What is a “DOMINATE” Athlete?

I thought that a good way of starting off this article index would be to define in as articulate a way possible what it is that a DOMINATE Athlete needs to be in order to succeed at Dominate Athletic™. On the other hand if an athlete comes to us without these qualities they will soon become a part of that person’s character as they push through difficult sessions and achieve their goals.

Character

A DOMINATE Athlete is one, first and foremost, who has courage. This is no small matter. It will take a lot of courage just to make the decision to put other things aside (tv, friends, parties, etc.) in order to take up the challenge of achieving the goals that one so eagerly desires. This is no proverbial “walk in the park.” To achieve your specific athletic goals will mean giving up certain luxuries in order to “put your hand to the grindstone” and make things happen. It always makes me chuckle when I watch those infomercials that say “you will get 6-pack abs in just 3 minutes a day” or “with this machine we take the ‘work’ out of ‘workout'”! That does just not run right with me, I cannot believe people buy into this stuff … but they do and in the past I have done so as well – touché. However, it just does not work that way! At Dominate Athletic™ we have the courage to call a spade a spade and know that we are going to need to “bring it” and “dig deep” consistently over a lengthy period of time in order to achieve those goals we so eagerly desire.

From a character perspective a DOMINATE Athlete will also need plenty of drive and determination, as well as self-discipline and perseverance. Without these qualities we will not achieve success, but with them we will change lives (our’s and others’).

Okay, so that is what a DOMINATE Athlete is from a character perspective, now what do they need in order to get through the sessions and then DOMINATE their opposition on Game Day from a physical perspective?

Physical

At Dominate Athletic™ we believe in training the athlete as a whole. This means we first train the athlete to become as complete and proficient in ALL athletic qualities as we can, and only after that do we specialise for their particular sport/position. Often while doing the general athletic work, they find that they take giant strides forward with regard to their specific sport’s performance – even before we have specialised. And the benefits of this approach for injury prevention are obvious. We aim to build the complete athlete.

The complete athlete would master these physical qualities and would show proficiency in a vast number of tasks without specifically specialising in any one in particular. These are:

• Range Of Motion (Flexibility)
• Coordination
• Balance (muscular + proprioceptive)
• Mobility (Especially in the Ankles + Hips)
• Stability (Especially in the Knees, Lower Back + Scapulae)
• Muscular Strength
• Explosive Power
• Speed (Reaction, Acceleration + Pure Speed)
• Agility (Game Speed)
• Endurance (Anaerobic + Aerobic)

It is once we have built a solid athletic foundation consisting of these physical qualities that we start to specialise our training programme specifically for our athlete and their sport.

Conclusion

In following articles we will look more in depth at what it is and what it requires to become “the complete athlete.”

I would like to conclude this first article on DominateAthletic.com by sharing with you a quote that has been with me for a while and has helped me in the tough times to bring perspective to this life we live.

“These things I do, because oftentimes hard things are worth doing.” Graham Dean on Training Hard.

Dig Deep!

Graham Dean.