Product review: Ultimate Offseason training Manual.

First off let me say that Eric Cressey is a very smart guy. He is one of the most innovative minds currently working in strength and conditioning today. His Ultimate off-season training manual is a great (if pricy) resource for it's intended audience. The intended audience seems to be ball sport athletes, their parents, and coaches of small programs. There is great information on athlete assessment, and the mistakes people make when designing an off-season training program. The manual does a great job in breaking up the off-season into 3 segments. For me these segments would be: "Recovery", "Assessment & Improvement", and "Conditioning." The author designates them by their time frame. Either way, these are important points that are missed by many athletes and coaches. The manual also does a great job emphasizing using the off-season to become a better athlete, to have an OFFseason, rather than a second season. While, I do recommend this book to anyone who is either an athlete or coach who does not have a strength and conditioning coach designing a program for them, there are a few weak points. The author specifically points out that a lot of these theories don't exactly apply for endurance athletes, and he does a good job of calling out the points that do not. However, I hoped that he would have an appendix that gave some information on how someone (like me) who's participates in a sport on the aerobic end of the spectrum, and who's year consists of 1-2 major competitions every 2-3 months could train more effectively. I understand Undulating Periodization, but if I didn't and I just dropped a benjamin, I'd be happier if that information was included, and not something I looked up online for free. Overall, it's a worthwhile investment.