Lifting Improves Agility for Male Athletes

Agility is being able to accelerate, decelerate, stabilize, change direction, and accelerate again. It is a good predictor of performance and a vital aspect of most major sports. Being able to enhance agility can help improve performance and decrease risk of injury.

Performing Cleans, Snatches, Squats, and Deadlifts has been shown to improve agility in male athletes. These lifts do not involve lateral or transverse plane motion yet they still enhance our ability to change of direction. This is due to the increase in rate of force development produced by these lifts. Rate of force development gained from these lifts allows us to rapidly produce force vertically into the ground. This is one of the most important abilities to enhance jumping, sprinting, and agility.

Enhancing rate of force production and agility can be beneficial for all populations. It is easily achieved by incorporating and properly programming these major lifts into your training program. Best of all, it only requires minimal equipment such as a bar and some plates.

References

Keiner, M., Sander, A., Wirth, K., & Schmidtbleicher, D. (2014). Long-term strength training effects on change-of-direction sprint performance. Journal of strength and conditioning research, 28(1), 223–231. https://doi.org/10.1519/JSC.0b013e318295644b

Ribeiro, J., Teixeira, L., Lemos, R., Teixeira, A. S., Moreira, V., Silva, P., & Nakamura, F. Y. (2020). Effects of Plyometric Versus Optimum Power Load Training on Components of Physical Fitness in Young Male Soccer Players. International journal of sports physiology and performance, 15(2), 222–230. https://doi.org/10.1123/ijspp.2019-0039

Teo, S. Y., Newton, M. J., Newton, R. U., Dempsey, A. R., & Fairchild, T. J. (2016). Comparing the Effectiveness of a Short-Term Vertical Jump vs. Weightlifting Program on Athletic Power Development. Journal of strength and conditioning research, 30(10), 2741–2748. https://doi.org/10.1519/JSC.0000000000001379