In Foundation Building, I covered four skill sets that I believe make up the base of all athletic endeavors. If you get good at all four of them, you will have an incredible level of general physical ability.
But the medleys recommended in that post train all four aspects at a time, in one session. This works great for novices with no training experience, or those who already train and want to add a day or two of Foundation work to their training week.
This article will cover another method of Foundation Building where each training session covers only one or two Foundational skills, at a higher intensity. If you have space in your training week for more focused work, this is a great option.
Skill Set Focus
The following subsections cover how to focus in on one specific skill set at a time.
Each uses a training method called contrast training. This simply means that we will do some heavy work and immediately do some quick/explosive work before resting. This is not only time efficient, but has been shown in a few studies to produce better results than training the two styles separately.
When doing the quick/explosive work, you want to focus on getting into a good starting position and accelerating quickly with as much force as you can muster. This work should be short, and done for low reps. Focus on executing each movement with precision and speed - don’t let yourself get sloppy.
From a program design standpoint, Foundation work focuses on minimal or low tech equipment, so none of the below should require specific forms of load. But you will require some heavy things to move about.
Hauling
The hauling focus is probably the most straight forward of the sessions.
Carry, push, or pull some load over whatever distance you have. You’ll have to figure out what load and distance combinations are the right amount of challenge. You can vary the carries from round to round, or stick with the same one.
Drop the load, get into position, and sprint back to where you started.
Rest for 2-3 minutes as you walk over to where you set the load down, then repeat from this side.
Start with 5 total rounds, working up to 10 over time. When you can do 10, increase the load and/or distance. You can also consider adding something like weighted vest on top of the load you move, so that you have additional weight when running too.
Vaulting
The vaulting focus can be done in a smaller space, without taking up too much room.
Perform a set of alternating reverse lunges. You want to hit around 10 reps per leg, so add load in your hands, hugged to your chest, or on your shoulders to make it challenging enough.
Setup and perform a set of 3 vertical jumps or broad jumps. Switch between the two from round to round. Each jump should be done with as much effort as you can muster, so take your time in the setup.
Rest for 2-3 minutes, and repeat.
Start with 5 total rounds, working up to 10 over time. When you can do 10, increase the lunge load. Eventually switch to single leg jumps as well, maybe even adding load when those get less challenging - make sure to alternate legs.
Throwing
Throwing will require you to have an object that can be thrown and a space to throw it in.
Perform a set of 10 pushups, using any variation that is challenging at 10 reps. You can change variations from round to round.
Stand up and perform a set of 3 chest throws. Throw the object, walk over to it, and throw it back to where you started.
Rest for 2-3 minutes and repeat.
Start with 5 total rounds, working up to 10 over time. When you can do 10, switch to harder pushup variations or use bands. Eventually switch to one-armed chest throws using the off-hand solely to guide - make sure to alternate arms.
Crawling
This one is going to interesting, as we’re adding in some climbing. You’ll need a pullup bar or rope of some sort, but at the bottom I will discuss an option that doesn’t need a bar.
Begin this focus session with a set of 5 reps of leg tucks. This video covers two different methods - you should alternate between the straight and lean-back versions from round to round.
Drop from the bar and bear crawl as quickly as you can without breaking form. The distance here is simply enough to be challenging.
Return the the bar and rest for 2-3 minutes before repeating.
Start with 5 total rounds, working up to 10 over time. When you can do 10, add one rep to all sets of leg tucks; as you get better, consider including backwards and sideways bear crawls as well.
Rope climbing is a great alternative for leg tucks - one I’d probably recommend first, but I expect it’s easier to find a pullup bar than a climbing rope for most people.
If you have neither bar nor rope, then begin with bear crawl drags using a heavy object, followed up with quick bear crawls as above.
Programming
Now that we know how, let's talk about when. These sessions should be short, but intense; the heavy portions done as heavy as possible, and the quick/explosive portions done with as much effort as you can muster. This means that each session should be fairly fatiguing.
With that in mind, I recommend doing each focus session on its own day. That is, four sessions per week, one focus each session. If you do more, whatever comes second will suffer.
But if you don’t have four days available in a week, you can pair them - Hauling & Crawling in one session, Vaulting & Throwing in the next. These pairings have the least amount of overlap. This opens you up for other activities during the week as you see fit.
I always try to eat my own dog food, as it were, and I will be training with these methods for the next 3-4 weeks. I welcome anyone to join me on this journey - post in the comments if you’re doing this with me!