The 1 Thing Everyone Needs: Power

The Work Equation

Work = Force * Distance

Work is defined as the amount of force transferred over a certain distance. A higher force or distance equals greater work!

How does this tie in together?

Let’s take a sled push as our example. The sled weighs 100 lbs and the distance you have to push is 50 yards. The work is pushing the sled the full 50 yards. Power is doing the work divided by time. You approach the sled and push it the whole way in 10 seconds. Your gym buddy pushes the same sled for the same distance in 15 seconds. You and your buddy can both do the work, but you have greater power! You have greater power because you pushed the same sled the same distance in less time than your gym buddy.

Now that we understand power, let’s go back to our three scenarios of the football running back, the tennis serve, and the soccer shot. The running back can carry a ball 50 yards to the house and if he does it in a shorter time than his teammates, then he is the most powerful running back when comparing the same work in less time. Same with the tennis serve and the soccer ball flying through the air on goal. If anyone attempts to serve the tennis ball or strike the soccer ball the same distances as our professionals, but cannot seem to get it there in the same time or better as our pros, then we are less powerful.

After learning about power and its relevance to athletics and gym scenarios, are you now able to make the connection with the aging population? The less powerful a grandparent is, the harder it will be to complete tasks like we referred earlier. Taking in the groceries is a product of power. The force needed to move the groceries over a set distance from car to kitchen and the time it takes are all components of power. Just like picking up their grandkids from the floor to the couch. The quicker it can be done is a more powerful movement.

 How do we increase our power?

The best way to improve power is to increase force over distance in a short amount of time. Okay. Okay. I know I just restated the whole formula, but it really is that simple. Power training defined in most strength and conditioning textbooks have these guidelines for someone to implement into their training program. Power during training utilized 0-20% of your 1 rep max at low reps and low to high reps. The rest component is crucial as well. It’s recommended to rest between 2-3 minutes between sets. The reason the rest time is so long is because we want to have the nervous system recharge to get maximal effort and input to all of the muscles working. It’s not how heavy or forceful the movement is. It’s also how quickly it is performed. Remember there is a time component. We can only be as quick and efficient when we are fully recovered.

This concept is different from endurance. You might think, “I need to train hard and for a long time to work on producing the same force over a long period of time.” Our endurance is another key to how well we can perform, but it does not help you create maximal tension in our body to perform an explosive movement like box jump, striking a soccer ball, or hitting a 40 yard dash. Those movements are powerful, again, because the time component is so short.