Imagine a world where you’re not constantly nursing an injury. Buckle up because relative strength could be your ticket.

I had a young man join our squad 2 years ago. He came in with high expectations, junior international, sports scholar, could he be the saviour we had been looking for. Sadly, he only played 7 out for 30 matches.

He had constant injuries, those niggly ones which keep you from playing your best, hamstring, calf, the hip. He could barely get though training, let alone play 2 games a week at the highest level of field hocky in the country.

This year this same guy, well he managed to play every single game, being a 19-year-old playing week in week out against grizzled veteran of premier league hockey to future Olympians and 100 cap senior internationals.

Why was he able to do this? Well one of the reasons I believe is because of his improvements in strength relative to his body weight.

Relative strength is how strong are you relative to your bodyweight. It is so so important for those who want to compete and perform week on week. And here are the reasons why?

Number 1: You can handle the forces of the game

Change of directions, sprinting exposed the body to huge forces from 3-5x your bodyweight. Repeatedly being exposed to them game after game, leads to fatigue in the body, so the stronger you are the better able you can handle this from game to game

Number 2: You recover quicker

It has been shown that stronger people recover quicker, and in a 2 game week this allows you to bounce back and be prepared to excel game to game, week to week.

Number 3: You perform better

Numerous research studies have shown that strength is the base to power, stronger people can perform more athletically, sprinting faster, better at change of direction, jumping higher. This is key to not just being on the pitch but making an impact

Number 4: It’s a get out of jail free card

You will always end up in weird positions while you play, being stronger can be a get out of jail free card. I have seen individuals who you see perform a movement and you think surely they aren’t getting up but bam, there they are standing up getting struck in.

How to work it out?

Well you do the weight you lifted divided by your body weight.

So if you are 100kg and squat 180kg that would be 1.8 kg per body weight.

So what is good?

Good depends on what movements you do and your sport. However, for lower body here are my suggestions which I have found are good scores.

Back Squat 1.8kg per body weight

Front Squat 1.5kg per body weight

Deadlift 2kg per body weight

RDL 1.8kg per body weight

Upper body depends on the sport, but these are two I think will help any sport

Chin up 30% of your body weight

Bench Press 1.2kg per body weight

Press Up 20% of your body weight

Summery

Improve your relative strength is key, so keep pushing that over time. Make sure you are working on being balanced with this, so push pull, squat and hinge, you will find you will have less injuries through the season.