Here’s how I onboard a new athlete — and why skipping steps leads to coaching the wrong athlete.

Jamie reached out and asked me to prepare him for a full ATHX season. With limited prep time, we started the way we always do at eddiesmethod: We tested. We assessed. We built backwards.

The more straightforward way to know if your conditioning is improving is to remove as many confounding variables as possible — take out heavy loads, demanding skills, and focus purely on capacity.

A coach plays a huge role in an athlete’s development. They don’t just provide programming; they guide mindset, help you see your potential, and hold you accountable when it matters most. A good coach understands when to push you and when to pull back, and that balance can make all the difference in long-term progress. I might be on the competition floor alone, but this is truly a team effort. 

As this long block came to an end, both of us felt the structure worked perfectly. The results back it up — Sarah achieved new personal bests in multiple areas, including: 1-mile run, 2k row, 3RM bench press, max strict HSPU, butterfly chest-to-bar pull-up, several benchmark workouts.

When applied correctly, plyometric training can significantly enhance both force and power output. The “magic” lies in how the muscle temporarily stores elastic energy during an eccentric contraction and then releases it explosively in the concentric phase.

If you train hard but don't allow your body to regenerate, you're undermining the stimulus before it can take effect.

I’ve always believed that athletes who want to perform better should also think better — and part of that comes from learning beyond the gym.

Last month, I read three books that every athlete could benefit from, each offering a distinct perspective on performance, longevity, and focus.

Unlike specialised sports where training can focus on one domain, functional fitness demands concurrency — often within the same week, sometimes even in the same session. This complexity makes programming both a challenge and a necessity.

With nutrition, sleep, training structure, age, and training level all working together, athletes can optimize recovery, reduce injury risk, and sustain high performance over time.

The best way to address overtraining is to prevent it, as once an athlete reaches that state, it can be tough to reverse.