Science for Sport Podcast - Episodes Tagged with “Power Training”

271: Strength First: Why It Underpins Everything

Science for Sport — Mon, 09 Jun 2025 06:00:00 +0100

In this week’s episode of the Science for Sport podcast, host Richard Graves is joined by Leicester Tigers’ Head of Performance, Matt Parr, a former professional rugby player turned strength and conditioning expert with experience across both rugby union and league.
Matt shares his fascinating journey from the pitch to the performance department, offering valuable insights drawn from his time at Leicester Tigers and Catalan Dragons. With a career that’s spanned both codes of rugby, Matt dives into the key physical demands of each sport and how training must adapt to meet them. He also lifts the lid on what really goes into building strength, power, and robustness across a long and gruelling season.

In this episode, you’ll learn:

The real physical differences between rugby union and rugby league – and why it’s not just “the same shaped ball”
How to build meaningful preseason plans that lay the foundation for success
Why strength underpins everything, and how it connects to power and injury prevention
The importance of athlete conversations over just relying on data
How Matt handles return-to-play protocols and balances performance with player wellbeing

Whether you're a coach in pro sport or working at grassroots level, this conversation is packed with practical takeaways and thought-provoking reflections on what it really takes to keep athletes performing at their best.

About Matt Parr
Matt Parr is the Head of Athletic Performance at Leicester Tigers and a former professional prop whose rugby career saw him represent clubs such as Sale Sharks, Saracens, London Irish, and Leicester. After transitioning from player to coach, Matt began his performance career at the Tigers in 2015, later becoming Lead S&C coach in 2020. In 2022, he took on the Head of Performance role at Catalan Dragons in rugby league, before returning to Leicester in mid‑2024 to bring his cross-code expertise back to the Tigers setup . With an MSc in strength and conditioning and a reputation for strategic planning, leadership, and performance optimisation. Matt combines top-level playing experience and science-backed coaching to help elite athletes perform and stay on the field.

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159: Improve Endurance Performance With Perfectly Planned Strength And Power Training

Science for Sport — Mon, 17 Apr 2023 02:00:00 +0100

In episode 159, Hector Romero, Strength & Conditioning Coach at TeamNL, joins us.

Specifically Hector will be looking at:

Importance of strength and power in endurance sports
Adapations to strength training in endurance sports
How to plan strength training for endurance sports

About Hector:

"Hector Romero is a Strength and Conditioning Coach based in the Netherlands. He has been in the industry for 10 years starting his studies at UNSW in Exercise Physiology and completing a Masters Exercise Science at ECU, Australia, whilst gaining experience as a personal trainer. After completing his studies he shifted to more sports performance specific work, working with a variety of athletes ranging from football, basketball, field hockey, tennis and kick boxing at both the amateur and professional level. He is currently work with TeamNL assisting in the physical preparation of the Dutch National Rowing team as well as a Speed Skating Talent Team whilst also running his own online training business, Potencia Athletica."

Website: https://potencia-athletica.com/

Instagram: hromerosnc
Facebook: Hector Romero

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110: Play More, Win More, Earn More: Reducing Injury Risk In Sport

Science for Sport — Mon, 09 May 2022 02:00:00 +0100

In episode 110, Christian Woodford, Strength and Conditioning Coach at Woodford SSC, joins us.

Specifically you will learn:

The importance of reducing injury risk
How to train to reduce injury risk
What NOT to do in the gym
How Christian programs for his athletes

About Christian

"Christian Woodford’s name is the biggest in sports performance, injury prevention and rehab – return to perform in Australia (while pioneering the growth, development and understanding of applied sport science/athletic development in The Australian private sector). Over the last 8 years (est. 2012) Christian & WSSC have become world renowned and some of the best coaches in the world such as Joe Defranco giving their tick of approval to WSSC & Christian.

Christian is known for his athlete centred and RESULTS driven approach to his coaching. Athletes from professional, semi professional, amateur to weekend warrior (both here and abroad) have all hire Christian to prepare them for sporting performance, injury reduction & rehab -return to perform coaching.

Christian’s passion for applied sport science, coaching and the industry has developed him into the coach that is #changingthegame in the private sector not just in Australia but around the world.

Christian offers consultancy for teams, individual athletes, coaches, students and upskill for other personal training, coaching companies."

Instagram/Twitter: @coachwoodford @WoodfordSSC

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