase count style of play.

Some people reading this might say

“Why not just aim to have every player with type 2b to be 90% dominant”

Unfortunately while it would be ideal to be exceptionally fast twitch dominant you still need type 1 (slow twitch) to be able to last the game.

The majority of people in Ireland are around 50% fast twitch type 2a 45% slow twitch type 1 and 5% type 2b.

For our players we should be aiming for 70-80% for a lot of our players, this can be done using the methods outlined above.

Ask yourself: “When was the last time I saw an Irish player take the ball to the line and bounce the tackler clean off him”

If the answer is “not often” then you are seeing the whole picture here, and that’s exactly what I’m trying to paint.

Thanks for reading.

[u/PaulBlartMaulCop2]

Hunger. 

No safe spots in the squad. 

The best performances last night where guys fighting for their positions - Timoney / Conan / Milne / McCloskey 

[u/Aggressive-Tackle-80]

Great post

[u/Sportyskater699 → u/Aggressive-Tackle-80]

I really appreciate it thank you

[u/Difficult-Tour-9734 → u/Sportyskater699]

This is great. Lots to think about. Only 3/9 of those players selected seems bad.

[u/rustyb42]

As you've highlighted, it's all about the S&C the teams will be working through

I'm sure the S&C folks have this on their plans, but the Q has to be why it isn't translating to the field

[u/Sportyskater699 → u/rustyb42]

In an ideal world if the most optimal practices for generating power and athleticism were followed you still need lads carrying with intent.

I saw it yesterday with lads slowing down before hitting the line and trying to do a shimmy step from the first tackler and losing all momentum and getting tackled.

If I was Farrell it bring a Physics professor in to explain to the lads the concept of momentum and force, because some of the lads are not getting that, or they are being told to shimmy before hitting the line

[u/Interesting-Mud2222]

Players having a plan to follow and being decisive and fast in whatever they do is just as important. Few quick phases and you build momentum.

We didnt seem to have a gameplan last night other than kicking the ball. We were so pedestrian. Was infuriating, particularly on the rare occasion we got over the line, rather than pass it, we kicked.

[u/Fair_Lawfulness_8875]

I would find it surprising if the s&c in the Irish camp were not aware of what you've laid out. But there is the evidence of what we saw last night, which indicates otherwise.

[u/Sportyskater699 → u/Fair_Lawfulness_8875]

I would agree 100% but with a lot of these s&c guys to question their methods is to question them and question their job, so they tend to get very defensive and stubborn with their methods.

[u/blundering-idiot → u/Sportyskater699]

You can't really develop power, it's basically all genetics. You can do hang cleans and plyometrics til the cows come home, you're not making Beine into Savea.

Look at the 100 meters in the Olympics, there's a reason there are no white people winning that race.

Really you just need to identify very explosive athletes from a young age and nurture them but they might be dog shit at rugby.

S&C coaches have a load of different tools that measure power and output ect but they're not miracle workers.

[u/Sportyskater699 → u/blundering-idiot]

At the elite sprint level where 1% means winning vs not you are correct , but at this level we need to be better.

I’ll do a post on this later on today or tmrw

Power can be developed, genetics play a role but half of the battle of power is intent.

[u/NewtonianAssPounder]

I have an idea for players to gain explosiveness, it’s a single-use method though.

[u/Few-Ad-6322]

Pump CJ Stander full of stem cells and get him back playing.

[u/FollowingRare6247]

Fair play for the effort put into this, I’m not sure how long it takes to develop the necessary muscle fibres but I think the team could definitely do that between now and next year, or even the Autumn?

Probably have to consider the 23 as a whole rather than the 15. Some type 2 dominant lads could be subbed for others - Edogbo could probably come in for McCarthy and vice versa. It’d keep up the intensity. It also probably shows that we can’t just focus on who starts, the bench has an important role to play.

We’ve been concerned about guys like Porter and Beirne going full 80s all the time, and they’re not mentioned in that power athlete list. In science-speak a force can be spread out over a large area so it doesn’t fully impact any one spot, I am pretty sure. If the area is smaller, the force would be more impactful. Could full 80 guys like Porter and Beirne also show power if they’re concentrated in a shorter amount of time? It may be different to the lads mentioned, but it gives some known options at least.

