Ultimate Guide to the CSCS Exam

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This eBook is dedicated to my son Lincoln and my wife Lisa. It is impossible to describe in words how much I love you.

The information contained in this guide is for informational purposes only. I am not an education professional nor am I an official representative of the National Strength and Conditioning Association (NSCA). Any advice that I give is my opinion based on my own experiences learning the material for the CSCS exam. This guide does not guarantee you a passing grade on the exam. The material in this guide may include information, products, or services by third parties. Third Party Materials comprise of the products and opinions expressed by their owners. As such, I do not assume responsibility or liability for any Third Party material or opinions. No part of this publication shall be reproduced, transmitted, or sold in whole or in part in any form, without the prior written consent of the author. All trademarks and registered trademarks appearing in this guide are the property of their respective owners. Users of this guide are advised to do their own due diligence when it comes to assessing their readiness to take the CSCS exam. By reading this guide, you agree that my company and myself are not responsible for your success or failure on the CSCS exam.

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I didn’t write this book because I love writing, or because it was fun (though it was sometimes, it was mostly hard work). I wrote it for number of reasons: 1) Strength and Conditioning is fun 2) Much like S&C challenges you and makes you better, this project challenged me and made me better 3) Readers of my blog were asking for my help. A lot. 4) I could’ve used something like this when I was preparing for the exam. While my website cscsexamguide.com only reflects my studies from the year of 2013, I actually purchased the Essentials of Strength and Conditioning in February of 2011. It took me nearly three years to finally get my CSCS. I even purchased an NSCA membership, held it for an entire year, and let it expire without attempting the exam. I could make a long list of reasons and excuses why it didn’t happen, but I think it really comes down to one word: uncertainty. I wasn’t sure I wanted it. I wasn’t sure I needed it. But most of all after I put in all the time, effort, and money in studying I wasn’t sure I would pass.

Make a big deal out of it. Tell your friends, your wife, your dog…tell everyone that you are studying for a test and you need to pass it. You need their support, but perhaps most of all you need to shame yourself away from not quitting. Believe it or not, that’s actually a big reason why I started cscsexamguide.com – it was a public platform for me to commit to finishing. It wasn’t a very efficient way of studying (writing all those posts took a looong time!) but it was a pretty fail-safe way of making me finish. So commit to it and let your world know it.

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Someone told me I needed an “about the author” page, but I feel weird writing about myself in the third person. 20 years ago, I got my hands on my first computer…and that all started a chain-reaction of events that led me to pursue a career in Electrical Engineering. It was hard. But it was also fascinating as hell, challenging, engaging, and extremely useful. Pay wasn’t bad either. A series of events, boredom at the workplace, and a curious mind led me to the world of fitness & nutrition. I started the blog (www.cscsexamguide.com), quit my job, and started pursuing a career in fitness and physical rehabilitation / manual therapy.

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Disclaimer: If you have a degree that is directly related to the material in the Essentials of Strength and Conditioning (i.e. Kinesiology), you may not need all these materials. I used the following items to study for the exam, and recommend you do the same. Some people have reported needing only the book, but I do not recommend this especially if you don’t have a degree in a related field.

Here is what I used:   

Essentials of Strength and Conditioning textbook Practice Exams 1, 2, & 3 from the NSCA Internet resources, like my website, Wikipedia, etc.

That being said, some people require more material than this. We all come from varying backgrounds and expertise. What comes easy for some, comes difficult for others. I consider the materials I used to be the bare minimum essentials. I would not attempt the exam without those materials, nor would I recommend it. Doesn’t mean you can’t get it done with just the textbook. But if you are dropping several hundred dollars to become a member of the NSCA, get the textbook, and take the exam…you should do everything you can to make sure you pass. It’s EXPENSIVE to fail. After communicating with lots of my blog readers, people who have passed the exam and people who have failed, on the next page you will find a checklist of items and resources to use for the exam.

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   

Essentials of Strength and Conditioning 3 rd edition CSCS Online Practice Exams 1, 2 & 3 Internet Resources (cscsexamguide.com) (wikipedia) This eBook

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CSCS Exam Content Description Booklet Exercise Technique Manual for Resistance Training

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CSCS Workbook, Audio DVD & Assessments

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There were a handful of questions I missed as a result of not having the exam content description workbook and the Exercise Technique Manual for Resistance Training, however I still passed with a comfortable margin by knowing the other material very well. The purchase of the secondary and tertiary items is a decision you must make based on the knowledge and understanding of your own abilities.

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Item

Source MemberCost Non-Member

NSCA Membership Essentials of Strength and Conditioning textbook CSCSOnlinePracticeExams1,2&3 CSCSExamContentDescriptionBooklet

NSCA Amazon NSCA NSCA

$ 120.00 $ 72.00 $ 86.40 $ 20.00

N/A $ $ $

72.00 115.20 27.00

Exercise Technique Manual for Resistance Training NSCA NSCA CSCS EXAM -Paper&Pencil CSCSEXAM-ComputerBased NSCA

$260.0070.00 $ $ 310.00

$ $ $

72.00 395.00 445.00

Totals

$

$

1,126.20

938.40

As you get to new sections in this book, you will see graphs like the one below that describe where you should direct most of your attention. As you can see, most of the exam is concentrated in the Exercise Sciences – approximately 30%. This means you should spend approximately 30% of your study time on these topics. If you go to the Exercise Science chapter of this book you will see another graph that further breaks down the material into chapters of the book.

Exam Section Breakdown by Percentage 35% 30% 25% 20% 15% 10% 5% 0% Exercise Sciences

Nutrition

Exercise Technique Program Design

Organization and Administration

Testing and Evaluation

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Ultimate Guide to the CSCS Exam

Disclaimer ............................................................................................................................. ii Preface ................................................................................................................................. ii About the Author................................................................................................................... iii Materials You Will Need ...................................................................................................... iv Primary .......................................................................................................................... v Secondary ...................................................................................................................... v Tertiary .......................................................................................................................... v Cost Breakdown ............................................................................................................... vi Exam Breakdown ............................................................................................................. vi Table of Contents ................................................................................................................. 1 Part 1 - Scientific Foundations .............................................................................................. 3 Exercise Science ............................................................................................................... 4 The Sliding Filament Theory Revisited........................................................................... 5 Statics of the Human Musculoskeletal System............................................................. 14 More Statics: Levers and Mechanics ........................................................................... 17 Gender Differences ...................................................................................................... 22 Muscle Twitch .............................................................................................................. 23 Humans: A Hybrid Energy System ............................................................................... 28 The Physics of Human Motion ..................................................................................... 39 Key Anatomy Points..................................................................................................... 45 Nutrition........................................................................................................................... 56 Protein ......................................................................................................................... 57 Carbohydrates ............................................................................................................. 60 Fat ............................................................................................................................... 62 Hydration ..................................................................................................................... 63

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Food Disorders ............................................................................................................ 65 Part 2 – Practical & Applied Knowledge.............................................................................. 66 Exercise Technique ......................................................................................................... 67 Fundamental Rules ...................................................................................................... 68 Handgrips .................................................................................................................... 69 Five-Point Body Contact Position................................................................................. 70 Breathing & the Valsalva Maneuver ............................................................................. 71 The Five Phases of Sprinting ....................................................................................... 72 Program Design .............................................................................................................. 73 The Seven Steps of Program Design ........................................................................... 74 Cycles and Periodization ............................................................................................. 86 Organization and Administration ..................................................................................... 89 Facility Specifications................................................................................................... 90 Testing and Evaluation .................................................................................................... 91 Memorization of the Mean ........................................................................................... 92 Statistics Review .......................................................................................................... 95 Conclusion and Final Thoughts .......................................................................................... 97

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The first part of the CSCS exam is comprised of 90 questions covering all the scientific foundations of exercise science and sports nutrition. This is very nearly half of the exam. The questions can be difficult, especially if science isn’t your strength. Visualization, mnemonic devices, memorization, and reliable math skills will be key for

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making it through this half of the exam.

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This is the largest and arguably the most challenging section of the exam. As you can see from the below graph, questions in this section are derived from chapters throughout the book but with a big emphasis on chapters 4, 5, and 6. Keep in mind, however, that the below breakdown is derived from the three practice exams published by the NSCA, and this may not be exactly representative of the exam—though I would say it is similar.

Exercise Science Chapters 25%

m 20% a x E n o is 15% s a h p m E d 10% e t a m it s 5% E

0% 1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

17

18

19

20

21

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Book Chapter

Figure 1 - Estimated chapter contribution to Exercise Science section

There will be a graph like this at the beginning of all chapters, and if you look at the other graphs you will see that every chapter in the book is covered in some form or another. For the rest of this section I will be covering scientific foundations that I believe are important in understanding the basic science of exercise. This requires some basic working knowledge of physics and energy, and I will cover these topics in my own unique way instead of reiterating the topics covered in the textbook. Again I would like to reinforce that this material is meant to supplement the material in textbook; do not consider this guide in any way a replacement to having Essentials of Strength and Conditioning 3 rd edition.

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Three years before I became a CSCS, I opened the textbook to the first chapter and read about the sliding filament theory. I’m pretty sure I closed the book shortly after, disheartened and disinterested. Almost every academic textbook I’ve encountered starts in a similar fashion: specific, but fundamental—boring, but essential. “How the hell is this going to help me train people?” you might ask, and I wouldn’t blame you. But you must learn it. You won’t always know why you need to know something, and that’s just a fact of education. There were plenty of times in my education where I saw no practical application to what I was learning, but in every single case where I thought that it wouldn’t contribute to my skill and practice as an engineer, I guarantee you, it did. Just because you can’t understand how something might be useful doesn’t mean it isn’t. The same holds true for the sliding filament theory. Just because you don’t know wtf an H-zone or I-band has to do with physical conditioning and athleticism doesn’t mean understanding it won’t help you. On the blog I introduced a mnemonic device to help with the memorization of the fundamental structure of muscle. I nicknamed this mnemonic HAZIM. Pronounce that word with an Arabic accent, imagine a character from the Middle East, give him a ridiculous grin and you have HAZIM:

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Figure 2 - HAZIM a mnemonic device created with the help of a reddit rage face

As you can see from the above picture, each letter of HAZIM’s name stands for a structural zone of the most fundamental component of muscle—a sarcomere.

