What is the difference between strength and power, and which matters more?
Strength is the amount of force you can produce; power is how quickly you can produce it. A sprint start, a jump and a tackle are all decided by power. But power is force expressed fast, so raising the amount of force available raises the ceiling on it — which is why a program builds strength first and converts it later.
For most community athletes the honest answer is that strength is the limiting factor, because they have not built much of it yet.
Why
The two are trained differently. Strength work is heavy and relatively slow — the bar moves at whatever speed it can. Power work is light and fast, and the intent to move quickly is the point rather than a side effect. Doing a jump squat with a heavy bar trains neither well.
Why the order matters. An athlete who can only produce a modest amount of force has very little to express quickly. Spending a pre-season chasing power before the strength exists underneath it is the most common way to train hard and get marginally faster.
Why it does not stay in that order. Strength that is never expressed at speed does not automatically transfer. That is what the later part of a block is for: the same qualities, trained fast.
Train Smart's four-week blocks change character across the year — muscle-building, max-strength, power, maintenance — so the emphasis moves with the season rather than every block looking the same.
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OpenA program that already answers this for you
Train Smart builds your week around your sport, your season and the days you actually train — with the weight to put on the bar on every set, and the reason each movement is there.
One month free, then A$24.99/month. Cancel any time. iPhone and iPad.