Silverback,
I think the confusion comes into play because all of these implements are different. GPP refers to developing the energy systems and work capacity that is slightly different than what is specific to your sport, but helps to improve your overall conditioning (work capacity, general strength, etc.). It doesn’t matter if you are lifting a keg, a barbell or another human being, if it is in the work bracket that is specific to your sport, it is specific, if not, it is general.
[quote]silverback3433 wrote:
One other thing. Isn’t GPP just a cool and scietific phrase for just plain moving, carrying in groceries, cleaning up your house, walking to get the mail, holding your child. I am not trying to be a wise ass, but it sounds like people felt gay if they said cardio, or conditioning. So GPP was born to make you sound more hardcore. I just hate when this stuff get’s made up. Again why are doing d-bell presses on a physio ball “functional” but doing them heavier on a bench is for meatheads and isn’t sport’s specific. Don’t even get me started on “sport’s specific” training.[/quote]
You’re confusing things. GPP and functional strength are not necessarily related; GPP is to improve conditioning, functional strength is something made up to sell stability balls.
GPP doesn’t have to be cardio related at all, especially for a powerlifter who’s trying to improve his recovery, not become more cardiovascular.
In the words of one of the guys who posts over at elitefts (I forget which one): if you just wanna get yourself breathing hard, smoke a pack of marlboro’s unfiltered.
I’d like to get you started; what’s your beef with training smart to improve your sport?
-Dan
Sports’ specific training to me does not exist, but that is another thread and I have no beef with training smart to improve sports performance. I understand GPP can involve many things. Power lifters will drag a sled for 15 minutes and call it GPP. If you walk on a treadmill for 15 minutes it is called cardio. I am not trying to confuse things I am using them a s analogies. When something is done in a traditional way it has a different name then when it is done with a new device.
Again this is just an analogy but why are doing military presses on a physio ball “funtional” and doing them on a bench is not. That is what I am asking with GPP. Running for 20 minutes is not GPP or is it? Does GPP have to involve using some sort of weighted device?
Silverback, I think that your last post says it all. It has become a relatively nebulous term. I think it comes down to what you are GPPreparing for.
Briefly, for conversation’s sake, let’s take a relatively new powerlifter with a decent relative level of base strength who is in the second week of his meet cycle. I would consider him to be farily well conditioned going into the training cycle.
He is having difficulty completing accesory movements with weight he should be able to handle, has handled easily in the past.
The only difference is that the volume of the core lift, which preceeds the accesory work, has increased quite a bit. Let’s say that it is in the bench press and he is doing reps in his shirt, perhaps 3 sets of 3, with a considerable amount more weight than he uses al fresco.
What do you perceive to be the cause this and how would you address it? Is it a “GPP” issue?
I would define GPP as work outside of your specific work bracket that improves your overall athletic qualities in some way. That might be too broad of a definition, but I think it works.
For a 100m sprinter, running 400m to build up endurance would be GPP, but for a 400m runner, running 400m would be “specific.”
For a powerlifter doing circamax work would be specific, but high-rep dumbell presses would be GPP.
I don’t think GPP has to involve exotic devices or weird movements. I could be wrong, but that’s just my two cents.
Doing Presses on a Physio Ball might be more difficult than on a bench, however this does not necessarily make it a more “functional” form of training. It will require the use of more stabilizers, but that is about it. If your sport doesn’t require balancing on balls then you are ass out. However, this is not GPP training.
GPP ought to be performed by an athlete prior to beginning off season work. For instance, NFL’ers will be showing up to their respective complexes around the end of March for their optional offseason conditioning (which will last somewhere in the neighborhood of 12 weeks). The first two weeks will be spent on re-introducing themselves to rigorous workouts by performing very general exercises like interval work (light sprinting, cone drills), unilateral work, ball work, med ball work etc…
Bompa would refer to this period as Anatomical Adaptation. After this 2 weeks (or so) they will begin to increase volume and weight, and hopefully their bodies have adapted to the new stress levels brought on by intense workouts. They should have also identified any areas that they specifically need to work on in order to restabilize or rebalance to avoid future injury.
20min. of treadmill cardio, or 15 min of sled dragging do not qualify as GPP. GENERAL being the key word–total body pre-“conditioning” if you will. Throw in the weight work, the balance work and the structural work and increase recovery ability and you have yourself GPP.
[quote]silverback3433 wrote:
Sports’ specific training to me does not exist[/quote]
Not trying to insult you, but that right there kind of sums up why you’re confused about all the terms being used these days; you don’t know the background from which they come. I’d recommend Zatsiorsky’s “Science and Practice of Strength Training” as a good start.