Figure 3 - Sarcomere. Source: Creative Commons

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This image was pulled from the Wikipedia page on a sarcomere, but it is missing a key component. Here it is with the M-line or M-bridge pointed out:

Figure 4 - Microscopic image of sarcomere with M-line called out

If you aren’t familiar with the structure of a sarcomere from the textbook, these images will probably look foreign to you. That’s okay; I’m going to do my best to give you a complete rundown of the structure. Spend a few minutes studying the above figure. Got it? The mnemonic is HAZIM, so let’s start with the letter ‘H’.

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This zone describes the area where only myosin filaments are present.

Figure 5 - H-Zone location with cross section

This darkened band describes the area where myosin and actin are interleaved. The cross section shows what it might look like with each myosin band surrounded by six actin.

Figure 6 - A-Band location with cross section

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This is the anchor point for the actin filaments, and also the border between sarcomeres.

Figure 7 - Z-Line location with cross section

This is where only actin is present. As the muscle contracts the I-Band shrinks as does the H-zone, while the A-band increases in size.

Figure 8 - I-Band location with cross section

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Much like the I-Band is the anchor point for actin filaments, the M-Line is the anchor for myosin filaments (hence the M in the name).

Figure 9 - M-Line location with cross section

Those are all the zones that the mnemonic HAZIM describes. Visualize these graphical representations for the different areas of a sarcomere, and come test day write down HAZIM and label the diagram to help you answer questions. Now I want to use an analogy to really imprint the structure of muscles onto your brain.

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First, let’s talk about a very basic mechanical device, the pneumatic cylinder

Figure 10 - Pneumatic Cylinder

Notice the structure of the piston and cylinder. One fits inside the other, an airtight seal is created, and energy is transferred using compressed gas and stored using a spring. Compare this to the structure of actin and myosin filaments.

Figure 11 - Myosin between two Actin filaments approximates a cylinder

Similarities: 

The actin approximates the cylinder, and the myosin approximates the piston.

Differences: 

Energy is transferred in a different way (through cross bridging).

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Energy is stored elastically in the elastic components of muscle.

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Also, actin surrounds myosin in a ratio of 6 fibers to 1, whereas a cylinder is completely continuous.

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Figure 12 - Pneumatic Cylinder, the piston approximates myosin while the cylinder approximates actin

I don’t think it’s that far of a leap to make this comparison, hopefully it helps you remember how myosin and actin fit together to create movement.

Let’s take this analogy one step further. In engineering, a lot of what we do is make approximations. If you’ve ever taken calculus, a classic example is a Riemann sum. What does this have to do with muscles? Not much, except when we take our piston analogy and run with it. A sarcomere is actually more like a bunch of pistons clumped together in a 3-dimensional space (see figure 13).

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Figure 13 - Sarcomere-clumped piston analogy

Think of it like this—the material that creates the cylinder is the metal material that normally surrounds the piston and creates an airtight seal. Though in a muscle, it’s not continuous but represented by individual strands of actin. It makes little sense (or at least I can’t think of a reason) to design a real life engine this way because you simply take up more space. Furthermore, it complicates how you get gas in and out of the chamber. You might as well just have one big cylinder. But in the case of a muscle, it makes a lot of sense because the driving force isn’t the rapid expansion of a gas; it’s the cross bridging of actin and myosin. The more actin and myosin cross bridging, the greater the force is.

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In Engineering we had a class everyone referred to as “statics”. As an electrical engineer I didn’t have to take this, but because I heard so much about it and how fundamental it was to mechanical engineering I chose it as one of my electives. That served me well when it came to the topics that follow, I will do my best to transfer some of those skills to you.

There are three basic types of muscle action. These actions are distinguished in a manner so as to separate actions from contractions or shortening. Muscles can do all sorts of types of work, and sometimes some of the most effective work (for muscle building at least) is done when muscles are acting against a force but not shortening. Each muscle action is distinguished by how great a force the muscle exerts relative to the external load. There are three possibilities: 1. Muscle Force > External Load 2. Muscle Force = External Load 3. Muscle Force < External Load Most full-body multiple-joint exercises involve muscles transitioning through all these actions. Can you guess what happens to a muscle that exerts force that is greater than the external load? It shortens. This is concentric action. Can you guess what happens to a muscle that exerts force that is equal to the external load? Its length stays the same. This is isometric action. Can you guess what happens to a muscle that exerts a force that is less than the external load? It lengthens. This is eccentric action. Let’s give some examples. The lowering phase of essentially any exercise is eccentric action; the stabilization of the trunk muscles, abdominals, and erector spinae in the squat are examples of isometric action; and the upward movement of most exercises involves concentric action.

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There are a lot of categories for muscles. Primary movers & Secondary movers, Flexors & Extensors, Skeletal muscles & Smooth muscles, Type I & Type II (). In this article I will attempt to differentiate between Flexors and Extensors in my own words. 

A Flexor is a muscle that actively shortens the angle of a joint when it contracts in concentric action.



An Extensor is a muscle that actively widens the angle of a joint when it contracts in concentric action.

The easiest example is made using the elbow joint, and the biceps & triceps. Take every bro’s favorite exercise: the curl. At the start of the movement the angle of your elbow joint is roughly 180 degrees. As your biceps contract, the angle of your elbow decreases, and thus, by definition, your biceps are flexors.

Figure 14 - Flexor diagram

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On the other hand, consider the triceps extension exercise. At the bottom of the movement when your triceps are relaxed, the angle of your elbow is small. Assuming you don’t have massive biceps to get in the way, your elbow joint is probably somewhere around 45 degrees or less. As your triceps contract, the angle of your elbow increases and thus your triceps are extensors.

Some muscles can be both extensors and flexors, though to be both a flexor and extensor they must cross two joints. For example your hamstrings are a knee flexor and a hip extensor. Another classic example is the rectus femoris – an extensor of the knee and flexor of the hip. There are many examples of muscles serving multiple functions and I won’t explore all of them here as it isn’t important for the exam.

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This is a deceptively challenging topic. In this section there are diagrams to draw out the different lever classes, a great mnemonic for memorization, and examples that display how these levers apply to the human body. Despite going over all of this a long time ago, I still spend a long time arguing with myself over why I thought certain joint muscle actions were Class III’s instead of Class I’s. In the end, many of you may think I’m an idiot—and in this case, I probably was. But after spending a good deal of time arguing with myself and discovering a strategy that works every time, I never forgot how to solve these types of problems, and every question was nearly guaranteed to be correct. To fully understand this section, you may need to review what Torque is, what a Lever is, and what Mechanical Advantage (or leverage) is.

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Class I - A lever in which the load (dumbbell for example), and the applied force (by muscle in this case) act on the same side of the fulcrum. Class II - A lever in which the load and the applied force act on the same side of the fulcrum, with the applied force having greater mechanical advantage (a longer moment-arm) than the load. Class III - A lever in which the load and the applied force act on the same side of the fulcrum, with the applied force having lower mechanical advantage than the load (and thus a shorter moment arm).

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Figure 15 - The three classes of levers

So let’s apply this to the human body, with the most basic example of the biceps curl.

Figure 16 - What class of lever is this?

As you can see, knowing where the biceps inserts is key to being able to identify the location of the applied force. Figuring that the elbow is obviously the fulcrum, the biceps is the applied force, and the dumbbell is the load, we can correctly identify this example as a third class lever.

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Figure 17 - Biceps curl is an example of a third class lever

Know your anatomy, and rest assured that any movement around a joint is fair game.

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If you have read my blog, you might be familiar with FLE123 and where it comes from. We have Jackson from the University of Tennessee-Knoxville, a kinesiology student, to thank for it mnemonic device for lever classes. Without going back to the previous picture, see if you can correctly identify the lever types for these different levers:

Figure 18 - Which lever class is this?

If you had trouble with this, then you should read this piece from Jackson: I just graduated from the University of Tennessee-Knoxville in kinesiology, and my next step is taking the CSCS exam which is in just a few hours for me. I started studying for the exam in May while working part-time as a personal trainer. Your blog has helped me prepare quite a bit, so I thought I would share one of my tips. My biomechanics lab TA showed me the mnemonic “FLE 123″ for remembering lever classes. F = fulcrum, L = load, and E = effort. The fulcrum is in the middle for 1st class levers. The load or resistance is in the middle for 2nd class levers. And, the effort force is in the middle for 3rd class levers. Hopefully, that helps you. Pure gold!

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Figure 19 - Brilliant mnemonic device for remembering lever classes

The genius of this mnemonic lies in the symmetry. Identifying the component in the middle of the lever is the only information necessary to identify the lever as the other two components can be flipped and the lever still retains its class. Effort-Fulcrum-Load is the same as Load-Fulcrum-Effort; they are both first class levers. Prove it to yourself. Pull out a piece of paper, and write down FLE123. Now draw the three classes of levers and fill in the middle item using the FLE123 mnemonic. Fill in the rest. You can do this on exam day on your scratch paper and will always have all three levers handy.

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Men and Women are Both Human. Duh. Being members of the same race, the theories used to train men and women should be the same, and they are. Regardless of what magazines say about toning, or that women should do high reps and low weight—all of that is false, same species – same training regimen. That being said, if everything was exactly the same, there would be no need for this chapter. So let’s highlight the differences.

Before puberty there are essentially no differences between boys and girls. Once puberty hits, everything changes as testosterone shoots up for boys increasing muscle mass, and for women estrogen increases leading to breast development and increased fat deposition (a requirement for fertility & pregnancy).

