Each athlete must decide which areas of interest get prioritized in a particular training block. Note that exercises like RDLs and lunges are useful for multiple goals.
These are of the highest importance. Consider them almost mandatory. Bouncing, jumping, bounding, skipping, and maximal sprints are critical to develop tissue resilience and to maintain or improve the athletic qualities most important in Ultimate.
Winter training conditions might make it tough to find a place to run, so plyometrics must take up the slack by being part of every workout.
Train them in multiple directions, not just straight forward. Most plyometrics should be extensive, not intensive. Stay fresh; never try to train these through fatigue.
Hard throws demand healthy shoulders. Strength, mobility and resilience are important; a lot of muscle mass is not.
Good tools include Turkish get-ups, dead hangs from a pull-up bar, farmer's walks, dand ("Hindu") push-ups, and Lu raises.
Exercises for general strength (e.g. pull-ups, dips) also make sense if the player wants to dedicate more training time. These especially make sense for players who are weak in the shoulders and upper back.
An Ultimate player needs healthy hips that are strong in deep stances, because throwing involves deep stances.
Consider deep lunges (in all directions, including Cossack squats), 3rd world squat work (including goblet and front squats), horse stance exercises (like potato sack squats), and Controlled Articular Rotations (CARs).
Strongly bringing the thighs together is essential for safe cutting.
The opposite movement, abduction, should be trained as a counterbalance.
Weak players can use movements like Copenhagen planks and ankle-weighted wall splits, with leg raises for abduction.
Those with pre-existing strength should use a weighted butterfly stretch or specialized adductor machines. For abduction, plate-loaded bent-leg "dog pissing on a fire hydrant" from a quadruped stance is useful.
One of the most important muscles to be strong, powerful, resistant to injury
Think Romanian deadlifts, hamstring curls, single-leg deadlifts, kettlebell swings, and to an extent lower back extensions.
This movement serves two purposes. First, it helps prevent tweaks and pains. Second, lower back strength/strength-endurance is critical for transferring power through the body, and thus for sprinting.
E.g.:
- back extensions,
- Romanian deadlifts,
- overhead ball throws,
- (potentially) regular deadlifts,
- sandbag lifts
E.g.:
- reverse squats,
- forward throws
- hanging knee/leg raises
E.g.:
- Russian twists,
- plate rotations,
- ball throws to the side
- counter-rotation work
E.g.:
- windmills,
- side bends,
- Copenhagen planks
One of the most effective ways to develop relevant strength.
Weak players should use 20-rep back squats. Players with a base of strength in the movement can use front squats for lower-reps (3-6), deep lunges, Bulgarian split squats, and so on according to preference. Back squats in the ass-to-grass style are most effective for our purposes.
Strength-speed development enables explosive movement.
Power cleans, power snatches, and weighted jumps (with pauses) are effective tools for this part of the force-velocity curve. Use sets of 1-3 reps.
Think of these as "weighted plyometrics" but take care to train them distinctly: unweighted plyometrics are for maximum velocity, meaning short ground contact times create springiness/bounciness. Weighted power exercises like these are for maximal power, which means lower velocity against greater resistance. So adding weights to bouncy movements is counterproductive (slowing them down) whereas moving moderately-heavy (e.g. 1/3 to 1x athlete's bodyweight) weight at maximal speed a few times with a few seconds between them maximizes rate-of-force development.
Recent research suggests calf strength is critical for aging athletes to maintain speed.
Strengthening the Achilles tendon with slow eccentrics is also sensible injury prevention.
Especially helpful is the seated one-legged calf raise, which targets part of the muscle not otherwise worked.
E.g. juggling, throwing and catching a disc, throwing and catching other things. Helpful.
Spending time barefoot is good for the little muscles in your feet. In most cases this doesn't require much or any specific effort.