Sport periodisation in plain words
Periodisation sounds academic, but the idea is simple: organise training over time so you get better and peak when it matters. Here is what it means for climbers.
Coach Lucian · · updated · 3 min read
Periodisation is one of those words that makes training sound more complicated than it is. Strip away the jargon and it means this: you organise your training over time, on purpose, so that you keep improving and are at your best when it matters. That is it. Everything else is detail.
If you have ever climbed hard all winter, felt flat by spring and wondered why, you have already met the problem periodisation tries to solve.
Where the idea comes from
Coaches have always varied training through the year, but the idea was formalised in the Soviet Union in the mid twentieth century. Matveyev described what is now called the classic or traditional model: a long preparatory period with lots of general, high-volume work, gradually shifting towards lower-volume, higher-intensity, sport-specific work, then a competition period and a transition (rest) period.
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