MY TOP TEN BASKETBALL CONDITIONING WORKOUTS
MY NMBA BASKETBALL ACADEMY'S CONDITIONING WORKOUTS[/caption]
Created by: Trevor Huffman, Euro-Pro Point Guard and President of NMBA Academy
How you design your basketball conditioning workouts throughout an off-season is crucial to your success.
Why?
Because it’s the finals. The clock is running down. Your five is running up to set a middle down-hill ball screen. Your best shooter is in the left corner, your best athlete in the right. Your four man is at the elbow. This is your time to make a play. The ball is in your hands. The crowd is standing in anticipation.
What will you do? Which way will you go? Have you ever been in this position-- when everything you have done, practiced, and trained for leads up to the biggest moment of your basketball life?
I’ve lost games and won games in this position, but the truth is, the sun doesn’t always shine on you as a basketball player and what I mean is: sometimes you just suck, and worse, there are thousands of people watching you while you suck.
Which leads me to why I want to talk about basketball conditioning workouts and educate you on why conditioning is so important for young players to understand. My friend Jason Otter and I always talk about what kids are and aren't doing correctly. AAU basketball is kind of running the show these days during the off-season, which is both good and bad. Bad because players forget to focus on their skill development, athletic development, basketball conditioning, injury prevention, and learning what mental toughness is (think Rocky pulling rocks here people). Good because players still compete in live play.
But there is something missing with only playing pick-up or AAU. You develop bad habits. You don't focus on movement or basketball skills that prepare you for the highest levels. I developed the NMBA for this one thing alone: that players should be well balanced between playing high level competition and pushing their weaknesses to their limit through basketball and athletic skills training. TWEET THIS!
MY NMBA TOP TEN BASKETBALL CONDITIONING WORKOUTS 1. ONE-BALL TWO BALL DRIBBLE MOVE ZIG-ZAG:
This is a great drill and really gets players tired, while still making them better basketball players. Put a cone/chair at the corner, the elbow, half-court/sideline, other elbow, and then corner. Sprint towards the cones/chairs and change direction with an explosive dribble move. If you can master one ball, move to two balls. My NMBA players hate when I put this drill in the practice plan, which also means: the path of most mental resistance is usually exactly where you should walk (or run) to.
2.) THE WEIGHTED WOODWAY TREADMILL
At NMBA Basketball Academy, one of my favorite speed-conditioning workouts is on the Woodway treadmill. I love this thing. It has the feel of a pulling a sled, but just absolutely kills your hamstrings and glutes, and not only pushes you to get faster, but to get in better shape. If you did our Woodway basketball workouts all summer, your opponents wouldn’t be happy next season. If you have access to one of these bad boys, strap in, increase the pounds and sprint for 10 seconds (100% intensity, after a warm up) and then the walk for 30 seconds. I like to do this two to three times a week and slowly build up my power and endurance, making sets harder after each 3 week mini-cycle. Tweak and adapt. Always push yourself, but never hurt yourself.
Week 1: 10 sets: 10/30 rest.
Week 2: 8 sets: 12/32 rest
Week 3: 6 sets: 14/34 rest
Week 4: BREAK
Week 4: 5 sets: 16/36 rest
Week 5: 6 sets: 18/38 rest
Week 6: 10 sets: 10/20 rest
3.) VOLLEY-BALL LINE BASKETBALL CONDITIONING WORKOUT
Love this drill and hate this drill in the same breath. TWEET THIS. Anything I hate doing is usually because it’s the best thing for me (weight pull-ups come to mind). Not choosing something because it is hard is called that the path of least resistance for a reason. Players aren’t thinking about putting in the seeds in the off-season to reap their harvest when the lights are on. This drill will ensure your harvest looks like a politician taking money from Monsanto:
1.) Put a chair in the middle of the volleyball court going side to side. Start in a sprinter stance with the ball. Go!
2.) At the chair do a basketball dribbling move that breaks ankles or at least is fast enough to not get ripped by your grandma.
3.) Do 4 repetitions sideline to sideline. I teach hockey stop turns with the ball in both hands. Believe me when I say changing direction with a ball in your hand takes practice (google Isiah Thomas dribbling if you don’t believe me). Get low!
4.) I usually practice every move I’m developing during the off-season. Bread and Butter moves are key too: hesitation, cross, through the legs, behind the back, wrap around, in-out, stutter step, spin etc… Good luck. Week 1: 10 sets and then build it up!
4.) VERTIMAX VERTICAL TRAINING WORKOUT
This is a good example of what we do at NMBA. I’m a short white guy. I know this. I also know I’m competing against better athletes everyday, but that doesn’t mean I can’t improve my vertical jump or increase the power of my fast twitch muscle fibers through proper training. I am speaking from experience when I say that being a strong athlete is key. But you have to train strength the right way. You can’t just throw around big dumb-bells, grunt like an ape, and wear unitards around the weight room in the game of basketball and be successful (I mean, you can, just send me a pic so I can post it to my NMBA page).
