It is one of the most common questions parents ask our coaches: "Should my athlete keep training once the season starts?" The short answer is yes. The better answer is yes, but the training should change. Athletes who understand the difference between in-season and off-season work get faster and stronger every year. Athletes who treat training as an off-season-only activity spend every fall giving back what they built over the summer.
Here is how we think about the year-round rhythm at Momentum Athletic Performance, and how you can apply it to your athlete's calendar.
The off-season: where speed and strength are built
The off-season is the construction phase. With no games on the weekend and lighter practice loads, athletes can train more often, push harder and focus on the qualities that take time to develop: acceleration mechanics, top-end speed, strength and power. This is when two to three sessions a week make sense, and when the biggest measurable jumps happen on our DASHR timing gates.
If your athlete only trains during one part of the year, make it this one. But do not let it be the only one.
In-season: maintain, sharpen, protect
Once games begin, practices and competition take most of an athlete's weekly energy. That does not mean training stops. It means the dose changes. One to two focused sessions a week is usually enough to hold onto off-season gains, and holding on matters more than parents realize: qualities like strength and speed fade over a long season when they are never trained.
Good in-season training looks like this:
- Lower volume: fewer total reps and sprints, so training adds to the week instead of draining it
- Maintained intensity: short, quality efforts that keep speed and strength sharp
- Technique upkeep: sprint mechanics and lifting form stay coached, so habits do not slide mid-season
- Awareness of the game calendar: heavier work early in the week, lighter work near game day
Coach's Tip
Schedule in-season training on your athlete's lightest practice day, as far from game day as the week allows. One well-placed session beats two poorly placed ones, and our coaches will happily help you pick the right slot from the weekly schedule.
The year-round rhythm
Zoom out and the year looks like a cycle: build in the off-season, sharpen in the pre-season, maintain in-season, then reset and start building again. Each phase feeds the next. An athlete who follows that rhythm for two or three years ends up dramatically ahead of one who trains in random bursts.
This is exactly why our memberships and 10-packs are built to flex across the whole year: the same package covers heavier off-season weeks and lighter in-season weeks, so families never have to start and stop. And because every training group runs in small, coached sessions, the intensity of each workout is adjusted to what the athlete's week actually looks like.
What about multi-sport athletes?
For a lot of families in Canal Winchester, there is no true off-season. Soccer runs into basketball runs into track. That is fine. Multi-sport athletes simply live on the in-season side of the dial for more of the year, with short build windows between seasons. The key is consistency: one or two sessions a week, every week, sustained across the whole calendar. Over a year, that steady work compounds into real speed.
It also gives young athletes something their sport practices rarely provide: dedicated time on the qualities underneath every sport: sprinting, decelerating, jumping, landing and lifting with sound technique, all supervised by CSCS and Parisi-certified coaches.
The bottom line for parents
- Off-season: 2-3 sessions per week to build speed and strength
- In-season: 1-2 sessions per week to maintain what was built
- Multi-sport: stay consistent year-round at a sustainable dose
- Never: stop entirely for months at a time
Check the weekly class schedule to see which sessions fit around your athlete's practices. Most families find a rhythm within the first two weeks.