465: Ty Terrell on Optimizing Loading Patterns in Athletic Movement

Today's podcast features Ty Terrell, Director of Strength and Conditioning for Oklahoma Men’s Basketball. Ty brings deep experience from the NBA, having led performance programs for the Washington Wizards and Atlanta Hawks. He specializes in athlete development, performance testing, and biomechanics-driven return-to-play protocols. Ty has been mentored by Lee Taft and Bill Hartman, and has a unique fusion of abilities and methods in human performance. Typically, the goal of athletic performance training is based on increasing outputs, muscle size, and aerobic capacities. Less emphasis is given to athletic movement qualities, how the body creates space for motion, and the process of loading and releasing energy. In understanding both outputs and movement dynamics, a more comprehensive training experience can be provided. On today’s podcast, Ty speaks on optimizing the phases of athletic movement, particularly the “unloading” and reversal phases of squat and jump patterns that are often missed in training. He discusses the balance and interplay of movement-oriented training with strength and output capabilities. From a practical perspective, Ty gets into the nuts and bolts of unweighting methods, opening space in squat and hinge patterns, working absorption and propulsion with cables, step-up dynamics, and much more. Today’s episode is brought to you by Hammer Strength. Use the code “justfly25” for 25% off any Lila Exogen wearable resistance training, including the popular Exogen Calf Sleeves. For this offer, head to Lilateam.com View more podcast episodes at the podcast homepage. (https://www.just-fly-sports.com/podcast-home/) Timestamps 2:45- Holistic Athlete Development in College Sports 11:06- Organic Skill Development Through Free Play 19:04- Optimizing Movement Patterns for Athletic Success 20:06- Biomechanical Efficiency in Training Practices 29:52- Optimal Force Production for Athletic Enhancement 38:04- Optimizing The Phases of Athletic Movement for Vertical Jump Outcomes 47:44- Band-Assisted Unweighting for Muscle Recovery 53:54- Optimizing Movement Quality with Training Modifications 55:27- Optimizing Movement Quality Through Unweighting Methods 1:01:43- Efficient Transition Phases in Vertical Jumping 1:09:30- Cable Unweighting for Enhanced Movement Patterns 1:13:31- Cable Lifts and Step-Up Techniques Quotes (18:21) "I keep things very simple. I don't get far away from like, just the traditional movements. You have to be able to squat well enough." - Ty Terrell (22:40) "The unweighting phase creates the potential for the braking phase. The braking phase slingshots us into the propulsive or concentric phase." - Ty Terrell (23:15) "You need output, you need to be able to produce that quickly. But there are aspects of movement quality that will negatively impact your propulsive output. So you have to have both. And I think the biggest thing is to find is to define what is good enough in your situation." - Ty Terrell (40:12) "I think you're trying to get the most with the least. And the priority is to make them feel like they can go out and play. So it's more restorative." - Ty Terrell (44:48) "I kind of want that inflammatory process to occur in the off-season. So, you know, the adaptations and responses that come with that as opposed to the season, it's like we're trying to dampen those inflammatory responses so we can do something the next day." - Ty Terrell (49:00) "A big thing we do either at the beginning of the workout to learn movement or to learn how to move in a Low threshold way we do a kind of sandwich. Maybe we had a sprint day, maybe at an encore workout, then we're going to sandwich the day with, hey, like another like 10 minutes of low threshold work and unweighting, you know, so like front foot elevated split squats." - Ty Terrell (50:31) "You have to find a way to come back into that space a little bit or else you won't be able to acces...