Hormones cause the key difference and drive all the changes. Men don’t have magical muscles that are just inherently stronger; they just have more muscle. Peak force output is directly tied to muscle cross-sectional area. Take careful note of the word choice in that sentence. Peak implies the absolute maximum force output. But just because your muscles have a larger cross sectional area than someone else’s doesn’t mean you can produce more force than them. Your ability to drive those muscles hard comes into play as well.

All muscle sizes being equal, could a woman beat a man? Yes. This is how a trained woman could produce more force than a man who has a similarly sized muscle. It’s important to remember that despite all our differences, women and men are members of the same species. Thinking about it from this perspective, it makes perfect sense that muscles of the same size can produce the same force regardless of gender.

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The following concepts can be difficult to understand. When I encountered this information in the book, I immediately saw parallels with concepts in electrical engineering, and it was useful to me to elaborate on those similarities. If these concepts end up sounding like a foreign language to you, don’t stress much over it.

Before we talk about the signaling between the brain and muscles, I want to show you some basic electrical signals so you can draw the parallels between electronics and brain



muscle signaling.

Figure 20 - Various electrical signals

*The data signal could be represented by any pattern like this, I chose this one at random.

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One thing I encountered while reading the NSCA book that reminded me a lot of an engineering concept is the idea of a twitch. We learn about fast twitch, slow twitch, and different muscle fibers, but let’s talk about the twitch signal in itself. When your brain sends a signal to your muscle to fire, what does that signal look like? Is it just like pressing an on button, or plugging in a battery, or flipping a light switch? I think the signal is actually represented pretty well by a pulse.

Figure 21 - Representation of the signal sent from a motor neuron

The pulse is your neuron firing, an electrical signal which results in the release of calcium in your muscle cells. If you wanted to represent this like you would in engineering school, your muscle could be represented with a block diagram and a transfer function. The transfer function represents your muscles and would transform the electrical signal of the pulse into a force output.

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Figure 22 - Muscle represented by transfer function H(s), force by Y(s)

Or represented graphically in the time domain, y(t) (force produced by muscle) is equal to the electrical signal sent from the brain transformed by the muscle, x(t) * h(t) The calcium binds to troponin (as we discussed earlier) for a brief period of time during which the muscle contracts. If the first pulse isn’t backed up by another pulse a short time later, the calcium will unbind and force produced by the muscle will drop.

Figure 23 - A single "on" pulse results in a small amount of force that falls quickly as calcium unbinds from troponin

If, however the pulse is backed up by another pulse, then the force produced by the two signals will add.

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Figure 24 - Force from two signals sums if sent in quick enough succession

It’s in this way that you can recruit a large muscle to produce a range of forces. Remember that when you recruit a large motor unit, all muscle fibers contract due to the all-or-none law. However, because the force produced by the muscles is modulated by the period in which your motor neuron fires, the amount of force you can produce in a given motor unit isn’t all-or-nothing but somewhat continuous. And finally, this is what happens when your motor neuron fires at a sufficiently high frequency for a sufficient amount of time—maximal force production.

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Figure 25 - Enough motor neuron impulses fired in quick succession yields maximal force production

Notice how the train of impulses sent by your motor neurons looks similar to the clock signal we discussed at the beginning of the section? There are actually quite a few similarities that I could draw between electronics and the control of muscle output, but they would only be useful to other electrical engineers – so I will spare you for now.

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Your body uses a hybrid energy system. Much like the popular Toyota Prius (and many others) uses both electricity and gasoline, your body uses multiple forms of energy to get work done. This analogy isn’t perfect because while the Prius uses two forms of energy, your body accesses energy through three pathways: the phosphagen system, the oxidative system and through glycolysis. While the analogy isn’t perfect, it’s still very good because much in the same way a hybrid car stores waste energy (braking) into very useful high-torque energy (electricity), your body can convert anaerobic byproducts (lactate) back into a form of energy that’s very useful during high intensity exercise (glucose).

Figure 26 - Human vs. hybrid car analogy

Depending on exactly how the internals of a hybrid car are set up, you could create an even better analogy by drawing comparisons between phosphagen and capacitance, but that’s far too geeky for this book.

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In the hybrid car, gas is the energy source. Sure you have a battery, but unless you plug it into the wall, that battery’s sole purpose is to buffer the energy flowing to the power train to allow the gas engine to operate at peak efficiency and store energy from braking. In the human, fat is the energy source. Sure you’ve got carbohydrates and protein, but in terms of actual power produced, fat generates the most. Even assessing it on the basic level of macronutrient calories, 9 calories per gram is more than double the 4 that protein or carbohydrates can provide. If we take a look at the actual ATP produced, the difference can appear even more dramatic. Net yield of one glucose molecule: 36-38 ATP Net yield of one 18-carbon triglyceride: 463 ATP

The phosphagen system is relatively simple compared to the other energy systems but just as important. Your body has a certain amount of ATP (cellular energy) on hand at any given time. Replenishing this supply can take some time, and some methods of replenishing it are quicker than others. As with most things in life, the method that takes the longest yields the most ATP, and the quickest method yields the least. The phosphagen system uses a molecule called creatine phosphate (present in high quantities in muscle tissue) to rapidly replenish ATP.

Under relatively normal activity, your muscles would rapidly run out of ATP. However, measuring ATP in muscle cells shows very little fluctuation throughout exercise, and this is directly attributed to the large amount of creatine phosphate that rapidly replenishes ATP from ADP. There is a reason why creatine is one of the most widely used, safe and effective ergogenic aids (see chapter 8)—because it is effective. Finally, one more enzyme provides an important function in the phosphagen system: adenylate kinase.

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So while creatine phosphate rapidly restores ATP from ADP, if you do it at a rapid enough rate, adenylate kinase will start creating ATP out of two ADP with an AMP as the byproduct. This serves two functions: 1. Get more ATP to do work NOW 2. AMP stimulates Glycolysis (we need more ATP, and fast!) Which leads us perfectly to the next topic: Glycolysis.

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I must say the book’s coverage of this topic is confusing. I rewrote this entire section because some of the things I srcinally wrote were wrong. I went back to Wikipedia, did a lot of research, and started from scratch. For the sake of clarity, let’s divide Glycolysis into two separate processes. The book will refer to these two processes in a number of different ways, so let’s clarify the different naming conventions: 1. Fast Glycolysis = Anaerobic Glycolysis 2. Slow Glycolysis = Aerobic Glycolysis Furthermore, let’s distinguish the two by clarifying what the trade offs of each are: 1. Fast Glycolysis

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Speed = 100x, Net ATP = 2

2. Slow Glycolysis  Speed = 1x, Net ATP = 38 And before we go any further, there are two sources of glucose: blood glucose, and muscle glycogen. Blood glucose requires 1 extra ATP of energy to enter the cell, whereas glycogen does not. So, depending on the source, net ATP could be as high as 3 or 39 for fast and slow glycolysis, respectively. The following figure is a simplified block diagram showing the outcomes of the various pathways.

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Figure 27 - Simplified glycolysis block diagram

You may be wondering, if you can produce 2 ATP 100 times as fast as you can produce 38 ATP, that’s 200ATP per unit of time versus 38. While true, your body has to deal with the excess lactate as well as hydrogen ions that change the pH of your blood. Get a significant enough change in your pH and the whole glycolytic system gets inhibited, your muscles burn, and you get that overwhelming urge to stop whatever you’re doing and rest. Well your body has yet one more mechanism to continue trying to support fast glycolysis by reconverting excess lactate back into glucose.

While we are talking about energy systems in this chapter, The Cori Cycle is not an energy generator. That is to say, it does not perform the same function as the Phosphagen system, glycolysis, or the oxidative system. The net ATP produced from the Cori cycle is negative 4, yes, you actually lose ATP by running lactate through the Cori cycle. Gaining ATP is not its purpose, in fact the sole purpose of the Cori cycle is to produce glucose to support whatever high intensity activity the body is currently engaging in.

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Figure 28 - The Cori Cycle

Your body’s ability to move lactate through this system is an important performance marker in exercise science. There are two main terms referred to in the book that you need to know: 

Lactate Threshold (LT)



Onset of Blood Lactate Accumulation (OBLA)

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There are some specific things you should know regarding the LT and the OBLA for the exam, but first we need to build a good fundamental understanding of these concepts. In figure (x) below you can see how blood concentrations of lactate increase as the intensity of exercise (indicated here by %VO2 max) increases.

Figure 29 - Lactate threshold and OBLA in trained vs. untrained individuals

You should study this graph, and take away a few things: 



The LT is when the body starts shifting more towards fast glycolysis, enough so that lactate levels in the blood increase to a measureable degree OBLA is the second inflection point, where blood lactate increases even more rapidly. The theory is this starts when larger muscle groups with lots of Type II fibers are recruited, further increasing the production rate of lactate.

The lactate system can be trained. Training causes both the LT and the OBLA to shift to higher levels of exercise intensity, allowing higher levels of intensity for longer periods of time. Since lactate begins accumulating at higher intensity levels, training this system to be more efficient requires, well, higher intensity exercise obviously.

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Finally we get to the combustion engine of the human body.

Figure 30 – (Gasoline engine/Fatty acids) are complicated and (low-torque/low-power) compared to the (electric motor/glycolysis), but rich with energy.

At the heart of that engine is the krebs cycle. Surrounding that are a bunch of mechanisms that convert and prepare the fuel for burning. The oxidative system is extremely versatile and accepts proteins, carbohydrates, and fats as fuel sources. However the krebs cycle is somewhat picky, only accepting Acetyl-CoA and a few amino acid varieties as fuel. Before the fuels get there, a lot of enzymes cleave, cut, and convert everything into Acetyl-CoA or amino acids that the krebs cycle accepts.

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Figure 31 - A simplified energy diagram. Refer to pages 29-31 in the book for a more detailed diagram.

