The Transfer Principle for Sports Training

The Transfer Principle suggests that learning and performing one activity affects the performance of related skills and activities. This principle is essential for designing practice strategies that have the greatest positive impact on competitive performance. Correctly applying this principle saves valuable training time while accelerating results.

Coaching Tips for Applying the Transfer Principle

1. Identify similarities between previously learned skills and new skills.

2. Maximize the similarity between training activities and competitive conditions. Simulate various elements of competition (e.g. arousal level, game intensity, spectator noise) occasionally during training sessions, particularly during the in-season.

3. Provide adequate experience with fundamental skills before advancing to more complex skills. Well learned lead-up skills can positively influence an athlete's performance in more demanding conditions at the next level of play (e.g., T-ball to baseball).

4. Develop more general capabilities, such as critical gross motor skills, that are adaptable to a variety of sport tasks. For example, in basketball, the vertical jump is a key element of rebounding and blocking shots.

5. Point out to the athlete how training activities will improve sport performance. For example, call attention to the shifting of weight, the hip lead, and the arm movement in softball throw when teaching the javelin throw.

For more coaching tips, check out

Teaching Techniques for Coaches: 9 Principles for Sports and Fitness

I wrote this unique e-book to give coaches some of the most useful instructional techniques I've found to speed up the athlete's ability to learn and perform competitive sports.

For more about this principle, see Transfer of Training.

See other Training Principles:

Balance Principle

Individualization Principle

Overload Principle

Recovery Principle

Reversibility Principle

Specificity Principle

Variation Principle

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