A brief introduction to the idea of micro-dosing your training plan. When you have limited time in a training week and you need to be selective in your approach, often a minimalist approach can be highly effective even with highly trained athletes.

1. MICRO-DOSING – MORE
WITH LESS
KHYL ORSER – MSc, CSCS
St FX Strength and Conditioning

2. Micro-dosing –The Concept
Charlie FrancisTaper
• Used a 10-Day taper
• Had small doses of high-intensity work every
day
• Sprints at 90-100%
• Lifts at 80-100%
• Tempo for Recovery @ < 70%
• Low volumes allowed CNS recovery
• Athlete feels fresher and ready to perform
• Why not feel like this always?
• Derek Hansen questioned this and started to
develop the idea
Learning a New Skill
• Learning a new language, to play an
instrument, something CNS Driven
• Do you practice 2-3x per week for 1-2 hour?
• =2-6 hours of workload
• Quality of work over the 1-2 hr period?
• Do you practice 20-30 mins every day?
• = 2-3 hours of workload
• Quality of work in 20-30 mins?
• Ability to focus?

3. Micro-dosing – Selling Features
Benefits
• Strength, power, speed are skills to be practiced
• Small doses of high quality stimuli =  performance
• Lower fatigue state = higher state of
preparedness
• Athletes can focus on tactical development with
sharper acuity
• In the collegiate setting
• Less time for physical prep work
• MD requires less time/day, but more high quality
work performed daily
• Less fatigued athlete at practice =  in adaptability
to skill development (technical / tactical)
• The less effort, the faster and more powerful
you will be – Bruce Lee
Issues
• Selling athletes and coaches on it
• Still a culture of more is better in many sports
• More is more, better is better – Dan Baker
• High intensity work in season can scare coaches
• How do you sell it?
• Preparedness is not about simply resting
• Potentially difficult to implement across large
groups
• Athletes need to be “present” during training to
reap the benefits
• Important to educate both the athletes and
coaches on the WHY and HOW it will benefit

4. Micro-dosing – Case Study
Small Group of Football Players
• Initially unsure, but wanted more than others
• Sold on the value of sprinting, lifting heavy easy
• Reiterate purpose of resting
• Semi-sold on importance of recovery tempo’s and
recovery lift
• After 1-2 weeks of it, SOLD!
• Results in 12 weeks
• 20-40lb  on Bench, 20-50lb  on Squat, 10-40lb  on
Power Clean
• 5-10%  in BJ,VJ and  in 40-yd times
• Highest PC vol = 18 reps, Sq = 29 reps,
BP = 31 reps
• Highest SprintVolume
• Day 1 = 140 – 200m @ 90-100%
• Day 2 = 120 – 200m @ 90-100%
• Tempo
• 3000-4000 yards / week – LB / RB
• 1500-3000 yards / week – DL / OL
• Explosive MBThrows
• 20-50 throws / week
• Jumps
• 16-40 contacts / week

5. “
”
It’s not the daily increase, but daily decrease. Hack
away at the unessential.
BRUCE LEE