Football training for most athletes should include Olympic weightlifting movements--from lineman to running backs. High school strength and conditioning coaches must teach athletes to perform the snatch, clean, and jerk. These three exercises offer a starting point for football training in the Olympic lifts.

Low hang cleans teach football players the “power position”. The power position is essential for this movement, along with almost every movement on the football field. Low hang cleans help build explosiveness from the hips, all the way through the lower body as well as being aggressive with the upper body at the top of the lift. A very similar movement on the football field is making a tackle, you explode through the hips while making contact with the shoulder and then continue to drive with the legs as the upper body finishes.

OTM stands for on the minute. At Garage Strength that means you complete your set and then have one minute of rest before you start your next set. This is a very powerful tool for football players because it most closely simulates a game. You exert the most power you can during the set, take a break and then have to do it again, just like resting between plays on the field and then get ready for the next play to go all out.

Pause at the knee power snatch is great for holding positions. Pausing at the knee, one teaches the athlete how to bring their knees back and engage the hamstring, and two after the pause it teaches he/she to recruit necessary muscle group to fire and finish the lift. This is so much how to play football, going from running, breaking down and cutting, breaking down and exploding through someone to finish the play.