An Interview With Alwyn Cosgrove

Alwyn Cosgrove is a leader and pioneer in the industry of sport training. He is also a martial arts expert and world renowned conditioning coach for combat athletes.

BG: What's your background in youth sports and athletics? Have you trained a lot of young athletes?

AC: Well first of all I was a youth athlete so I guess that's where it all started - I was doing Tae kwon-do from a young age. As far as training young athletes I've worked with athletes as young as eight in a variety of sports. I'd say over 30% of my gym's clientele are teenage competitive athletes.

BG: There are a lot of coaches, parents and even trainers who treat young athletes as if they were little adults. What I mean by that is they will take the training routine of a superstar athlete and use it as a guide when working with youngsters. Why, if at all, should we warn against that kind of training?

AC: If you want to use Kobe Bryant's program - you first of all have to BE Kobe Bryant. You have to have experienced everything he has experienced in order for his program to work for you. Understand this - the program a "superstar" is doing is not the program that got them there. Young athletes need to be trained entirely different than adults - with a focus on transfer to sport and athleticism - not loading or sport specificity.

BG: The age old debate is How old should an athlete be before they begin lifting weights. What's your view on that controversial topic?

AC: I don't think it's controversial when you understand what you are doing. I've heard medical experts say - kids shouldn't lift weights until they are out of puberty - but they can do push ups and things until then. Does the body know the difference between loading from a push up and a barbell press ? - I doubt it. In practice what I do is establish a solid foundation of bodyweight training, swiss ball training etc - but I'm not afraid to introduce external loading as and when it is necessary.

BG: Using your ideals, could you define functional conditioning for us?

AC: Great question. Functional Conditioning : A form of fitness and conditioning processes that directly transfers to improvements in real life on-field (on court, on ice etc) performance. Specificity is irrelevant - only transfer. Will a 300lb squat better transfer to real life strength on the soccer field better than a 250lb squat - maybe not. But will a multiplanar single leg jumping lunge exercise transfer better than either squat ? Absolutely.

BG: If you were training a healthy ten-year-old athlete, what would a session with you look like? Length? Exercises?

AC: 30 - 50 min and I'd probably have them in small groups.

• 5-10 min general warm up

• 5-10 min specific warm up (agility ladder etc)

• 5-10 min stretching as needed

• 10-20 min functional strength training (lunges, rotations, swiss ball etc)

• 5 min big finish (fun activity - races, timed exercises etc)

BG: Is there a particular criteria or path that you follow when developing young athletes over a long period of time? For example, at what age is it best to develop flexibility? Power? Coordination?

AC: Flexibility needs to be developed continuously. With young athletes I follow a continuum I learned from Paul Chek: Flexibility - Stability - Strength - Power Agility and co-ordination are trained continuously - you need to. You can't wait until the athletes are strong enough or you just have a strong uncoordinated kid. The key to success in training is two-fold. Progression of training - when to step it up - that's the science of fitness coaching. And integration of training - how to balance the development of each quality in the training cycle -- that's an art form.

BG: Should athletes specialize in a particular sport at a young age or participate in a number of different sports? Why?

AC: Unless the sport involves peaking at a young age (like gymnastics and figure skating) I really feel that a base of athleticism is far more important than specialization Early specialization in sport will ruin more careers than it will develop in my opinion.

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