Strength in Numbers #30
As we grow older, our body changes.
There’s a critical stage of massive change between the ages of 13 and 16, where most kids hit peak height velocity. During this growth spurt, bones grow at an accelerated rate, and muscle mass increases.
It’s a critical time for young athletes, as these changes lead to performance enhancement, and players get more competitive psychologically.
For developing pitchers, it’s the first time velocity advancement is realized, resulting in greater forces and more significant loads on the joints. It also correlates with the transition from a smaller to a larger field which adds even greater stress to the developing body.
With our Pitch Strong Guidelines, we account for these important changes in athletic development by adjusting pitch counts and days rest as muscles, bones, tendons, and ligaments are all changing length and thickness.
We must appreciate these physical changes as part of the training and competition of every young athlete, but the thrower is especially prone to overly taxing a growing body which can lead to lifelong problems.
Growing Old
Now on the flip side, as we progress through our competitive careers, we hit the age of 30.
In many sports, 30 years old is generally when our physical abilities degrade. Our strength can increase, but contractile velocities tend to slow, and power suffers.
Several studies show a dip in athletic performance in baseball players around the age of 29.
It’s interesting how both lower body power and athletic ability seem to correlate as they both start to take a nosedive when power starts to decline.
We can see this in our benchmark for power as vertical jump height, with the greatest positive impact on velocity being at a minimum jump height of age x 1.5. Obviously, this is not unlimited, and most of our peak jumping performances occur in our early twenties (ref).
Defying Age
We caught up with one of our strongest ambassadors for ArmCare.com in Joe Beimel.
Joe defies age and physical limitations that occur biologically and has found a sweet spot in his training, assessment, and non-negotiable individualized training for this throwing arm.
Joe played for 13 years at the MLB level only to return in the 2021 season as a minor league sign at 44 for the San Diego Padres.
The Padres experienced a significant loss in 2021 with ten pitchers on the injured list and had to fortify their minor league system with experienced pitchers in case further injuries ensued. In Joe, they had a reliable left-handed reliever that had increased his previous fastball velocities in the low to upper 90s in 2021.
His arm transformation is remarkable, as most men his age play slow pitch. Even worse, many have exited the game without ever throwing again due to arthritis and other orthopedic changes that occur to the arm as a baseball player ages.
He realized significant velocity gains using the ArmCare.com system that amazed scouts and himself.
Joe began with ArmCare.com as a project of interest for the two facilities he runs. He wanted to experiment on himself first, and it worked!
He is the ultimate baseball professional, still competing while mentoring athletes.
In this week’s podcast, Joe will goes his preparation, mindset, and outlook for himself in the game of baseball. It’s amazing to listen to him speak, and we are excited about everything he has set out to accomplish in the next phase of his career.
This is not a comeback, but an awakening and one that should resonate with all athletes in the game of baseball.
If you want a competitive advantage, you can dive fully in and make your body your business with the ArmCare App. You will experience greater opportunity in the sport by monitoring your throwing arm strength and range of motion.
Keep training smarter, not harder, and listen to the podcast about a rare professional athlete and possibly the igniter for many more pitchers in their 40s to come back and show the young ‘ins a thing or two about the game.
Related Content
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How Joe Beimel Is Throwing Harder Than Ever At 44 Years Old (More Than Velocity #23)
Joe Beimel is a big-league pitcher, whose looking to make a comeback through some hard work and direction from the ArmCare App.