Inside the Krebs cycle is a complicated mess. Energy in the form of ATP is harvested from the Electron Transport Chain (ETC) through a series of complex reactions and exchanging of electrons. NADH and FADH2 exchange their hydrogen atoms and in the process allow a Phosphate ion to reattach to ATP (see page 30). From all of this 40 ATP is produced from one glucose molecule. Depending on exactly which ions were used in the process, only 38 or 36 net ATP will be produced because 2 are consumed in the process (I’ve come across exam questions that expect you to know this number). Fatty acids on the other hand produce a wide range of ATP, depending on how long they are. The book gives an example of an 18-carbon fatty acid producing 463 ATP, which illustrates just how much more energy is stored in fat than in blood glucose.

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There are a few key points to be made about the control and output of the various energy systems. None of the points require much explanation, but you should commit them to memory as they will help you answer a lot of questions on the test. No energy system is ever the sole provider of energy Exercise intensity determines the energy system first Exercise duration determines the energy system second The faster the energy (e.g. phosphagen) the less total energy there is The slower the energy (e.g. fat oxidation) the more total energy there is

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As I’ve mentioned in the blog several times, some parts of my engineering education served me very well in studying for the CSCS, whereas some topics needed a lot more of my attention. In this section I’m going to attempt to impart some of that advantage to you by doing some in-depth coverage of a topic that plays to my strengths: physics.

Force seems like such a simple and intuitive concept, and in many ways it is. In other ways it’s not. So we’ll start where things are simple, in outer space. Take a rocket that’s just sitting in out space, stationary. The rocket fires its engine, which produces a force of 100 Newtons (kg * m / s^2). The rocket has a mass of 100kg, so plug those numbers into the equation:

 =  100 = 100 ×   = 1/  So while the engine burns the rocket accelerates at one meter per second. Figuring out the velocity of the rocket is then just a matter of how long the engine burns.

 =  +  Since initial velocity was zero v o = 0, we can simply multiply acceleration by time. After 1 second of engine burn, the rocket travels at 1m/s. After 2 seconds, 2m/s. If the engine burns for 10 seconds the rocket will be traveling at 10 meters per second, etc.

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Figure 32 - Rocket accelerating through space

On earth things get a little more complicated mathematically speaking, because we are always dealing with friction and earth’s gravity. Your body is constantly subjected to a force, the force of gravity. This force is often referred to as your weight. F = ma, Force is equal to the mass of the object multiplied by the acceleration. In the case of your body, the mass is how big or massive you are, and your acceleration is determined by earth’s gravity 9.8m/s^2.

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In its pure physics definition work is the application of a force over a distance. You’ll notice in the NSCA book that sometimes another definition of “work” is used, a definition which is more practical when dealing with humans moving on earth. Work is a force applied over a distance, so a prowler is a great example of doing work Imagine you are pushing a prowler. Since we are on earth, there’s gravity, and friction. Technically there’s also air resistance, but we’ll assume that’s pretty negligible (it is unless you’re superhuman fast or you're pushing the prowler in a wind storm). You run up to the prowler and try and push, but at first the prowler doesn’t budge. Let’s figure out what forces are involved at that moment:

Figure 33 - A prowler being pushed with all forces labeled

Three of these forces should be straightforward – the force you apply, the force of the prowler against the ground, and the force of friction stopping you from moving the prowler. The last force (labeled in blue) is called the “normal” force – normal because it is always

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perpendicular to the plane on which the object sits. This can get a little confusing and involve more math when things are on an incline, but since this prowler is on flat ground it’s pretty simple: the prowler’s weight pushes against the ground, and the ground pushes back. If the ground didn’t push back with equal force the prowler would sink through the earth until something stopped it. Since the prowler is at rest, we know all the forces are equal:

 =   =  For the rest of this example, since we won’t be lifting the prowler off the ground we can always just assume the normal force and weight of the prowler will be equal. Let’s talk about friction briefly. For this example there are two types – static and kinetic friction. You see before an object begins moving, friction forces are usually higher than they are once they get moving. This is why whenever you are sliding an object, it always feels harder to move at first but once it gets moving it feels a little easier. It’s also the reason for anti-lock brakes, because when the wheels aren’t skidding they actually grip the street with more force, so you can stop quicker when the tires are rolling than if they lock up. So before when you couldn’t get the prowler moving, you simply hadn’t overcome the static coefficient of friction. Let’s say you get a running start, and this time the prowler budges. You are off and moving – working against the kinetic coefficient of friction. Let’s say you run for 50 meters, and now let’s figure out how much work you did. 

Kinetic friction coefficient = 0.2



Mass of prowler with 4 20kg weights = 125kg



Acceleration of gravity = 9.81m/s^2

 =   

= ×

 = 0.2 × 125 × 9.81/  = 245 cscsexamguide.com

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 = 245 × 50 = 12250  = 12.25 Hooray you did 12 calories of work! Seems pitiful doesn’t it? Fortunately your body burns more than this due to a number of factors – but we won’t get into that now. Next question: what is power? Well, it’s how quickly you pushed that prowler. Just divide by time. Let’s go over an example.

You remember what the Margaria-Kalamen test is? (Check NSCA textbook page 258). This is absolutely a test you are expected to know, and it directly uses the little bit of physics I just explained as the basis for the test. The genius in this test is its easy setup and readily available materials. For someone with a familiarity with physics, the test makes perfect sense. Remember that example we just did with the prowler? Doing something like that is a pain in the butt, and you have to make assumptions that are probably going to be inaccurate (like the coefficient of friction). For example what if the prowler is on the grass vs. concrete vs. artificial turf, all these different surfaces have different coefficients of friction. Fortunately, you can do work in all kinds of ways, and one we humans are famous for doing work against is gravity. Gravity is everywhere and almost perfectly uniform, so it has none of the complications of measuring work like friction-based work does. The Margaria-Kalamen test is a simple test of working against gravity. The force of gravity is simply the gravitational constant of earth times mass, and the distance is how far against gravity you travel. Run up a flight of stairs 10 meters tall and measure the amount of time that took you, that’s a pretty quick and easy measure of power. That’s essentially the Margaria-Kalamen test, only they did a few tweaks to make the results of the test more consistent. Let’s say someone large like me runs up a 10m flight of stairs in 10 seconds. Here is how much work I did and a measure of my power:

 =  ×  = 100 × 9.81 ⁄  × 10 = 9810 cscsexamguide.com

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=

 9810 = = 981   10

And that’s it, fairly simple. The Margaria-Kalamen test just has a few modifications. Height is only 3 stairs and sensor pads are on the two stairs to measure the time. Plug in the numbers, and you’re done. Below is an example of a 76kg athlete.

Figure 34 - The Margaria-Kalamen test

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Anatomy, as I’ve said on the blog is a topic that isn’t covered thoroughly in the book. I was surprised by the depth of anatomy that some of the practice questions expected you to know. That being said, there did seem to be a pattern regarding the questions I encountered on the exam. By and large, the area in question almost always is centered around the hip, spine, and core. And almost always involves these muscles: 

Rectus Femoris (One of the “quads”)



Psoas and/or illiacus , often referred to as “illipsoas”



Rectus Abdominis



Biceps Femoris (One of the hamstrings)

So I want to give these structures an in-depth treatment so that should you encounter a trick question on these you won’t get tripped up.

As the name implies, there are four of these guys. All of them attach to the patella and thus act across the knee joint, however only one of them c

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the Rectus Femoris.

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Towards the inside of your thigh is the Vastus Medialis, then next to that & underneath the Rectus Femoris is the Vastus Intermedius, and on the outside underneath the IT band and covering a very large area is the Vastus Lateralis, the largest of the quad muscles.

Rectus Femoris Tricks Trick questions will come around the rectus femoris. Since it’s the only muscle that crosses two joints (hip & knee), you can change it’s activation by adjusting the angle of the hip. Take the leg extension exercise. Keeping the hip angle too wide or too narrow will cause this muscle to activate less, as the actin and myosin filaments won’t line up to allow for forceful contraction.

Did you know there are actually four hamstring muscles? Why aren’t they named “quads”? I don’t think we’ll ever know the answer to that. The confusion comes from the fact that the biceps femoris has two heads, one long and one short. The short head crosses the knee joint and helps flex the knee, and the long head crosses both the hip and the knee. The semitendinosus and semimembranosus cross both joints and are large, powerful muscles.

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Figure 35 - The Hamstrings

As an engineer and perpetual nerd, I appreciate beauty and symmetry in math, physics, and in this case: biology. The hamstrings and quads also have a symmetry that I find

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fascinating, and it is most certainly not a coincidence...symmetries never are. This helps me remember the muscles, I hope it helps you too.

Crossing Two Joints BICEPS FEMORIS LONG HEAD SEMIMEMBRANOSIS SEMITENDINOSIS RECTUS FEMORIS

Crossing a Single Joint BICEPS FEMORIS SHORT HEAD VASTUS VASTUS LATERALIS INTERMEDIUS VASTUS MEDIALIS

Key

HAMSTRINGS

QUADRICEPS

Each group has four muscles. One group has a 3:1 ratio of two joint vs. one joint muscles, and the other group has a 1:3 ratio.

The psoas and illiacus are separate muscles at their srcin, but later join and are indistinguishable where they insert onto the femur. They both function to flex the hip, and are very active in an exercise like the sit-up. Questions regarding these muscles are often associated with details regarding hip angle. Let’s consider the difference between the abdomen workouts described in the textbook (page 333) versus an old school “sit up” that we all had to do in gym class. The exercises depicted in the text specifically target the rectus abdominus, I suspect because the old school exercise has fallen out of favor due to low back issues….but for the purposes of understanding the biomechanics let’s take a look at an image:

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Figure 36 - Psoas and iliacus

Notice how the psoas crosses many joints – many spinal segments plus the hip j oint. The iliacus crosses the hip joint (and joins with the iliacus, forming the iliopsoas) where they both insert into the lesser trochanter of the femur. The old-school sit up was meant to be an abdominal exercise but heavily recruits the iliopsoas to flex the hip & sit up. This heavy repetitive contraction of the psoas can add compressive forces to the spinal segments that it attaches to, and couples with improper bracing or a weak core can add shearing forces as well. This is a bad combination, and I suspect one of the reasons this exercise has fallen out of favor.