Best,
Dan
I think most S & C Coaches as well as most trainees over use GPP training. Most athletes of the past used some form of GPP training with out even realizing it (exp. Demolition crews, laborers, construction laborers, recreational activities such as mountain biking, surfing, ext…).
That leads me to another point professional Demolition work is the ultimate form of GPP (try using a 50 lb sledge for 7 hours per day, along with loading wheelbarrows with bricks, stone and other heavy odd shaped objects), bar-none!
GPP work should be utilized to build work capacity and assist with recover.
By the way strongman training could be called weighted GPP.
[quote]buffalokilla wrote:
silverback3433 wrote:
Sports’ specific training to me does not exist
Not trying to insult you, but that right there kind of sums up why you’re confused about all the terms being used these days; you don’t know the background from which they come. I’d recommend Zatsiorsky’s “Science and Practice of Strength Training” as a good start.
Best,
Dan
[/quote]
I agree with silverback3433 on his statement that Sports’ specific training does not exist. There’s more info about that in an old roundtable on this site, CT was the moderator.
Perhaps GPP articles are or were out of control compared to the people actually grasping the concept and performing GPP.
A couple yrs back I told a trainer friend of mine that GPP is the next buzz word after “functional training”. He told me that “functional” was gonna be around for a while. Fast forward to this year, he calls me up to say I was right.
For some odd reason he thinks I am a training genius (I guessed three workout trends so far that his gym wasn’t prepared for haha) and he asks what would be a good GPP workout. I took a page/workout out of a good GPP article here at T-Nation- ‘Plate loading the leg press’. After mulling the idea around in his head he figured that yoga and LSD runs would be better. At that point I felt CrossFit would have been better advice! rofl.
What GPP is is relative to the specific sport you are training for. I have heard several coaches say that GPP improves physical capacities not developed by your specific sport, but that will improve your body and thus improve your performance in that sport. For example, my sport, wrestling, will develop anaerobic capacity but not develop maximal strength; hence, for me, GPP is lifting weights to improve max strength, as it will help me but is not developed by my sport. 400 meter runs are ‘sport-specific’ conditioning rather than GPP because it is a physical attribute developed by my sport.
Some people here have got it right:
GPP has nothing to do at all with swinging a kettlebell for reps or bearhugging a sandbag.
Listen to Alwyn Cosgrove’s doubletap interview.
Unless your sport is powerlifting, bench press, deadlift and squat are all GPP.
Since i dont know of anybody who does competitive bicep curls or anything, they are all GPP too. Ropeclimbing is GPP, unless you happen to be a competitive rope climber.
Whenever you stretch, say, to improve a problem with an olympic lift (which is your sport), then stretching too, becomes GPP.
If you train purely to get lots of pussy, then sex is your sport and everything else you do is GPP.
Reminds me of something Dan John wrote where he asked a guy what sport he trained for, and he said ‘my sport is bodybuilding’. Fair enough, have you ever competed in a bodybuilding comp? Oh no, I just do it for me… then bodybuilding isnt really your sport then is it? Its just a pasttime or a hobby or something until you have at least entered something.
Words that sunk in to me hard.
If you train purely to get lots of pussy, then sex is your sport and everything else you do is GPP.
So let me see if I understand this. If sex is my sport, then rubbing one out to Lois on “the family guy” is my GPP.
[quote]deadgame wrote:
Doing Presses on a Physio Ball might be more difficult than on a bench, however this does not necessarily make it a more “functional” form of training. It will require the use of more stabilizers, but that is about it. If your sport doesn’t require balancing on balls then you are ass out. However, this is not GPP training.
GPP ought to be performed by an athlete prior to beginning off season work. For instance, NFL’ers will be showing up to their respective complexes around the end of March for their optional offseason conditioning (which will last somewhere in the neighborhood of 12 weeks). The first two weeks will be spent on re-introducing themselves to rigorous workouts by performing very general exercises like interval work (light sprinting, cone drills), unilateral work, ball work, med ball work etc…
Bompa would refer to this period as Anatomical Adaptation. After this 2 weeks (or so) they will begin to increase volume and weight, and hopefully their bodies have adapted to the new stress levels brought on by intense workouts. They should have also identified any areas that they specifically need to work on in order to restabilize or rebalance to avoid future injury.
