Work outs during season

check out zach dechant on youtube and instagram....strength and conditioning for texas tech baseball is excellent...can also find him on many podcasts he addresses this often

Between HS season, summer season and fall season “in season” is about 7 months out of 12.  Not lifting “in season” means you not only lose over half of your available time to make gains you are losing some of what you gained in “off season”.   Although you may not be able to train as hard or as often, you have to at least train enough to maintain.

In season = lower weight, higher reps (endurance) 10-15 reps

Out of season = higher weight, lower reps (strength building) 6-8 reps

JMO - open to hear what others are doing.

off season, my 2023 was lifting 4x/week with 2 days upper body and 2 days lower body (m, th lower, tu, f upper).  since practice started he's been doing mwf hitting all body parts.  backed off the weight amounts.  season starts this week with tuesday thursday games. once the league schedule starts they'll play wednesday and friday in league and saturday out of league. he'll adjust his lifting days and amounts accordingly.

Tcu not TX tech sorry

I would recommend to Go short and heavy 2 times a week.

Quick full body workout with compound lifts about 3 sets of 5-6 reps with heavy (but not quite Max) weight.

That way you maintain most strength without straining the body too much.

Younger players who only play like 2-3 times a week might do more volume in season too.

At the college level right now our team typically lifts 3 days a week. Monday which is an off day from baseball is typically a heavier day total body, Wednesday is heavy-ish total body, Thursday has a pretty heavy power focus and super low reps. My understanding is that in order to maintain the gains doing high weight for very low reps works best while limiting soreness (My roommates and I have found this to be true). The low weight high reps personally makes me feel pretty sore and at the end of the season my strength numbers had dropped a decent amount, making it feel like a bit of a waste.

The thought process is basically that high reps is pretty taxing on CNS, and also tears more muscle tissue making it harder to recover. I kind of view it similarly to lactic acid, running long distance actually causes it because of the muscle breakdown, potentially making you worse off than doing nothing for post throw recovery (Something Zach Dechant has touched on on twitter).

Also when I say low reps high weight, that is typically geared toward lower body. For example, in the off-season I may work up to a weight on deadlifts and work there for 5 sets of 3 reps, in-season this would fall on my Monday and look like working up to a top weight and going for 3 sets of 2 reps. So I still get the load of working up to top weight, and put my body under that top weight tension, without doing so much that I am going to be sore the next day.

I know Tread was mentioned in another post, and when I worked with them this was also pretty similar to how they worked, although it was during summer ball so it was a bit more aggressive lifting as the stakes are a bit lower than during the college season.

As a two-way it may be tough, but finding at least a day or two a week to get some sort of workout in would be huge. Hopefully your son isn't playing ss the day after pitching, which might make the night of the start or next morning a good time to get a heavier lift in with low reps to keep the gains while also being lower impact on the body. Trying to get a lift in within 24 hours of pitching (or playing really) is ideal too as it puts all the stress in one cycle and allows your body to start recovering earlier. Depending on how many games your son plays a week, the 2nd day could be a power/movement/mobility focus with jumps and med ball stuff, working on being explosive and getting work in on the left side of his body to help prevent him developing imbalances in his body.

Hope this helps

@Mac dad posted:

Looking to see what is the general consensus on weight lifting during the season.
My son who is  a Pitcher/Short has stopped all lifting and is playing ball everyday one way or another.
Just seeing what’s the normal program.  In his other sport they lift during the season.
thanks for the input

MacDad

It's necessary. You only need to lift once a week to maintain what you've built up to that point. However, I don't know many athletes that would just lift once a week and that's it.

It's all going to depend on practices and games. Your sets/reps/%RM and RPE/RIR are all going to fluctuate based on that.

Thanks everyone for your input.
it really helps to have outside opinions. I don’t like to push him when he is so dedicated. He’s now back to working out based on these posts. Still light. He also plays waterpolo on the downdays if he hasn’t pitched so keep it rolling. Didn’t  want him losing the gains made.  
Thanks again

I generally fall into the camp of in season keep intensity and reduce volume. As an example keeping maybe 80% 1RM on say deadlifts, but 1-3 reps.

Also cut down on eccentrics, pin squats instead of squats.