Program History
One Four Four One (1441) Strength & Conditioning continues its evolution, which originally began as Fitnecessity Sports Performance, as a conceptual idea in 1994 on the campus of Sam Houston State University (Huntsville, TX). Raphael Ruiz was an assistant strength & conditioning coach under the supervision of Director Ben Pollard. It was there that many observations were made and countless discussions took place about the true meaning of athleticism. They noted that in the discipline of strength and conditioning, the majority of time and effort is placed on achieving greater levels of strength in the squat, bench press, incline press and Olympic Lift(s), which are standard practices. When they evaluated the strongest individuals in their programs, they tried to correlate that with success in performance-related parameters such as the 40yd dash, short shuttles and vertical jump. They then carried that further and analyzed those measures of strength as they correlate with success in their arenas of play (football/soccer fields, basketball/volleyball court, baseball/softball fields, etc.) When they distanced the variables of proficiency in Olympic lifting and separated sports skills, a remarkable and surprising observation was noted. There was not a significant result of success in traditional strength and conditioning programs (as stated above) that dramatically paralleled successes in whichever activities they took part in. Many athletes lacked an ability to transfer weight room success to useful and purposeful ability in performance.
It was at that point where Raphael first began to examine and list as many variables that were thought to be associated with athleticism. This led to an unending register and was the precursor for the view from outside of the proverbial box. As these variations were noted, research began on each and every one of them. It became very apparent that there was an enormous amount of information being studied in a large number of other disciplines that would have a tremendous impact on Human Movement Science.
Eventually the road led to Tampa, FL in 1998. It was here that Raphael Ruiz focused an unbelievable amount and undeniable quality of resources. These included some of the brightest minds in their respective fields. Seth Gasser, MD, Bill Bonney Ph.D., Robert Belsole, MD, Aaron Mattes, John Small, MD, David Reina, DC, Mark Frankle, MD, Scott Brickett, ATC were among the individuals involved in this flood of information exchange as the Advisory & Program Development Board was developed. Some of the brightest minds in their respective fields like Exercise Physiologists, Orthopedics, Physical Therapists, Myofascial & Massage Therapist, Sports Nutritionist, Coaches, Athletic Trainers, Sports Psychologist, Biomechanist, Neurophysiologists, Chiropractors, athletes and many more were brought together in order to advance the discipline of Human Movement Science. What resulted is the constant evolution of one of the most comprehensive, scientifically based, and orthopaedically backed and performance driven programs.
Through its proper implementation, scores of athletes, general fitness population, sports rehabilitation, sports reconditioning and many more have benefited from the outstanding ability of bringing together many talented individuals for the collective purpose of reducing the occurrence and severity of performance and training related injuries while improving sports performance parameters. All of these talents, while properly applying 1441 Strength & Conditioning training systems, are coupled with the hard work and desire of an athlete, resulting in the achievement of their goals and dreams.
