#113: Joe DeFranco - Developing Speed with Hypertrophy Training

Joe DeFranco joins us for a masterclass on training for Speed and Sports Performance.

Joe, with 22+ years Sports & Conditioning experience has trained 1000’s of athletes, and contributed to some incredible careers in NFL, Rugby, Figure Skating, Skiing and many more sports.

Joe’s the go-to S&C trainer in the college football space, and made his name helping these young men excel in the NFL Combine. He’s also a leader online, with his Podcast and popular Instagram feed, as well as his renowned CPPS coaching certification.

This interview extends the conversation of #107: How to Improve Sport Performance and Body Mechanics, where Joe’s top coaching principles were shared by Bryn Jenkins. If you are keen to understand how to improve your sport specific speed and sprinting, this latest episode is is absolute gold!

There are gems for Coaches and Trainees alike – helping us all understand what a great coach is, and how a solid coach-trainee relationship can have an enormous impact.

Here’s what we discuss

Joe’s Crushed Dream – From NFL star-in-the making to excruciating back pain that lasted 5 years!
Making his name – Joe explains how his career started, where he cut his teeth, and his biggest career achievements
Does Hypertrophy Training help you get faster? – We discuss Training age, relative strength, mass specific force, muscle mass
Body shapes and Speed – Explaining the body composition of various sporting disciplines, including track, sprinting, NFL and soccer
How to Test Someone’s Speed? – Joe offers two novel tests for evaluation if someone is fast vs strong, and how to program for them
Strength Training Principles for Speed Improvement – Individual-specific programming, general speed training principles and what NOT to do for speed
Can you make anyone faster? – Could Joe make Steve faster? How?
Neurological adaptation vs Muscular Damage – What is the difference, and how to use them in the gym?
How to get faster reactions on the field? – Is reaction-training, coordination work, and dynamic effort universally important to perform faster?
Why Joe does NOT program Olympic Lifts and Kipping Pull Ups – and his general concerns of these lifts in general purpose gyms
Other Stuff – Specialising kids too early, replicating Usain Bolt’s training, and always asking why when you train
Advice Gold on how to be a GREAT coach – Joe share’s some great tips and ideas that apply to every discipline and business model