20min. of treadmill cardio, or 15 min of sled dragging do not qualify as GPP. GENERAL being the key word–total body pre-“conditioning” if you will. Throw in the weight work, the balance work and the structural work and increase recovery ability and you have yourself GPP.[/quote]
I know D-bell presses are not GPP, again it was an analogy and isn’t everything you just said have to do with conditioning? Mini camp is to get in condition and to practice skills. Anatomical adaptation is another fancy phrase for practice. I am not claiming to Know more than Bompa but when I see that term I read it as practice.
When football players report to mini camp and do drills it is to practice movements and to condition right? When I played hoop in college we did about 10 minutes of dynamic flex work to warm up for practice. Lunges, inch-worms, lat lunges, high knees etc. This was a warm up.
In the off season I would do 20 minutes aday of dynamic flex. I considered this flexibilty training and conditioning, especially when I started doing combinations of 2 or three movements. So, am I wrong insaying that GPP and conditioning are the same as well as saying anatomical adaptation and practice are the same?
[quote]apwsearch wrote:
Silverback, I think that your last post says it all. It has become a relatively nebulous term. I think it comes down to what you are GPPreparing for.
Briefly, for conversation’s sake, let’s take a relatively new powerlifter with a decent relative level of base strength who is in the second week of his meet cycle. I would consider him to be farily well conditioned going into the training cycle.
He is having difficulty completing accesory movements with weight he should be able to handle, has handled easily in the past.
The only difference is that the volume of the core lift, which preceeds the accesory work, has increased quite a bit. Let’s say that it is in the bench press and he is doing reps in his shirt, perhaps 3 sets of 3, with a considerable amount more weight than he uses al fresco.
What do you perceive to be the cause this and how would you address it? Is it a “GPP” issue?[/quote]
I would say it is a few things. Fist of all he has not adapted to the new workout yet. This will take a few more of the workouts before he can progress. I do not call that GPP. Let’s take GVT for example, the only way to get better at GVT is to do it. Week after week you add more weight because you are getting stronger and in better shape. I would call that adaptation.
After a couple of workouts his weights will increase and he will be able to maintain a certain level of strength for a longer time. So his GPP is doing the workout over and over again until he gets better at it. I would not do GVT after a layoff. I would start a total body type of program 3 days per week and build work my way up. I wouldn’t call that GPP I would say that this getting back in shape by starting an exercise program. Basically all working out will prepare you for anything physical.
Like the gentleman said in an earlier post his GPP for being better at his sport is weight training. Does he need to do GPP to get better at weight training to get better at his sport? That is a lot of work that may not translate into being better at your sport.
Great answer.
What I am kind of getting at is that what is happening with this lifter could be largely attributed to his work capacity.
However, IMHO, the most effective way for adaption to occur is through persistence in the task at hand, not introducing new activity under the guise of raising his “GPP.”
[quote]nolecat wrote:
If you train purely to get lots of pussy, then sex is your sport and everything else you do is GPP.
So let me see if I understand this. If sex is my sport, then rubbing one out to Lois on “the family guy” is my GPP.
[/quote]
Yeah, and if being a pervert is your sport, then you just won a medal 
gpp is dumb…weightlifting most of the time is dumb. i love to do olympic lifts. move some really heavy weight man. im a meathead, as are all of u. i should prolly do some more cardio. i am too big and out of shape. i really like cake too. lol.
Silverback~
It just depends on your sport and your goals. GPP has made Mario a beast…
Mario is able to train far harder than most everyone else do to his extremely good shape.
Now, all of the implements you are talking about are just extensions of the Perform Better business plan… are the implements better?.. probably due to a far more unstable nature, but are they necessary? Only if they are used in your actual sport…
For other sports such as athletics and team sports, GPP is absolutely vital. Guys like Charlie Francis have demonstarted that most of the gains seen by track sprinters derive from their level of condiditoning… GPP. Then, ability and sound training drive you from great to elite…
It is similar in many sports… fatigue makes coawards of us all…
So true.
If you sport is to move huge weight in the BP and Squat, or single lifts in the Olympics Lifts, then GPP must only be done to keep your ability to handle volume primed… but the actual competition requires little ability to maintain performance…
If you look at the Westside articles, you will see that what they are talking about for GPP would be very simple (with relative weight of course) for a soccer player, but the needs of the sport are amazingly different.
Personally, I use barbells like yourself. The other stuff is much like the ‘cutting edge’ crap you see in Sports Illustrated articles about NFL guys… mostly colorful, varied stuff to keep their attention… much like a small child…
I use the same thing with all of my athletes (weight vests, sleds, etc…)
You have to trick them into doing work…
J