The National Strength and Conditioning Association (NSCA) is proud to announce the recipients of the organization’s 2024 Peer Awards. These distinctive awards honor professionals around the world for outstanding achievement in their field. Each individual was nominated by the NSCA community and will be formally recognized at the 2024 NSCA National Conference in Baltimore, MD, this July 10-13.

The NSCA is proud to recognize the outstanding work of our professionals around the world. Please take time to nominate your peers when you see excellence that deserves recognition.

Diana Vives, MS, CSCS,*D, presents, "Building a Career for the Performance Trainer"

Because a client’s functional abilities will change in each of the tissue healing phases, the fitness professional must understand the time it takes to heal and the science behind each phase in order to prescribe safe exercises for clients in those phases.

Self-myofascial release (SMR) through the use of foam rolling or other implements is a time and cost-efficient method of increasing performance and recovery.

Incorporating land-based strength and conditioning into a training regimen can give a swimmer a competitive edge. As with every sport, there are sport-specific exercises the athlete should perform in order to mimic the specific sport movement they are trying to improve.

This article briefly describes how individuals can have the same training program, but have large fluctuations in the adaptation responses due to genetic and life style factors.

Using the sled closely mimics real-time sports performance movements and activities because of the horizontal resistance opposing the vertical movements typically seen in a weight room setting. This article highlights a variety of sled training exercises designed to target the core musculature.

As rotation, power, and rotational power are all common pieces of everyday life, it is important to train for efficiency in the movements. This article addresses the specific approaches rotational training can have in an individual’s strength program to address core integrity, synergistic muscular systems, and overall athletic capabilities as it relates to aging.

The following article is an example training program that was built based on personal experience and research for an in-season soccer athlete.