The Not-so-secret Secrets to the success of Gator basketball

Matt Herring doesn't like when his players move dirty.

"Guys just don't move smooth when we start out with them. It's my job to clean that up," said Herring, the strength and conditioning coordinator for the UF Men's Basketball team.

Herring spoke to my Health and Fitness class on Sept. 17 about the philosophy behind techniques he uses in the gym to improve game on the court.

And although he doesn't like referring to his exercise plan as functional training ("That's a buzz word I hate," he said within the first five minutes of his talk), that's precisely what it is.

Inspired by physical therapist Gary Gray's principles of applied functional science, Herring and his staff used four truths of function to develop moves that, when mastered, should directly influence success in movement on the basketball court.

1. Basketball is played in an upright position
2. The body works in all three planes of motion at all times (sagittal, frontal and transverse)
3. Humans are gravity-driven
4. Muscles don't have brains -- we have to train the way we want our muscles to engage
   

That's something bicep curls just can't accomplish.

With limited practice time during the season (the NCAA mandates training no more than 20 hours a week), Herring utilizes exercises that are functionally dense.

He developed six basketball-specific moves, like short shuffles, bounding and vertical jumps, to address the skills basketball players need to maximize their effectiveness during a game.

As players begin to master the moves, he uses a progression sequence called GTEC -- Groove, Tweak, Enhance, Challenge -- to complicate them, which keeps athletes guessing and forces them to continue to develop.

Grooving the move addresses mobility issues, which could include a tight hip flexor that prevents a player from performing a lunge.

To tweak a move, Herring adjusts it to involve multiple planes of motion. To tweak a lunge, turn your foot inward but continue with the same motion.

Enhancing the move involves adding external resistance, such as wearing a weighted vest while lunging.

The final step in the progression, challenge, means combining two or more moves. These combination exercises, a shuffle to a run, for example, simulate movements players make dozens of times during a game.

Come back for a post about functional exercises for rowing. In the meantime, what sport do you play? What are some functional moves you can groove, tweak, enhance and challenge to clean up your performance?