With the season in full swing your wrestling training has started to take off and your training for wrestling plan should reflect the changes with the season.

Remember- ultimately this is what you're looking to accomplish so backing off here and there to ensure you're at your best when the times comes is key.

While some things stay fairly similar in the programs for the wrestlers that I train, there are a couple of changes I make, especially after the holidays pass and the final 2 months of the season gets underway.

This next series of posts entitled Wrestling Training will first go into some of the things I keep in mind when designing an In-Season training program.

I’ll then introduce the first 4 weeks of an 8-week program I wrote for a college wrestler that I train via email. I’ll go into detail of why I decided to structure the program the way that I did as well as detail a number of exercises like I did in the Training For Wrestling series.

Wrestling Training: In-Season Principles

In-Season Wrestling Training Principle 1- Be Audible Ready

I stole this from Dave Tate of EliteFTS.com a number years ago when I first heard him present on it and have used this ever since; especially when working with In-Season wrestlers. What does “be audible ready” mean in terms of wrestling training for strength and power? In a nutshell it means that you need to be ready to make adjustments to your program based on how you feel.

Maybe the practice you just finished was a lot harder than usual. Obviously this isn’t a good time to be pushing yourself to set new personal records in the weight room if you’re fatigued and banged up.

However, maybe you’re in the weight room on a Sunday and you cruised to an easy tournament victory the day before, or had the day off from competition and you feel great. This would be a great time to push yourself a little more than usual, especially if you don’t have any big upcoming matches early in the week.

Regardless of what you may or may not have planned, you need to be ready to make changes to your wrestling training workout on the fly based on how you feel on any given day.

Dave Tate teaching the Box Squat.

In-Season Wrestling Training Principle 2- Focus On Power Development, Strength Maintenance

I’ll be the first to admit, it can sometimes be very difficult to increase your strength during the season. The toll practice, matches, and cutting weight takes on your body obviously creates a less than optimal environment for gaining strength.

However, with as difficult of a grind as the season can be, maintaining strength In-Season is more than sufficient due to the significant decreases you can see if you drop lifting all together (according to a study performed at Oklahoma State University in 2006, if I remember correctly).

Increasing your focus on maximizing your power during the season will have you shooting faster, moving quicker, scrambling better, and doing basically everything with a faster rate of force. Ultimately you will win more, and that’s what I’m sure you’re after as someone who follows a strict In-Season wrestling training program.

For a few ways to increase your power check out my Training For Wrestling blog post series I’ve also recently put together a new eBook, Explosive Power Training For Wrestling, that details over 70 exercises that I use both in my personal MMA training as well as the training of the wrestlers that I work with both at my gym and via email.

Look at the speed and power of these top men at their peak. This is what calculated and periodized In-Season wrestling training programs that develop speed and power results in:

Power Wrestling Training Results:

In-Season Wrestling Training Principle 3- Decrease The Volume

Decreasing the total training volume (number of sets, reps, and exercises you perform) is a must for In-Season lifting. In the program that I’ll detail below, I keep the volume pretty high for this wrestler until after Christmas break. He expressed interest in trying to maintain and maybe even put on a little bit of muscle during the first part of the season because it’s not going to be as intense as the second half when double and triple sessions start during the winter recess on campus.

So to help him get the most out of his wrestling training plan, I included a higher volume that begins to taper slightly over the course of the last 4 weeks. Again, a lot of the volume adjustments go hand in hand with the first principle- be audible ready.

However, as a general rule of thumb it’s in your best interest to cut down on the total number of sets, reps and exercises you’re doing so as to minimize your recovery time so that you’re ready for practice and matches.

Because lowering the volume is individually specific, you’re going to want to start experimenting with your program by cutting 2-3 sets out of it. Ultimately you want to find the right balance that allows you to do the following:

Wrestling Training Program In-Season Focuses:

1. Maintain your strength.
2. Increase your power.
3. Get the most positive impact on your performance (obviously you may get a little sore here and there, but keep things under control so you’re not crippled or having mobility or speed issues and keep your sights set on the big matches at the end).

Ultimately, those are the 3 big principles I like to follow when designing in-season wrestling training plans. Keep your training simple, follow these 3 principles, make adjustments as you need, and you should be primed and ready to win some big matches at the end of the season in 2012!

Sample In-Season Training For Wrestling Plan

Below is the first week of the 8-week in-season plan I put together for one of the college wrestlers I train via email. To download the first 4 weeks of the program click- Wrestling Training.

Wrestling Training Plan Day 1

a. Kneeling Jump (4×4)
a. Speed Russian Twist (4×12)
a. Plyo Pushup (4×4)
b. Zercher Squat (4×6)
b. DB Windmill (4×8)
c. DB RDL (4×8)
c. Feet Elevated DB Pushup (3x AMAP)
c. Pullup (3x AMAP)

Wrestling Training Plan Day 2

a. Kneeling SL Lateral Jump (4×3)
a. Rotational Cable Lift (4×6)
a. Plyo Pull-up (4×3)
b. Hang Clean (4×4)
b. Wtd Spread Eagle Situp (4×8)
c. Pin Press (4×5)
c. Wtd Pullup (4×5)

Wrestling Training Plan Day 3

a. Box Squat Horizontal Jump (4×4)
a. MB Slam (4×5)
a. SL Jump to Bench (4×4)
b. DB Jerk (4×4)
b. Hanging Leg Raise (4×10)
c. Dr. Mike DB Bench (4×8)
c. Pause DB Row (4×10)
c. DB Step Up (4×8)

Because I’ve detailed all of the explosive power exercises in my new Explosive Power Training For Wrestling eBook, I won’t be covering them in this series of posts. However, I will go into some of the other wrestling training exercises and some variations that I have in the program that you may or may not be familiar with.

So be sure to check out the next post in this Wrestling Training series where I’ll detail the benefits of the Zercher Squat and a couple of the other variations I like to work in from time to time.

On another note, as I’ve mentioned above, I have finished my eBook Explosive Power Training For Wrestling in which I detail over 70 exercises that I implement both in my own program for increasing speed and power for MMA but also in the programs of the wrestlers that I train both at my gym and online.

This style of training has been the ultimate complement to the strength training that I’ve been using with the wrestlers I’ve trained for the last 9 years. It has produced unbelievably fast and powerful wrestlers when incorporated with the various strength training techniques and principles I implement.

Because this style of wrestling training for power works so well with a lot of what I cover in the Wrestler Strength eBook, I’ve decided to include it as an up sell to it. However, before it is included as part of that package, I want to make it available to people who already own Wrestler Strength, or are just interested in the Explosive Power Training For Wrestling eBook.

So to keep things simple (and keep my bill to my web guy lower), I’m going to make it available for sale via PayPal. If you want to pick up Explosive Power Training For Wrestling for only $14 without having to first purchase the Wrestler Strength eBook, just click the button below.

I’ll answer orders every morning between 7:30-8:00am and will email you a download link to the Explosive Power Training For Wrestling system.

Explosive Power Training For Wrestling

1. 116 total pages
2. 51 weeks of programs (6 full wrestling training programs of various lengths).
3. Over 70 exercises to add to your In-Season wrestling training plan which will maximize your speed and power.
4. Private video links to every exercise to show you how to perform each one properly.

So be sure to get your hands on this in the next couple weeks before it’s only available as a separate up sell with the Wrestler Strength package.

And be sure to check out the next post in the Wrestling Training series.