How I Train: An interview with Danny Camargo

How I Train: An interview with Danny Camargo

By: Eric McGinnis, CSCSDirector of SSP Swim
Rollins College Strength & Conditioning Coach
Sports Performance SpecialistSpectrum Sports Performance

Since returning to competition in January of this year, I’ve had quite a few people express interest in how I am getting back into form while coaching full time at SSP. In order to give people an inside look at what I’m doing in the weight room I decided to do a video interview with my strength coach, Danny Camargo. Danny is the president of Florida Weightlifting and has been a coach for multiple U.S international weightlifting teams. After I retired from swimming upon graduating from the University of Kentucky, I sought out Danny in order to learn more about Olympic weightlifting. Competing in weightlifting gave me a much-needed competitive outlet to fill the void of swimming, and also taught me a lot about how to properly incorporate Olympic lifts into an athlete’s program. Training under Danny has benefited me tremendously in my athletic development, which is why I continue to go to him for my programming now that I am a swimmer once again.

During the interview we touched on quite a few interesting topics, resulting in a video over 18 minutes long. In an effort to make this more accessible to viewers I have split this up into 4 sections so that you can either watch it in pieces, or simply watch the part that sound most interesting to you. I would like to note that this video discusses only my personal training, and is not necessarily a reflection of how I might program one of my own athletes. I have quite a bit more experience strength training than most swimmers, which is why my program is more aggressive. Keep in mind that most swimmers, even at the elite level, are still novice lifters. Although I use a lot of what I have learned from Danny, how I coach my own athletes at SSP is dictated based on age, experience, sport, previous injuries, etc. I will try to give more insight into how some of my own athletes are training in the near future. Also, depending on the level of interest, I am planning on detailing some of how I maximize my training in the pool since the hours I have available in the water are limited. If you have any questions or if there is something specific you would like to know about, please leave a comment and I’ll do my best to respond or incorporate the type of information you’d like to see in future posts.