Train Like an Athlete: The Key to Building Strength, Resilience, and Lifelong Fitness

As the years stack up in my career as a physical preparation coach, I’ve become increasingly convinced of one thing: the most effective way to build strong, resilient humans is to train them to move like athletes. That means more than just lifting heavy or chasing numbers — it’s about being able to move in every direction, generate and absorb high levels of force, and maintain strong positions under a variety of loading patterns.

This kind of athletic movement isn’t just for sport. It’s the foundation for a body that performs better, stays healthier, and thrives in every aspect of life. That’s why our approach to training will always combine the elements that build strength, conditioning, resilience, and movement efficiency — all through multiple modalities and planes of motion.

Beyond the Basics: Where Most Programs Fall Short

Many training programs get stuck in the same movement patterns over and over again — think power cleans, deadlifts, squats, and pull-ups. These vertical patterns are excellent for force production and muscular development, but real life doesn’t happen in a straight line.

To truly prepare the body for life — and reduce the risk of injury — we need to complement those foundational lifts with movements that challenge us in lateral, diagonal, and rotational planes. We need to jump, cut, rotate (and resist rotation), sprint, push, pull, hinge, lunge, and squat from all angles and under various loads. This is how we build balanced strength and a body capable of handling anything life throws our way.

Movement Should Look — and Feel — Athletic

Every coach should be preaching this: the goal is to move with the effortless fluidity of an athlete. Unfortunately, too many trainers miss the mark. They either chase gimmicks — like unstable surfaces and circus-like exercises — or they push everyone into being full-on powerlifters or Olympic lifters.

Now, don’t get me wrong — unstable surface training has a place, but it’s mostly in rehab or injury-prevention contexts. The key is balance. True functional training works across multiple planes and teaches the body to move the way the real world demands: forward, backward, sideways, diagonally, and rotationally.

Strength and Aerobic Capacity: The Twin Pillars of Longevity

Research is clear: two of the most important factors for quality of life as we age are strength and aerobic capacity. The number one reason people enter assisted living is a loss of strength. As coaches, it’s on us to understand what kind of strength creates lifelong adaptation.

That means going beyond bilateral (understanding the deficiencies that the “bilateral deficit” creates) barbell lifts and incorporating single-arm, single-leg, rotational, and anti-rotational work. It means challenging the body with different loading patterns and positions to improve balance, coordination, and stability — all essential for real-world strength and function.

Build Coordination Before Capacity

Too often, coaches jump straight into intensity and capacity before establishing the foundations of balance, coordination, and symmetry. That’s a recipe for compensation, overuse injuries, and burnout. Short-term gains might happen, but they come at the expense of long-term resilience.

Our job is to refine movement quality first — focusing on structure, coordination, and control. That foundation leads to greater strength and power, higher capacity, and far fewer injuries.

Real Functional Training Builds Resilient Humans

A true functional training program should be progressive, multi-planar, and dynamic. It should challenge the body from different angles, with different loads, and in different positions. Done right, this approach doesn’t just build stronger athletes — it builds stronger humans.

The result? A system that’s more powerful, more adaptable, more resilient, and more capable of thriving — in the gym and in life.

Yours In Fitness,