The Vertimax is a nasty little device that creates resistance with bands and loads your hips and makes gravity 10x stronger you’d ever like it to be. Unfortunately, we can’t force Lebron to wear one of these while he plays so he can feel what we feel. But beating gravity starts with pushing more force into the ground and training different mechanics, form, and executing a proper training program with the Vertimax has rounded out my basketball conditioning workouts top ten.
5.) THE VERSA CLIMBER
I just dry heaved a little saying this word. Every week we race or train or do a shuttle with teammates on the Versaclimber.
I love this conditioning workout for my older athletes and pros because you don’t put any stress on your joints (c’mon Shaq, get in the Academy, I’ll get you in shape!) and is one of the hardest friggin’ workouts you can ever do from cardiovascular standpoint.
I like doing HIIT workouts with a partner. We also have a record board at NMBA and we allow players to try to break records weekly.
6.) SAND WORKOUTS Conditioning workouts with basketball don’t always start in the sand, but I do like to end my workouts in them. 1.) Because I hate getting sand in my toes and then working out after. 2.) Because I like saving the best for last.
Now this is a huge part of my off-season training. I am trying to get Rob to put a 30 yard sand pit next to SST so our athletes can watch their speed, agility, and quickness training shoot through the roof. I remember doing this in Cleveland with Eric Lichter and it was the fastest, strongest, I had ever been. Of course, in my all-knowing youth, I stopped working out down there because I moved back to Michigan, but I can’t imagine how much better my career would have been if I had just stayed in Cleveland after my Kent State days and continued to train with other pros and college guys in the area (hence, my academy in Northern Michigan).
1.) Put a speed ladder in the sand. Start the clock. 20 minutes of footwork drills and sprinting out of the ladder after each set. You will never be the same if you continue to do this throughout your career. Make sure you completely recover before you do your next set. I also like races and competition, but you need space.
7.) CORNER TURN SHOOTING
I put cones out around the three point line (usually I want every angle possible) or closer for my younger players. I tell them to sprint dribble, corner turn with a low shoulder, hand on the ground (dip that shoulder), and sprint to the basket. Then I add a lay-up, pull-up, floater, runner, step-back, or euro-step footwork pattern and finishing move once we get the right technique on the shoulder turn.
I love this technique of teaching players to get lower than their defender. Jason Otter has so many great drills too and really helped me when I got to college. An explosive dribble move is only that (fast ball movement), but when you add in mechanics of shoulder dip, stride length, and reading defender’s footwork and how to attack their weak points, you naturally adapt to being able to get past defenders when you know you can get lower than them.
Depending on level, adapt your footwork and finishing moves inside these sets: Have one group go, while the other rests coaches.
Week 1: 10 sets: 20 seconds/20 seconds rest
Week 2: 12 sets: 15 seconds/ 15 seconds rest
Week 3: 14 sets: 10 seconds/10 seconds rest
Week 4: REST
8.) FULL COURT 5 DRIBBLE/SHOOT This is not easy. Put a chair at half court. Start under the basket, dribble at the cone/chair, execute a dribble move (if you do a combo move it still only counts for one dribble), and then get to a finishing move like in the corner turns drill. I like to mix in all finishing moves, especially after you master something simple like a jump-stop pull up. Get your rebound and go the other way and do the same thing with a 5 dribble max limit (for younger players you can add dribbles). Change moves at half court cone/chair per set, or per shuttle, or if you are a coach, call out a new move to make it instinctual reaction move for players at the cone/chair.
For my college players, sometimes, I’ll add a weighted vest or weighted shorts and push them for a short amount of time with extra resistance. I don’t like to overuse weighted vests or shorts because I want my players joints to last. Any pro will tell you that the first thing to go is your joints, your back, etc, so I want players to be able to be able to walk when they are 40.
Shoot 10 free throws between each set, record. @Extra challenge= Every free throw you miss, you add that into an extra set.
Week 1: 3 sets X 8 full length court shuttles
Week 2: 4 sets X 8 full length court shuttles
Week 3: 5 sets X 8 full length court shuttles
Week 4: Break.
9.) I’m not going to tell you 9 or 10. 10.)
Come to my Academy. I can’t give away all my secrets! Or contact SST at the above link to save a spot. If you are out-of-state, or are a college/pro player and want to train for free, please
email me here or leave a comment and I'll get you a NMBA ELITE application. Or
TWITTER me (to let you know, Twitter is about as fun as rocket science is to me). If you are out of Northern Michigan and want to come train and want an application, please contact me or leave a comment. :)