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The “core” is such a hot topic these days, and as a result you can expect some questions on the CSCS exam relating to the core. First let’s cover some of the key players of the core.

Notice the fiber orientation of the external obliques and you can pretty well figure out what their function is. Also notice how the fibers terminate into the center of the abdomen, and the right and left fibers, were they to continue past the linea alba (center line of the abdomen) would run perpendicular to each other.

Figure 37 - External Obliques

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Now compare the fiber orientation of the internal oblique to the external obliques on the previous page. Notice how the internal oblique runs perpendicular to the external oblique of the same side, but parallel to the external oblique of the opposite side. Notice the transverse fibers running from the spine to the linear alba, this muscle assists in rotation and along with all the abdominal muscles assists in stabilizing the spine – especially during the valsalva maneuver.

Figure 38 - TVA, Recuts Abdominus, and Internal Oblique muscles

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On the practice exams and even the actual exam, I remember this muscle popping up frequently. It’s important in the strike phase of sprinting and walking where it eccentrically contracts, and also in stability of the ankle joint. It’s primary function is dorsiflexion and inversion.

Figure 39 - Anterior Tibialis

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The main points for these two muscles is recognizing that one crosses the knee joint and the other does not. Exam questions will test your ability to differentiate an exercise that targets the soleus vs. one that targets the gastrocnemius. Doing a calf exercise with the knee bent lessens the contribution of the gastrocnemius and targets the soleus, and vice versa.

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Figure 40 - Gastrocnemius and Soleus

Anatomy is a topic you could spend a whole lot of time studying and still not know everything. Fortunately for the CSCS Exam you don’t need to know a ton, and in my experience the above muscles are the ones most often used in questions.

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Understand the structure and function of the following muscles: 

Quadriceps and hamstrings and their symmetry



Psoas and iliacus and their different attachment points



Abdominal muscles, their function and fiber orientations



Anterior tibialis attachments and function



Gastrocnemius and Soleus attachments and how to target each in exercise

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Nutrition Chapters 90% m80% a x E 70% n o 60% s i s a h 50% p m40% E d 30% te a 20% m it s 10% E

0% 1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

17

18

19

20

21

22

Book Chapter

Figure 41 - Nutrition section chapter emphasis

The nice part about this section is its clear ties to just two chapters in the book, mainly chapter 10. I want to preface the material covered in this section by saying these are the recommendations of the NSCA, not me. I say this because I took a deep dive into the science of nutrition a few years ago, and my philosophies do not match with the NSCA. That’s not important for you to know, but I felt it should be said. Most of these chapters are pretty easily absorbed and self-explanatory so I won’t be covering these topics extremely thoroughly. I will focus on a few topics and trick questions that you might encounter on the exam.

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Some of the very basics you need to know are: 

Essential vs. non-essential amino acids



High vs. low quality protein sources



Protein requirements for athletes vs. non-athletes

By and large the general recommendation for most athletes will fall between 1.5-2g per kg of bodyweight. These basics are easy to memorize and are in the textbook (pages 207-208). Let’s go over an example of how you might be tricked.

These questions usually involve you doing a few conversion and calculations, followed by a question that is phrased in a way to make you a little nervous. A 26 year old male NBA basketball player is 6 ft, 3 in tall (191cm) and weighs 190 lb (86kg). He wants to increase muscle mass and strength. Which of the following is the MOST appropriate daily intake of protein? A – 270 kcal B – 330 kcal C – 580 kcal D – 990 kcal Notice the “MOST” in the question phrasing. The athlete in question might physically be able to eat all of these different options, but one might not support his current lean mass, one might be a little on the hairy edge of too much protein, and one will fit right in the standard recommendations (1.5g – 2g). First step is figuring out how many grams each of these options are. We know protein is 4kcals per gram, so divide each option by 4. Then we need to determine how many grams of protein he is getting per kilogram of his own bodyweight, so divide that number by his bodyweight in kilograms.

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A – 270 kcal – 67.5g – 0.78g/kg B – 330 kcal – 82.5g – 0.96g/kg C – 580 kcal – 145g – 1.68g/kg D – 990 kcal – 247.5g – 2.8g/kg As you can see, one option falls directly in the standard recommended range for athletes, and the other is significantly higher than the recommended range – but still far from the dangerous range (4g/kg). The range between 2-4g per kg isn’t really discussed in the book, only that vegans or vegetarians may require more than 2g’s per kg due to lower quality proteins. So this question can seem a bit nebulous. But because option D is nebulous, and A & B are clearly too low, the MOST appropriate answer is going to be C. It’s safe, and falls in the most commonly recommended range for athletes.

Many questions center on an athlete gaining or losing weight. The typical mistake here is always assuming that weight loss is going to be fat – which is assumed to be around 3500kcal per pound. This is how I always approached these problems, and on the practice tests it took me a good deal of digging to find out why my answer was wrong. The trick lies in the phrasing of the question, specifically in how you should assume the gain of fat mass vs. lean mass. Buried in the book is the important detail that the kcal value of lean mass is 2500kcal per pound . So let’s make up a question that puts this concept to use: A 250lb college level linebacker needs to gain 30lbs in 12 weeks. He is currently maintaining his weight by consuming 4100 kcal per day. Assuming he will gain equal parts fat mass and lean mass, how many extra kcal should he be consuming per day? First thing we recognize is that half of the mass gained will be fat, the other will be lean tissue. Since the goal is 30lbs, we divide that in half for 15lbs fat and 15lbs lean tissue. We calculate the kcal requirements for that amount of tissue and add them back together. Finally we divide that amount by the number of days he has to gain that weight, and that determines how many extra calories he needs per day.

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15 * 2500 = 37500; 15 * 3500 = 52500; X+Y = 90000; Z / (days) = calories per day 90000 / (7*12) = 90k / (84) = 1071 calories And the correct answer will always be the one closest to the number you calculate, so that would be D – (number here). Those are the two types of trick questions for protein you will encounter, the others should be fairly straightforward – just make sure you know your requirement ranges, essential and non-essential amino acids, and what constitutes a high or low quality protein.

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There’s a lot of debate about the role of carbohydrates in training and performance. The NSCA has even hosted debates of pro-carbohydrate trainers vs. low-carbohydrate advocates. Click this video to see Alan Aragon and Jeff Volek debate this topic. These types of things are an interesting discussion and can help you form your own opinion, but the true value is helping you get a deeper understanding for what happens physiologically with and without carbohydrate consumption. On page 210 of the book there is table describing the Glycemic Index (GI) of various foods. The GI can seem counter intuitive – often because it is discussed as a metric for how healthy a food is, the lower the number the better.

GI is a measure of how quickly a food raises your blood sugar, normalized against a slice of white bread or pure glucose. It’s a relative measurement, as opposed to an absolute measurement – so a set of values measured against pure glucose will come out different than a set of values measured against white bread. The tests also normalize the amount of carbohydrate in a food, so the same quantity of calories is ingested across all test subjects. Take a look on page 210 and you’ll see a grain products hanging out around 100, pure glucose at 140, legumes in the 50’s and so on. From a scientific perspective, this appears to be useful information. However in the real world this information is less useful. Take watermelons for example, with a Glycemic index of 103 it appears to be as detrimental to your blood sugar as a slice of white bread. But because the study normalized grams of carbohydrate, we have essentially lost some information about how carb-dense the food is. Let’s use an example: 

100g of white bread – 260 calories – 4 slices of bread



100g of watermelon – 30 calories – less than 1/16th of a watermelon

You would have to eat eight times the amount of watermelon in weight to equal the number of calories. The book cites a study that found no correlation between GI of foods and athletic performance, and I don’t see that as much of a surprise. The GI doesn’t really provide much practical information about the food we eat. Glycemic Load (GL) on the other hand is actually much more useful, but isn’t required knowledge on the exam.

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The book briefly mentions ketosis in that roughly 50-100g of carbohydrates are needed to prevent going into that state – operating under the assumption that the state of ketosis is bad. In fact every person when they wake up in the morning is undergoing a mild amount of ketosis. Ketones are produced primarily by the mitochondria of the liver and provide an alternate fuel source to glucose. You should just be aware that this state isn’t necessarily bad, and is the focus of many popular diets and can be a useful intervention for some. For the purposes of the test assume that it should generally be avoided.

When considering the quantity of carbohydrates for an athlete to consume, first consider their activity. An aerobic endurance athlete will not have the same needs as an Olympic lifter. 

It’s been shown that aerobic endurance athletes consuming 8-10g per kg (2400-



Intermittent high intensity like soccer players also benefit from high carbohydrate



5-6g per kilogram of bodyweight is sufficient or strength, sprint, and skill athletes

3000 kcal) adequately restore their glycogen levels intake

Pro: Three days of high carb + exercise tapering (600g/day, 8-10g/kg) increases glycogen 20-40% above normal Con: potential side effects of extra water weight, weight gain, flatulence, diarrhea

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There’s a lot to be said about fat, because it has been so misrepresented. So much of what is said about fat is wrong, and it’s not really the job of the NSCA to say what is right – it’s more their job to reiterate what is “common knowledge” or what various organizations of authority say is correct. It’s not my job either - so instead of discussing at length the science of fats here’s a brief bullet list of what I think you should know for the test: 

Foods with fat provide important fat soluble vitamins



Saturated, Monounsaturated, Polyunsaturated – what are they and what foods have



Low fat diets are not recommended for athletes



High fat content in athlete diets has not been shown to negatively affect plasma



Higher fat content has been shown to increase performance in aerobic athletes and

them

lipids in athletes increase time to exhaustion in female soccer players The only time it is recommended to consciously decrease fat intake: 

To increase carbohydrate intake to support training goals



Need to reduce total caloric intake



Need to decrease elevated blood cholesterol

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Hydration doesn’t really require deep understandings of the biology behind dehydration and performance degradation, so I I’m going to spare you any lengthy discussion on the topic and just list out important things you need to know.

