Structural Balance

Structural balance is a concept that I have been intrigued by for over 10 years. Charles Poliquin, to my knowledge, was the first to popularize this concept. His view is that there is an optimal strength ratio for multiple lifts and muscle groups of the upper and lower body. Charles Poliquin, along with Bill Starr, where the first two guys I really studied when I first started lifting. I still use many of his concepts to this day. Much like movement screening, these tests should reveal where an athlete is weak and what area he needs to bring up in order to be able to perform at his highest level. If an area is severly lacking, it is what is holding the lifter or athlete back.  He based all of the upper body tests on the 14 inch close grip bench press. Here are the ratios...
100%-Close Grip Bench Press
83%-45 degree Incline Bench Press-Medium Grip
81%-Chinups-Bodyweight + added weight
64%-Behind the Neck Press
46%-Preacher Curl with a Straight Bar
30%-Reverse Barbell Curl
9%-External Rotations-Done for 8 reps instead of max single. Search his article for a description on how to do this exercise.

When I ran the numbers on myself, I found that I was weak on preacher curl and external rotations. This wasn't suprising as I have done maybe 10 sets ever of preacher curl and haven't worked my external rotators directly in quite some time.

I know he has one for the lower body but haven't been able to find much about it. The only thing I found is that your front squat should be 85% of your back squat. I am sure that this is a high bar olympic back squat along with a full front squat.

Test yourself and see where you stand.

Movement Screening

Movement Screening is becoming one of my main interests. I believe that Gray Cook leads in this area and most others have followed suit. The information you can get from some of these tests are invaluable for your athletes and for you. The best example I can think of is with my offensive lineman. If you watch the NFL Combine at all, you will hear Mike Mayock say knee-bender and waist-bender one bazillion times. Now I am no movement expert at all. If anything, I am only an expert on how to raise two sets of twins. However, if you look at the ability to bend at the waist, it all begins at the ankle. If athletes are able to properly dorsiflex their ankle joint, then they are more able to keep their upper bodies in a good power position because the center of mass will always seek to stay over the base of support. So if you have someone with tight ankles, they must bend at the waist in order to keep their weight over their base of support. For this reason it is imperative that coaches institute drills and exercises that emphasize dorsiflexion, particularly with the knee flexed. I have found that one of the best ways to do this is with a loaded full squat stretch. We will assume a squat stance with the bar on our back as if we are going to perform full squats. I then instruct our athletes to squat down as far as they are able to go. Most of our dorsiflexion challenged athletes will immediately feel a stretch behind their ankles. We will then sway (think baseball catcher receiving a ball on the black) from side to side to deepen the stretch. I have had one athlete in particular who has totally changed his ability to bend at the knees after about 6 weeks of doing this 3 times per week. He might have acquired the ability earlier, I just didn't notice it until then. He went from having to bend at the waist to keep the bar over the middle of the foot, to being able to sit completely upright with his knees past his toes and the bar over the base of support. This ability in invaluable for all types of athletes and especially my football offensive lineman and defensive lineman.

Other useful drills...
Loaded Duck Walks
Stretches on a Seated Calf Raise
Overhead squats
Overhead duck walks
Not allowing your kids to wear those stupid shoes with the air and bouncy mechanisms in the heal their whole life.