What a year in the Weight Room can do.

My daughter has played on her schools varsity team as a 7th,8th and 9th grader.

As a 7th grader she was overmatched at the plate, her stats for that year were .210 BA, 300 OB%, .8750 fielding % in 11 games played.

As an 8th grader, she was not overmatched at the plate, but was just not strong enough to drive the ball past people. .304 BA, 340 OB%, .960 fielding. 34 games played.

During her 9th grade year, she has spent a good deal of time in the weight room. Basically the same size as previous year. .406 BA, .506 OB%, .971 fielding. 30 games played. Weak ground ball outs from the previous year are now line drives to the outfield. If my stats are correct, she has 13 fly ball outs this year. Coulda/ shoulda been a huge year at the plate with some luck.

Just wanted to share our experience with someone, sometimes it is not the swing, its the motor pushing it. A year of strength training has helped her tremendously...

Completely agree. I think a big part of the difficulty with younger hitters in developing a good swing stems from an overall lack of strength and, especially, core strength.

That's great to hear!
What style/type of lifting is she doing?
Standard sets, where she's going in and doing sets of 6, 8 or 10 reps and slowly working her weights up? (Which is great for her as a beginner)
Pyramid, or old school, where she does reps of 8,6,4,3,2,1.
Or power lifting? Where she sets herself up on a cycle, like a competitive power lifter does when they prepare for a competition?

If she's doing power lifting, be careful so she doesn't get too strong, too fast. And starts blowing stuff out.

Hoover's Dad said:

A year of strength training has helped her tremendously...

Click to expand...

Great share. DD just started working out more regularly this off season. More than helping her with softball, I love the self-confidence she's gained from it. She's not a big girl to start with. But her girlfriends tease her and say she has boy arms because she's solid and the boys comment on her muscle definition. She's not one who normally likes any attention, but I think the positive feedback from peers has done wonders. And now I rarely have to remind her to get a couple workouts in each week.

If interested, she mixes in a variety of work outs to keep it fresh. She does free weights and P90x3, mostly agility, core, and yoga.

As I always say, you can tell the difference between players who have been in the weight room and the wait room.

My DD's 16u team has been lifting all season. My DD goes about 5 days a week while others get 2-3 days depending if they show up to optional practices during the weeknights. I have noticed the strength difference on inside and outside pitches. They aren't lazy pop ups to the infield they are now muscled over the infielders. Her arm strength has improved so much that teams will need to have those elite speed girls to steal.

We do total body 2-3 days a week and the other 2 days we focus on specific lifts or muscle groups. DD being a catcher there's a lot of legs, back, shoulders. Looking forward to how her stats climb with increased strength.

Our teams all hit the weights regularly, year-round. We leave it to pros to design the workouts but core strength is always a part of it. They focus on strength and power training, balance and stability training, endurance training, and speed and agility training.

I love the confidence that weightlifting gives these young ladies and I can't wait for DD to get back into the gym after HS season is over. She used to be very intimidated by a particular girl but now they've become friends. DD says the girl's nice to her now because she knows DD can break her in half LOL!