Drink half an Oktoberfest beer stein…only swap the beer for water, and do it two hours before the workout. This gives the body ample time to absorb the hydration and urinate the excess.



Provide cool beverages (50-70F or 10-21C)



Have fluids easy accessible and remind athletes to hydrate.



You may not think you’re thirsty, when in fact your body could use more. Thirst



Drink frequently, approximately 1 cup every 15 minutes



Consume 0.5L (1 pint) for every pound of weight lost. All weight should be regained

doesn’t signal properly when large amounts have been lost.

to indicate hydration status has returned to normal. 



Water is the most effective hydrater (duh), however flavored beverages can encourage drinking. The ideal fluid replacement beverage depends on the athlete, so know your athletes tastes, know your environment (temperature & humidity), and know the training regimen (intensity, duration).

Important: Voluntary Dehydration Most athletes will only replenish 2/3 of lost fluids after exercise. This phenomenon, called voluntary dehydration is one that strength and conditioning professionals need to be aware of and encourage athletes to fully replenish their stores after exercise.

When does fluid loss lead to decreased performance? 

A 1% loss in body weight of water leads to an increase in core temperature, however does not have a measurable effect on performance.

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

A 3-5% loss of body weight results in cardiovascular strain and impaired ability to dissipate heat, leading to performance degradation



At 7% loss, collapse is likely.

For example, a 200lb athlete may lose 10lbs while exercising in the heat (5% loss). This is fairly common, but should be recognized as detrimental to performance.

A very accurate way to monitor hydration status is by weighing the athlete before and after exercise. Each pound lost represents 0.5L of fluid loss and must be replaced before the next training session.

Electrolytes lost in sweat are higher in untrained individuals vs. trained athletes. The average concentration of sodium in sweat is 1.15g/L, with concentrations ranging from 0.46 to 2.3g/L (a big range). Given that the average American salt intake is 4-6 grams per day, electrolyte loss in some athletes is common and can lead to cramping. Additional salting may be necessary, as well as potassium rich foods such as bananas, potatoes, strawberries, meat, and milk. In my next post, I’ll go over the general recommendations for hydration before, during, and after training sessions.

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As a CSCS it will not be your job to diagnose disorders. It is your duty to keep an eye out for the warning signs, and immediately report them to the team’s physician. Below is a list of warning signs.



Secretive eating habits, food wrappers in unexpected places, sneaking food from the



Disappearing multiple times after eating



Being nervous or agitated if unable to be alone after eating

table



Extreme weight gain or loss



Evidence of vomit



Large amounts of food disappearing



Saying “Do you think I’m fat”, when the person is skinny



Dramatic weight loss for no good medical reason



Getting below the ideal competitive weight, and losing weight during the off-season



Preoccupation with food, calories, and weight



Constipation or stomach aches



Mood swings and social withdrawal



Excessive exercise and concern about weight



Extremely critical of their own physique



Strong denial that a problem exists



Do gather information and report all findings to the team physician



Do not attempt to make the diagnosis, that is the physician or therapists job

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Do not simply require more frequent weigh-ins, monitor food intake, or offer encouragement on outward appearance. None of these strategies are effective in treating bulimia or anorexia. Refer to a physician.

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In this section I’ll cover some selected topics that you will see in the second portion of your exam. Keep in mind this is the section that includes approximately 40 video questions.Your practical experience will serve you well here. Having experience with actual clients, or even just a lot of personal experience in the gym will be useful.

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Exercise Technique Chapters 45% 40% m a x 35% E n o 30% s i s a 25% h p m20% E d e t 15% a m it 10% s E 5% 0% 1

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Figure 42 - Exercise Technique section chapter emphasis

A lot of what is covered in the exercise technique section could be classified as “common sense”. For the first 26 years of my life, I never trained. Then when I got into it, I read everything that I could on it. I devoured strength training philosophies, and tried a bunch of different things, watched videos, you name it. Through this, I learned a good deal. Notice how a huge portion of questions is derived from chapter 14. Open your book to chapter 14, and you’ll notice there’s not much traditional text there, just pictures of exercises and descriptions of how they are performed. This is boring to read , but you should go through them and make sure none of them are counterintuitive. If you’re like me and have taken a keen personal interest in training you might find this section easier, but if you haven’t you may need to spend a good deal of time slogging through chapter 14 and 17.

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So let’s start with a small set of rules that should almost always be followed:

Rule #1 – Neutral spine. All of your discs are neatly stacked with as equal pressure applied to each side of your vertebral discs as possible. This makes a lot of sense – your muscular control stems from this cord, protect it at all costs. Exercises that target the core muscles in non-isometric muscle action are the exception here (e.g. partial curl-up).

Rule #2 – Your head leads and your body follows. Don’t do funky shit with your head, keep it neutral when possible and during movements that require changes in direction your head should lead the rest of your body.

Rule #3 – That which is loaded f irst, is loaded most. This is a concept from mobilitywod.com, but in my experience it holds true for the questions on the exam

Rule #4 – When spotting, err on the side of safety, and always spot near the weight. There is no point in spotting on the elbows during dumbbell bench if their grip or pectoral muscles are the ones that fail.

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There are a number of different ways to grasp the bar, you should know about these because they can have different effects on muscle activation Pronated / Overhand - Palms facing down or away from you Supinated / Underhand – Palms facing up or towards you

Neutral Grip - Halfway between the two, palms facing towards each other Hook Grip - Instead of wrapping your thumb around and over your other fingers, you wrap your fingers around your thumb. This allows you to pick up more weight than you may have otherwise been able to. Open / False Grip - Any grip in which you do not wrap the thumb around the bar, also known as the “suicide grip” during the bench press

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When performing exercises on a bench, with your back on the bench the NSCA book calls out a specific stable position you should always maintain. Since this takes up the majority of their section on stability and positioning, you should probably know it for the CSCS exam. 1. Head is placed firmly on the bench 2. Shoulders and upper back are firmly and evenly on the bench 3. Buttocks are evenly and firmly positioned 4. Left foot on the floor 5. Right foot on the floor

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Holding your breath during an exercise has a fancy name, called the Valsalva Manuever. The maneuver greatly increases the stability of your trunk by increasing the pressure in your abdomen, which stabilizes your entire upper body by creating a rigid, fluid filled “ball” if you will of high pressure. Think of it like any normal ball, when it’s filled to the max it’s more “stable” that is, you could stand on it easier or do anything off it easier with more stability. If it’s not full, it’s less stable. This doesn’t come without drawbacks, as holding your breath through a sticking point in a heavy exercise will increase your blood pressure. The NSCA recommends only holding your breath for 1-2 seconds so as to minimize the negative effects.

Short version: they help make your valsalva maneuver more effective; they get the ball more rigid. However using the belt also removes the opportunity to train the core simultaneously during the exercises you use it on.

This section I found a little excessive, but nonetheless it is a necessary one to know. I’m going to try and break this section down into a few salient points: 

Always spot closer to the weight on dumbbell exercises

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Don’t spot power movements

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Use more spotters for heavier loads

For complex heavy movements the spotters should be at least as strong and experienced as the athlete.

The NSCA book contains an extensive section going over a variety of exercises. There is a great online resource for this: exrx.net. There’s a huge amount of detail, including a muscle map and an exercise and muscle directory. If you need to know what muscles an exercise uses, or what exercises to use to grow a certain muscle, exrx.net is a fantastic resource.

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Figure 43 - The five phases of sprinting, adapted from Schmolinsky

A blog reader asked a great question regarding the five phases of sprinting, so I answered his question on the blog. Some of the key diagram s are animated, so please visit the post on my website: Reader Question: Late Support Phase of Sprinting

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Program Design Chapter Contribution 45% 40% 35% n o ti 30% u b i trn 25% o C 20% n o ti 15% c e S 10% 5% 0% 1

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Figure 44 - Program design section chapter emphasis

Program design is the culmination and application of all previous knowledge obtained in your pursuit of the CSCS. To answer these questions reliably, you need to know just about everything else. To answer a question about designing a program for an athlete, and given stats about the athlete, you could only answer if you were familiar with the tests used to evaluate that athlete (chapters 11 & 12). To know which exercises to assign, you need to be familiar with which exercises strengthen which muscle groups of the body (13, 14, 15). Finally, to design an effective program you need knowledge of the science of adaptation, and the cycles that give the appropriate rest, work, intensity, and volume to facilitate those adaptations.

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While every step in designing a program is crucial, a thorough needs analysis is arguably the most important step as it informs all following steps. This step can really be broken into two parts: evaluation of the sport, and assessment of the athlete. This is a fancy way of saying “who are you, and what are you trying to do?” Let’s jump right in and cover step 1, the Needs Analysis. The needs analysis has two components: evaluation of the sport, and assessment of the athlete. A needs analysis is in many ways just like asking the athlete “who are you, what are you trying to do?”

Evaluating the Sport What is your athlete? An offensive lineman, a cross country runner, a basketball point guard, a center, a shot putter? All of these have different movement patterns and probably different priorities in terms of what to train for strength, hypertrophy, or endurance. It’s important that your evaluation of the sport covers these three attributes of the sport: 

Movement Analysis (body and limb movement patterns and muscular involvement)

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Physiological Analysis (strength, power, hypertrophy, and endurance priorities)

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Injury Analysis (common injuries and causative factors)

Say your athlete is a basketball center. A movement analysis will reveal a lot of jumping (power), running, blocking, and rebounding. The primary goal here would be strength & power. The training program you design for this athlete would be markedly different than if you designed it for a marathon runner.

Assessment of the Athlete The CSCS needs to profile the athlete’s needs and goals by evaluating training and injury status, conducting a variety of tests, and determining the primary goal for training. To do this, you want to gather information on their current training status and history, evaluate their physical fitness through testing and evaluation, and set a goal.

An athlete’s training status is their current level of physical preparedness, and is an important consideration when designing a new program. You can’t figure out what to do next unless you know where you’re at right? Pretty common sense here.