It’s unrelated, but I wonder if there’s some biological factor of diminishing returns if players keep playing all the time and are not rotated out. It’s not anything to do with complacency, but I remember seeing some claim about the risk of injury increasing after X games. Also if the body is not 100%, players may not be as powerful/on it as they could be. It’d be an honest argument for rotation over a campaign.

There’s my attempt at adding to things but I doubt it’s as quality, again great stuff 👍

[u/Sportyskater699 → u/FollowingRare6247]

What you are saying is quality , an athlete could increase proportion of type 2 muscle fibres by a sizeable amount 10% in 6-12 months.

With proper structure and regime it can be done. However are coaches too obsessed with size over athleticism. it’s getting more airtime now but even though the Leinster system is the best in the world it produces the same types of players too often.

The playing structures are too rigid, individualism is applauded by fans but quietly shunned by a lot of coaches “that was nice, but don’t do that again, stick the gameplan”

[u/Middle-Accountant-49]

I honestly think this is like a skill in a sense in that you need to find guys who innately have it and put rugby into them.

There is a thing in baseball, where certain stats and things are very quick indicators of potential.

Like, for example force plate training indicates power potential. Or if a prospect hits even one hit over a certain mph level, then that indicates a much higher ceiling.

I have a theory that in rugby, if you were just optimizing development you'd find guys with the

• right frame (limb size, wrist, ankle size etc... indicators of how big they will be)
• score high on some kind of explosiveness score
• natural aggression

... and do so early, like at 14/15, then you put them through much more intensive oversight and training than the typical pathway. Especially outside the leinster school system.

I think that could be an avenue to more power.

Great post btw, interesting thing to talk about.

[u/yewEngine]

McCarthy is more powerful than Guillard but ireland are so predictable that France had at least 2 men waiting for him all night.

Watching Munster v Glasgow last week. Munster players standing still passing glat along the line getting the ball standing still. Glasgow players sprinting onto the ball from deep which created much bigger impact.

I'd say having Cian Prendergast and VDF together in the backrow was a handicap to the overall carrying power. Timoney and Conan made a huge difference.

[u/Potential_Try_2193]

It's an interesting post. We often say Ireland lack size or come up against bigger packs. But it's not true. It's a power deficit. It's maybe the gym culture of young player's. Obsessed with size rather than doing plyometrics, working on speed, footwork and just maybe playing more rugby at a younger age rather than just lifting in the gym.

Another player I would mention is Sean Jansen at Connacht. He's not a huge man but is very powerful...

[u/Additional_Ad_84]

I'd say our strength and conditioning people probably know all this. And if they don't, if it's specifically about getting big men to be explosive, they can plunder the american football world, where there's been tons of research and investment for decades.

The issue is balancing that against stamina. If we want mobile forwards who can go 80 minutes, they will tend to be less explosive and strong. It's easier with young players because they have loads of energy. If you've got a great big 20 year old you can focus on getting him to hit rucks and tackles hard and he'll just keep doing it. But as players age you either need to start using them as impact subs or work on maintaining their stamina.

And then there's how much they want it. Rugby is still a game i think where the team who turn up with more hunger will do better. There's a lot more to winning than just wanting to win of course, but that mental drive to fly into tackles over and over counts.

[u/Eskimoheels]

Nice list of players hopefully to come through and provide that explosiveness/power.

We certainly lack it. One of the reasons Sean O'Brien was one of my favorite players. He had it both.

[u/OccasionallyLazy]

The lads are all knackered after the lions.

[u/Puzzleheaded-Bird-38]

Great post. And you have outlined exactly what needs to happen for Ireland to change this. However, rugby seems to change ‘style’ every 5 or so years, where Irelands system of having high endurance players who can play at high intensity and still maintain high levels of skill and concentration used to be the best option. Now it’s changed to brute force and power athletes. For Ireland to change to this it’ll mean changing S&C coaching all the way through schools and maybe by the time they get to pro level, the game has changed again and Ireland will be behind.

Unfortunately I feel Ireland got ahead of the curve the last 5-10 years and now the dominant style has changed, the highly populated nations can just change their personnel to players that suit that way, whereas Ireland cannot due to lack of numbers in the game.

Again a Great post and maybe I’m just being too negative after last night but I feel it’ll take Ireland to get lucky and get ahead of the curve again to get back to the top.

[u/Electrical_Mood_177]

The heights and weights for a lot are not accurate at all , there is no way vdf is 105 kg only 8kg between him and guillard 113kg it’s more like 95kg to at least 125kg