For a while, many people believed that the best way for an athlete to see gains in their sport was to adapt a strength training program. By lifting heavy and light weights, they were able to increase their overall strength and thus become more efficient athletes. While this is true, athletes have learned to train in other ways. Along with lifting weights, training their power has proven to be a much more effective way to improve their athletic performance. Power is defined by the speed at which an object can be moved. When it comes to strength and conditioning, power is an important measure of athletic ability. Many sports focus on how quickly a person can achieve this and how powerful they can be to achieve this. Once athletes began training for power, studies began to show that it was the best way to increase their training gains. Studies began to appear on power drive development, the idea that the more motor recruitment an athlete uses, the faster they will become. When performing powerlifting movements, they noticed that they saw the greatest motor recruitment. The law of specificity states that if you want to get better at your sport, you must train the same way. Because many sports today are explosive and focused on speed, they must train to be as fast as possible. Before athletes focused on power training, they were training inefficiently. This isn't to say that strength training isn't important, but to follow specificity, they need to train to get faster, not stronger. By focusing on moving the weight as quickly as possible, they were training the correct systems in their body. The level of motor recruitment was much higher in weight training and speed was actually affected in the positive position...... middle of paper ...... perspective sports. Although strength training was once considered the most effective means of training, we now know that athletes must build power to achieve the most gains. The higher the motor recruitment, the more power will be generated by the athlete's body. Power lifts such as plyometrics and explosive medicine ball throws are an effective way to train, but are not the most effective. These exercises can be used in an athlete's training program, but the main emphasis should be on Olympic lifting and maximal effort sprints. These methods have been shown to be most effective in achieving maximal motor recruitment levels in athletes. Concluding that to be the most efficient athlete possible, they must have power-oriented strength training that includes some simple power exercises but primarily focuses on difficult Olympic lifts and maximal effort sprints..