If you’ve ever watched your kid work with a strength coach and wondered exactly what that person’s job is or if you’re an athlete trying to understand who is responsible for what you’re not alone. Even coaches (strength & sport) sometimes struggle to define where one role ends and the other begins. Let’s clear that up.
Two Different Jobs, One Common Goal
A strength coach and a sport coach are not the same thing, and they’re not supposed to be. They work together toward a better, healthier, more capable athlete, but they each own a very different piece of that puzzle.
To understand the difference, it helps to know that athletic development generally happens in three phases:
- General Physical Preparation (GPP): building the physical foundation
- Specific Physical Preparation & Skill Development: developing the technical and tactical skills of the sport
- Competition: game time
The strength coach’s primary territory is phase one. The sport coach owns phase two. And both of them are working toward phase three.
What the Strength Coach Actually Does
General physical preparation can look a lot of different ways depending on the sport and the athlete. It might include strength, power, speed, endurance, mobility, or general agility.
Think of it this way. A strength coach working with a baseball player is focused on building the strength and power to hit a baseball farther. The hitting coach is the one making sure the swing mechanics are actually there so the athlete can make contact in the first place. Both matter. They’re just different jobs.
In volleyball, the strength coach might be developing the power, endurance, and mobility an athlete needs to get low and scoop a dig, or to explode upward for a spike. The volleyball coach’s job is to put athletes in the right position, read the play, and teach them the footwork and technique to execute. One builds the engine. The other teaches you how to drive.
Building the Engine
That’s really the best way to think about what a strength coach does — building the physiological engine. The goal is to close the gap between where an athlete currently is physically and where they need to be to meet the demands of their sport.
That includes:
- Injury prevention — keeping the body resilient enough to handle the workload of a full season
- Mobility — making sure the athlete can move the way their sport requires
- Endurance — building the capacity to perform at a high level deep into a game or a season
- Strength and power — developing the physical output the sport demands
The strength coach designs programs around all of this. Not around perfecting a free throw or a serve, that belongs to the sport coach, but around making sure the athlete’s body is ready to do those things at the highest level possible.
Why This Matters
When everyone understands their role, athletes get better faster. When those lines get blurry, things fall through the cracks or worse, athletes get pulled in two directions at once. Knowing what your strength coach is there to do, and what they’re not there to do, helps everyone work together more effectively.
The strength coach isn’t trying to coach your sport. They’re trying to make sure your body is ready for the demands of the sport
Thank you for reading!
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Ian Smith Owner, Lead Trainer — Mountain Speed Strength & Fitness Evergreen, CO