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Some good things to know would be the type of training done previously, whether sprint training, plyometric, resistance, etc. The level of intensity of the program, and the level of technique required to perform the exercises, and how regularly such training programs were followed.

Everybody comes from a different background, and in different shapes and sizes, with different capabilities. Strength, flexibility, power, speed, muscular endurance, body composition, cardiovascular endurance are a few attributes to consider.

Last step to all this is setting a goal for the resistance training. Is the athlete a football lineman during the off-season or a cross-country runner in the middle of active season? These two scenarios would benefit from two very different resistance training programs, and it’s up to YOU to know the difference.

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Choosing the correct exercise is critical in designing an effective resistance training routine. This is due to the SAID principle, or specific adaptation to imposed demands. This principle states that the more similar a movement or exercise is to the sport, the greater the likelihood that there will be a positive effect on the sport. Refer to table 15.3 in the NSCA book to get an idea of which movements transfer to which sport specific activities.

Core and Assistance Exercises Exercises are prioritized as either “core” or “assistance”. Core exercises recruit one or more large muscle areas (chest, shoulder, back, hip, or thigh), involve two or more primary joints, and should receive priority over all assistance exercises because they are more applicable to the sport. Rarely do sport movements involve a single joint movement and the recruitment of a single muscle, so this makes sense. Assistance exercises can be very useful for the specific injury and rehabilitation of sport-specific injuries, so keep that in mind.

Structural and Power Exercises Within core exercises (see above), you can further define exercises as “structural” and even further as “power” exercises. Thus a power exercise is both structural, and core. A structural exercise is a core exercise, but not necessarily a power exercise…and a core exercise is not necessarily a structural or power exercise.

Figure 45 - Venn diagram of core, structural, and power exercises

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Muscle Balance Muscular balance is important for injury prevention, so do not design a program that focuses too much on a single muscle. Don’t be a curl monkey, and don’t train athletes to be curl monkeys. If you train a muscle, train the antagonist muscle as well. Quads/hamstrings, biceps/triceps are two common examples.

Technique, Equipment, and Time These concepts are covered in the book but are fairly common sense and can be condensed into a list…or even three words. Supervise, Improvise, and Prioritize. 

Make sure your athlete executes an exercise correctly, even if it is a basic movement. In a word, supervise.

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If you don’t have the correct equipment or loads, substitute in similar exercises that have similar muscle group activation or require less load. In a word, improvise.

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Some exercises take longer than others, and some athletes have less time available than others. Take note, and prioritize. Supervise, Improvise, & Prioritize!

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Deciding how many times an athlete should train is a fairly common sense endeavor. First consider what their current physical activity is like, how often they practice their sport, and what their goals are. Consider these factors: 

Training Status

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Sport Season

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Estimated exercise loads

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Types of exercise Other concurrent activities

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Most of this is common sense, but the NSCA establishes some general guidelines to work between. Training status

Beginner

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2-3

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Sessions per week

Also spacing is a consideration, and again…more common sense here. Space training sessions evenly so that training status never declines. Two sessions should be spaced MTh, or T-F, so that never more than 3 days of inactivity occurs. Split routines are common for highly trained athletes. This allows more training sessions per week by focusing days on specific muscle groups. For example, M&Th are upper body days, T&F lower body days, giving two days rest for each muscle group but training a total of four days.

Sport Season Some consideration must be made for game day. If you are programming for a football player you would not incorporate a heavy squat day the day before a game – or even the day after a game. You don’t want the training to interfere with game day, nor the game day activity to interfere with training.

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Here are the NSCA’s guidelines for training sessions by sport season: Sport Season Sessions Per Week Off-season

4-6

Preseason

3-4

In-season

1-3

Postseason (active rest)

0-3

Other Considerations Max effort exercises have been shown to take longer to recover from, which is why competitive power-lifters will only max out squats or deadlifts once per week. There is some evidence that alternating heavy and light days improves recovery. And finally, more common sense: If the athlete has other activities, whether training or job related, these must also be considered and training adjusted appropriately.

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Exercise order refers to both the order during a single workout session, and the order on a day to day basis. Let’s say you want to program the athlete to complete 3 sets of 10 squats. You would not precede this exercise with multiple sets of leg extensions, leg curls, and calfraises. This would fatigue many of the support muscles involved in the squat, and diminish its effectiveness. Since the squat is a superior exercise in every way from the other exercises mentioned (muscular recruitment, hormonal response, strength & hypertrophy) diminishing its effectiveness might not align with the goals of the program. However, there are some situations where you would intentionally pre-fatigue a muscle group before going into a full body exercise, but let’s ignore those for now. In general, exercise order should go: 1.

Power (snatch, hang clean, power clean, push jerk, etc)

2.

Core (squat, deadlift, press, bench press, etc)

3.

Assistance Exercises (curl, leg extension, etc)

Here are some commonly used methods to segregate training:

Upper / Lower Split If an athlete finds completing multiple lower body exercises in a single session too strenuous, training can be arranged so that exercises are alternated between upper and lower body. This allows for adequate rest for each muscle group.

Push / Pull Alternating This simply involves alternating pushing exercises (bench press, press, squat) with pulling exercises (pull up, deadlift, lat pulldown). Typically different muscle groups are used for either action, so by alternating these you avoid fatiguing an individual muscle too much.

Supersets / Compound Sets Supersets, i.e. not resting between sets, are commonly performed with two exercises that use stress-opposing muscle groups, e.g. biceps curl and triceps extension. A compound set is when the exercises stress the same muscle group.

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Load is a fancy word for weight – and is the m ost important aspect of program design. What makes it the most important? Because it drives how many repetitions can be performed, which drives how many sets can be performed and also drives hormonal differences. Work as we learned previously in the physics chapter, is a force applied over a distance. However in the context of weight training this can sometimes be a difficult concept to measure, so other terms are used to be descriptive about a workout – namely load-volume and repetition-volume.

Load volume is essentially a rudimentary calculation of work. Take the weight used, the distance it was moved, multiplied by the number of repetitions. For example a 100kg deadlift where the weight is moved 1 meter for 15 reps would be 1500 work units. If the weight was moved 2 meters it would be 3000 work units, and so on. (100kg x 2m x 15 = 3000)

To simplify things even further, repetition volume removes the distance component. For the deadlift example above, both would calculate as 1500 work units (100kg x 15reps = 1500 work units). You lose some information about how much was done, but kept in context of the athlete it can still provide valuable information. So if you keep track of these statistics, you could quickly glean an idea of how intense a workout was. How many reps were performed, roughly how much weight, etc For example, an athlete completes the following: Back Squat – 50×5, 75×5, 100×3, 100×3, 100×3, 100×3, 100×3 Load volume (LV) = 250 + 375 + 300 + 300 + 300 + 300 + 300 = 2125 Rep volume (RV) = 5 + 5 + 3 + 3 + 3 + 3 + 3 = 25 Average load lifted = LV / RV = 2125 / 25 = 85

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In step 5, a good deal of calculation will rely on you knowing the athlete’s 1RM. Instead of testing a 1RM, you can estimate it by referring to a table that is included in the NSCA book. However, on test day you won’t have access to that book – so it behooves you to m emorize the table. Of course we know memorization is a pain in the ass, so I came up with a good way of memorizing the table. Take the following sequence of numbers: 1-2-4-6-8-10-11-15 Read those numbers out loud, slowly. Think about them for a minute. The first three numbers are doubles of the previous. 1-2-4 The first 6 numbers besides the first are all even and increment by two 2-4-6-8-10 And 11 just doesn’t fit in anywhere. Why does it only jump a single repetition from 10 to 11, but jumps four for the next? It doesn’t make much sense, but part of it does. You can use the quirky sequence that makes sense for part of it, but no sense for the last part – to memorize it easily. Now look at them again, then close your eyes and repeat them. 1-2-4-6-8-10-11-15 Did you repeat them correctly? If you didn’t, wr ite them down and spend some time memorizing these numbers before you move on to the next exercise.

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This next exercise is fairly simple, but very important. Take that number sequence you just learned and fill out the left hand column of the table below with those numbers.

Now that you’ve done that, fill in the right hand column with the top number starting at 100, and subtract 5 for each successive column – 100, 95, 90, 85, 80, 75, 70, 65. Your table should look like this: 1

100

2

95

4

90

6 8

85 80

10

75

11

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15

65

This is how you will recreate the table come exam day. You may be wondering what to do if you need to be able to calculate 1RM based on a 12RM – have no fear, just estimate. A 3RM is somewhere between 95 and 90, just guess 92.5 and you will be really close. Same goes for all the other numbers. The exam is not going to nitpick you for being off by 0.5 percent so you can rest assured that this method will get you good results come exam day.

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Volume, as we mentioned in Step 5, is simply the number of repetitions performed. A set is a group of reps performed without rest. If an athlete is instructed to do 2 sets of 10 (often written as 2×10) they would perform 10 reps, rest the specified amount of time, and perform another 10 reps - pretty basic stuff.

Multiple Sets, or a Single Set to Failure? Much debate has encircled the idea of doing a single set to failure, or multiple sets. Studies have shown 6×2, 3×6, and 3×10 all increasing strength with no significant difference in strength gains between repetition schemes. These studies all involved untrained individuals. Again, context is key…know the athlete’s training status. The lesson here is: For a beginner, anything works

Strength for Trained Athletes If the goal is strength the repetition scheme should involve sets of 3-6 reps. This maximizes strength potential and maintains the quality of the movement performed, especially with power exercises like the clean and snatch.

Hypertrophy It is generally accepted that higher volume leads to larger muscle size. No substantial amount of studies have been done on this topic, however interviews with elite bodybuilders suggest that performing three or more exercises per muscle group is the most effective strategy for increasing muscle size.

If you are training a football lineman, both strength and size are important as the athlete needs both power and size as he will be colliding with other players. Train with sets in the 812 rep range, to simplify go with sets of 10 reps. If you are training a basketball player, strength is important. Sets of 3-6 on the power exercises and 10 on assistance. A cross country runner is training for muscular endurance, 12-15+ reps would be appropriate.

