Do you find that your hockey players lose strength during the strength endurance phase? Also, what does the strength and power phase look like? Great issue, BTW.
Bump
The strength-endurance phase lasts only 3 weeks so there is absolutely no loss of strength. All of my athletes were actually stronger after one week of getting back to a strength/power phase.
What does happen is that the nervous system will loose some efficiency from the lack of handling big weights. But the muscles themselves don’t loose any strength production potential (in fact it’s even increased as there is normally an increase in muscle mass during the strength-endurance phase).
The CNS is not as stimulated during the SE phase, but that’s actually a benefit as it allows for some CNS recovery. Immediately upon returning to a strength phase, the athlete might be able to handle slightly lower loads. But CNS efficiency is recovered after 2 sessions (I use whole body sessions during strength phases) and by the middle of the second week neural drive is actually increased and the athlete shatter his previous records easily.
Excellent. Thanks, Chris.