Matthew Rains Strength & Conditioning

Matthew Rains Strength & Conditioning Co-Director and Head of Athletic Development at AVOLVE Performance

18/02/2026

The story might be the story that strength and conditioning coaches read themselves to bed.

It’s a great eye opener for athletes and parents of athletes to understand that simply doing their sport more is not always the answer.

Yes, it probably should take up most of your training resources and depending on the demands of the sport will change the need for specialisation.

BUT, dedicating so much time to the sport itself without addressing the various other factors impacting sport performance can be a huge risk to overall development.

Don’t underestimate the effect of training variety
Don’t overestimate the need for specialisation

04/02/2026

IS BOUNCING CHEATING?

Fast eccentrics are an effective way for athletes to challenge rate of force development and develop overall power output, however, when we use a faster and faster eccentric - we tend to experience a ‘bounce’ effect.

In this experiment, we wanted to see if the bounce takes away much from our overall force output into the ground. We compared the spring we receive when bouncing off a box in a box squat, compared to slowly sitting on and off the box.

The result showed no real significant difference between each variation when it came to peak force production, however, the bounce allowed for higher eccentric forces and faster rep completion - which possibly helps challenge acceleration qualities.

Any thoughts on this experiment? Drop a comment below!

28/01/2026

How do we balance high intent and force with fluidity, timing and coordination?

Relaxation when it comes to athletics movements can be a touch confusing

But it can make or break your ability to achieve advanced levels of power and speed.

I like to separate developing relaxation into two categories:

Conscious development, which is purposefully trying to do things like:
- Uncleanch the hands and jaw
- Loosen the arms
- Pull back to 95% rather than going for 110% effort

Then there is unconscious development where training or days can be dedicated to:
- Submaximal sprints (tempos, flys, etc)
- Submaximal plyos

Both of these levers should be pulled in order to develop the rhythm, coordination, timing and physical elastic qualities needed to promote relaxation during high intensity efforts

21/01/2026

In this force decks experiment, well tested whether or not their is a unique benefit of the PAP mechanism with heavy loaded resistance training to jump performance compared to simply just doing more jumps.

We found there wasn’t much a difference between the two, with both methods achieving significant improvements in jump results.

What we can take from this is that there are probably many ways to potentiate high velocity movement performance, and usually would involves ‘jacking up’ the nervous system with higher output motor tasks like strength lifts, power training, max isometric pushes and sprinting.

Plenty of ways to skin a cat as they say.

Have any more thoughts on the topic? Leave a comment below!

19/01/2026

“I wish I started this earlier” is a quote we hear quite regularly

There are lots of myths and concerns when it comes to youth athletes and weight training.

Rightly so too, we should be wary and concerned for the safety of the up and coming superstars of tomorrow.

However, in our experience and with the current literature in mind, it actually points towards that not doing some sort of consistent resistance training under the supervision of a qualified strength and conditioning coach - may actually be more dangerous for their long term health in their sport.

Sport is volatile, chaotic and heavily loaded. Having a small commitment to resistance training weekly can help further prepare tissues for these demands but also develop strong routines/habits to help them succeed either professionally or to extend their sporting careers.

20/11/2025

Here’s a quick case study looking at one of the intro speed sessions for an OzTag athlete. We worked on two key positions to develop her efficiency and speed in max velocity.

If you’re keen for a FREE GUIDE to some of my go to coaching cues for creating effective changes in a few critical technique components for both acceleration and max velocity, comment ‘CUE’ and I’ll send it over to you!

06/11/2025

Linear progression is a myth

Otherwise everyone would be olympians 🤷🏻‍♂️

Athletes will look at their progress in the gym and being able to increase the weight on the bar week to week and see it as a standard for progression, but in most cases they simply increasing the intensity at which they train at or reducing the reps in reserve.

When consistently utilising velocity trackers and timing gates, we see progression in its true form, and it’s a little more chaotic than first assumed, however, gives us valuable information about whether our training programs are actually working or if things need to be adjusted.

Not measuring training consistently, assumes you’re getting better, when in reality you might be beating your head against the wall for months and years on end.

30/10/2025

Band assisted jumps are commonly touted to be an effective stimulus for developing greater speed and contact times.

This little experiment set out to see how much of a difference the band made to not only contact time but also force production for bilateral jumps.

I found that the bands didn’t achieve a dramatic or significant difference in contact times, even performing slightly worse for one athlete, compared to unassisted pogos as well as reductions in force production with assisted pogos.

Now, movement strategies are very unique and we can probably achieve some faster contact times with a few cues which may affect the results (also often resulting in less force and lower jump heights), but, without instruction, it was interesting to see not much of a difference on time spent on the floor here.

There may be a few possible reasons for this result from the top of my head I can think of:
1) repeated jump performance is heavily dictated by coordinative factors - having low exposure to band assistance may impact that ability - more exposure may influence this?
2) reduction in body weight load and landing forces may reduce elastic energy stored and sequential stiffness created
3) Achieving low ground contact times is a complex skill that goes beyond just simply a reduction in bodyweight loading

Or even just luck and needing a bigger sample size (particularly those newer to plyos or trying with single leg maybe have greater difference). Either way, if you’re looking to progress your plyos - maybe a band assistance doesn’t achieve the massive decreases in ground contact times you may expect and can also take away the amount of force we’re looking to transfer in those short time frames.

Keen to hear your thoughts in the comments below ⬇️

22/10/2025

ARE HATFIELDS CHEATING?

Now full disclosure, my bias sits with the Hatfield set up. I’m a fan of them and see them as a nice tool to take away the stability of a lift to maximise the load used and force generated in a particular position.

I’m sure there’s plenty of limitations with this small n=1 study and probably should have tested at heavier loads (couldn’t be assed loading 260kg again) but from this data, it’s probably fair to say that Hatfields will still require you to work hard and will be a good stimulus for force development.

20/10/2025

Here’s a case study of how our testing data highlighted some qualities that needed some extra focus in our initial training block and the strategies we use to develop them.

From our data, we know that you can’t just throw a bunch of plyos on athletes and hope they stick. You need to choose specific option that will stress that trait that you want to develop.

16/10/2025

It’s time to stop gassing out

These examples are ways we can look to target specific conditioning qualities that may be holding you back in your sport.

Covering both low intensity and high intensity qualities, try these sessions out if you’re keen for a bit of direction and focuses to build upon over time.

02/10/2025

Plyos can help create force capabilities, positions and coordination skills to help prepare for athletic movements like acceleration, max velocity and change of direction.

In my experience, athletes who report that they need to develop in these positions tend to also struggle with the mentioned associated plyometric/jump movements and benefit from exposure to them.

I like to look at acceleration requiring large amounts of horizontal displacement, generally having longer ground contact times to top speed and requiring greater initial concentric force to overcome inertia.

Max velocity requiring very fast ground contact times, foot recovery, rhythm, coordination and stiffness to be able to handle the extremely fast nature of it.

Change of direction to have big deceleration & eccentric demands, positioning, reactivity and high force capabilities in a variety of short & deeps ranges of motion.

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