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Rest period, or as some people awkwardly call it “inter-set rest” is the amount of time you rest in-between sets. The NSCA has guidelines that are based on a set of studies examining the effect of rest periods on three different aspects of strength training: 1. Strength and Power 2. Hypertrophy 3. Muscular Endurance

Rest Periods for Strength and Power While training status does effect an athlete’s ability to train with less rest, performing structural exercises with near maximal load requires long rest periods. Studies have shown that 3 minutes of rest were better than 30 seconds of rest for strength gains in the back squat. Guidelines for strength and power: at least 2 minutes, or a range of 2-5min

Rest Periods for Hypertrophy Although the NSCA book doesn’t reference any studies, if you look at any body building program (aka hypertrophy) the rest periods are short. When the goals are growth, and not strength (remember strength is both neurological and physiological) shorter rest periods fatigue the muscle groups more and are generally accepted as being better for growth. Guidelines for hypertrophy: 30-90 seconds

Rest Periods for Muscular Endurance Endurance programs are typically designed with light loads lifted for many repetitions. Since the load is lighter, and the program is designed for endurance, the idea of sport specificity comes into play here (ie make the strength program mimic the demands of the sport). Guidelines for endurance: 20-30 seconds

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The concepts discussed in the next few sections are really just an expansion and application of what you’ve already learned in program design. Take what you’ve learned there – and apply it in the context of the General Adaptation Syndrome.

The GAS is founded on the idea that any sort of training stimulus brings about a brief period where performance is decreased (due to soreness or fatigue for example) followed by an increase in performance that exceeds previous performance. This is standard strength training knowledge and the basis for progressive overload. However the final piece that makes periodization necessary is fatigue. In reality the GAS is just a specific description of the general concept of stress in biology. Apply a stressor (training) in a specific dose and you get a good response. Apply it in too high a dose or for too long and you get a negative response.

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Figure 46 - General Adaptation Syndrome - Creative Commons

Periodization is essentially the optimization of scheduling, volumes, loads, and recovery to produce maximum performance during the time it matters most – competition. Take what you just learned about the GAS, plus the athlete’s schedule, training status, demands of the sport – then design an appropriate program given that knowledge and cycle it to peak at competition. That’s it.

A lot of very skilled coaches realized a long time ago that adaptation occurs on many levels – and many other aspects of individual’s mental and physical well-being can come into play. That’s why periodization involves cycles within cycles. Short cycles of a few weeks or 4-16 workouts to target a specific area of improvement, longer cycles to provide variety and stress different areas or muscle groups, and finally very long cycles that incorporate

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competition scheduling and time to de-load and de-stress. These three cycles are, respectively – the Microcycle, Mesocycle, and Macrocycle.

Say that your microcycles were 5 weeks long, mesocycles consisted of 3 microcycles, and your macrocycle was an entire year leading up to a competition in October. In this case your schedule might look like this:

Figure 47 - Macro, Meso, and Microcycles as they might relate to a calendar year

Keep in mind that this could look very different depending on the sport and schedule of events.

There are more details regarding this in the book – review this section in the book and please contact me if you have any questions. I couldn’t find any material interesting enough to cover here.

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Organization and Administration Chapters 60%

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Good luck with this chapter. I say that because I have no great advice here…the chapter is boring and uninteresting. Put your head down, memorize some aspects of facility design and specs, and move on.

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In my experience, people usually fall somewhere on a continuum when it comes to learning. You either hammer through facts with repetition and memorization, or you are a conceptual learner. This is an oversimplification, and there are exceptions…but let’s continue anyways. The conceptual person learns through understanding the fundamental principles of the topic, and through this understanding can reconstruct details of the topic. The memorizer commits every possible detail and piece to memory, and with it they construct the fundamental principles. Think of the topic like a puzzle. One person knows the picture that the puzzle should be, and the other has memorized where each individual piece should go. I’m a conceptual learner, and as a result I hate it when topics don’t have a cohesive “picture”. It makes it tough for m e to stay focused when a topic like this one comes around. Facility Organization and Risk Management is… A chapter with a lot of details. The kind of details that, well, that belong in a book. Not in your head. They are the kind of details that, when the situation arises you go find the book and look the detail up. So commit these to memory for the test, and when it comes time for you to actually use them in real life you can look it up. Without further ado, here is a long list of inane details: 

Minimum width for doors in a S&C facility is 36 inches to accommodate wheelchairs

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Hallways and circulation passages must have a width of at least 60inches

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All threshold should be flush

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Facility should have double doors to allow passage of large equipment Exits should be clearly visible and provide essential signage to the visually impaired

 

Emergency exits must remain free of obstruction

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Ceilings should have 12-14 feet of clearance

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Flooring should be carpet or rubberized flooring. Rubberized is better. Poured rubber is extremely durable but expensive. Wood is best for olympic platforms.

I can’t even bring myself to complete this list, it’s just too boring. I have nothing more to add, no trick or different way of thinking about this chapter. Just put your head down, read it, and hope there aren’t too many questions about it on the test…because that will be my strategy. It’s no coincidence that it has been a while since my last post. I really disliked this chapter.

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Figure 49 - Testing and Evaluation section chapter emphasis

This is the last section, but do not underestimate how important it is. Some questions are multi-faceted, and require you to know practical & applied stuff, Program Design, and Testing & Evaluation. While these chapters are rather picture and diagram heavy, do not let that fool you into thinking they are any less important.

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When you take the practice exams, you may encounter questions that look a lot like this: A 22 y/o college football running back is currently training for the NFL combine. Before designing a program for him, you run some tests on his 1RM and speed & power. The results are: Bench Press 1RM – 205lb Squat 1RM – 365lb Power Clean – 255 Based on these tests, what should the new program emphasize? A. Speed & Power B. Upper body maximal strength C. Lower body maximal strength D. A & B There are a ton of these types of questions on the exam. You have to spend time memorizing typical values for these tests, and these tests are the easy ones to memorize because most people are familiar with these movements. What if I told you that the athlete performed these tests? 

Margaria-Kalamen power test



Hexagon test



T-test

Would you be able to make the correct program recommendations? The trick with these questions is in identifying the athlete’s weakness. To be able to do this, you have to have a good idea of what constitutes a “good” score on all the tests in the question. The answer to that question lies in the interpretation of a table in the book, specifically memorizing the mean value of any particular test for a given population. Here is my hand-drawn table, a duplicate of the values in the book. I hand-drew it out to help memorize, but that really isn’t necessary – you will only need to memorize one number per population vs. test data set.

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Figure 50 - Percentile values table for high school football players

Looking at these values, you can surmise that our athlete in question is around the 40 th percentile for bench, 60th percentile for squat, and 90th+ percentile for power clean. So the recommendation becomes obvious, he needs to train his upper body maximal strength. But during the test you won’t have these tables handy. So let’s perform a little thought experiment, let’s say you only memorized three things: Bench-220, Squat-340, Power Clean-210. And you went into this question remembering these numbers. Compare them to the stats from the question: You Memorized: Test Question:

Bench-220, Squat-340, Power Clean-210 Bench-205, Squat-

365, Power Clean-255

You would notice that only one number from the question was lower than the number you memorized, the Bench Press. From that you would recommend B. Upper body maximal strength.

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So how did I pick these numbers? (Bench-220, Squat-340, Power Clean-210). If you go back to the table you’ll see that these numbers sit right around the 50 th percentile, but are typically rounded. I round them to make them easy to remember, and because the actual specific number isn’t important…what’s important is that you have an idea of what an “average” or “good” score is on the test, so you can make a recommendation. The NSCA isn’t going to pick a number 1lb above or below the average, they are going to make it pretty obvious where the weakness is. So don’t sweat the details of each table, get a good solid feel for what constitutes a decent score on a test for a given athlete population.

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In statistics there is a very important statistical pattern called the Gaussian distribution. Pretty much everything that is random follows this pattern, and it’s the same “bell curve” that teachers use when determining your grades. A Gaussian distribution can be modified in shape, centered about different numbers and thus be used to describe a whole bunch of really cool things. Take the table from earlier, this is a Gaussian distribution that describes that table.

Figure 51 - Gaussian distribution of figure 50

Think of it as a description of likelihood. If you picked a random 16-18y/o football athlete the chances are pretty good he will land near a 348lb squat…but a 600lb squat becomes extremely unlikely. That funny looking sideways “b”, or “sigma” is the standard deviation. This number tells you how narrow the distribution is about the mean. A good rule of thumb is that 3 standard deviations from the mean accounts for nearly all possible outcomes (97% or more). You can illustrate this pretty well be taking a 348lb squat and adding 88 to it three times, and you get 348+88+88+88 = 612. Finding a high school football athlete with a 612lb squat would definitely be north of the 97th percentile.

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Now, why is this in any way useful to you? Well, because every single test and evaluation created by the NSCA or described in the book would follow a pattern like this. There will be an average, and a standard deviation. Thus, memorizing the mean value is a valid studying strategy for answering these types of questions. You don’t have to memorize the standard deviation either. Looking at it would give you an idea of how closely packed together scores would be, but you can also just look at scores to get an idea. Anyways, I don’t think there’s any more reason to belabor this point: Memorize the Mean. Also the book briefly discusses statistics on pages 271 & 272, so review those pages.

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The most important thing when it comes to completing any task is not giving up , this is especially true for what can be a long process in preparing for the CSCS exam. Second to that I would put honesty – being honest with yourself on what you actually understand versus what you are hoping to guess correctly on come exam day. If you don’t know what I mean by this, I’ve written more extensively about it on my blog here. This book was a monumental effort on my part, and I hope it was useful to you. If there are any and I mean ANY topics that you are having trouble grasping or memorizing – please contact me at [email protected]. I would love to hear any suggestions you have for additional topics to be covered, as well as any criticisms you have of my work. In Strength,

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Ultimate Guide to the CSCS Exam

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