Phil Daru builds a fighter's strength around their sport, never over it. Here's how to assess and program combat S&C.
For a fighter, skill and sparring come first - so strength and conditioning has to make them more powerful and durable without stealing the recovery they need to fight. Phil Daru's approach starts with an assessment: measure the physical qualities, find the limiter, then program explosive strength-speed and durability that fits around the skill work. This breakdown covers his method in our own words, adds our take for coaching this online, and turns it into a fit-it-around-the-sport checklist.
By Markus Evers · September 2026 · a Coachway video breakdown
the short version
Daru's case is that a fighter's S&C exists to serve the sport: assess the physical qualities - power, force, movement, conditioning - to find the one limiting the fighter, then train explosive strength-speed and durability that complements skill and sparring instead of competing with it for recovery. The one thing a coach should do about it: stop bolting generic strength work onto a fighter's week - assess first, target the actual gap, and schedule the S&C so the sport always wins the recovery argument.
Phil Daru - Full Fighter Performance Assessment
Source: Phil Daru on YouTube - "Full Fighter Performance Assessment". Watch on YouTube. We embed the public video and summarise it in our own words; the video, title and channel belong to Phil Daru, and nothing here implies his endorsement of Coachway.
Who is Phil Daru, and why coaches watch
Phil Daru is a strength and conditioning coach who built his name working with combat-sport athletes, including professional MMA fighters, and has become one of the go-to voices for the physical-preparation side of fighting. His content covers how to make a fighter more explosive, more durable and better conditioned without disrupting the skill work that actually wins fights. Coaches watch him because combat-sport S&C is its own discipline - a concurrent-training puzzle where strength, energy systems and skill all fight for recovery - and he's practical about solving it. This fighter-assessment approach is a clear example of his method, which is the lens this page is written for.
What Daru actually argues (our summary)
This is our summary of the ideas in the video, in our own words - not a transcript. Watch the original for his exact framing and examples.
- 1
S&C serves the sport. For a fighter, strength and conditioning supports skill and sparring - it must not steal the recovery fighting needs.
- 2
Assess before you program. Measure power, force, movement and conditioning to find the quality actually limiting the fighter, then train that.
- 3
Train force fast. Combat rewards power and rate of force - explosive strength-speed - more than a grinding maximal lift, built on enough strength to support it.
- 4
Build durability. The body has to tolerate the collisions and volume of the sport - robustness is a trained quality, not a given.
- 5
Fit it around skill work. Schedule S&C so it complements sparring and technical training rather than colliding with it - the sport wins the calendar.
Coachway's take
We think the core discipline here - S&C serves the sport - is the thing most coaches new to combat athletes get wrong. It's tempting to program a fighter like a bodybuilder or a powerlifter and be impressed by the gym numbers, but if the strength work leaves them flat for sparring, it's actively hurting the thing that matters. Daru's assessment-first, complement-the-skill approach is the professional version, and the logic transfers to any athlete whose sport, not the gym, is the point.
Where we'd sharpen it for online coaching: you usually aren't at the gym to run the assessment or watch the sparring, so you lean harder on structured self-assessment and on readiness data. Have the fighter run simple, repeatable tests you can compare over time, and check recovery and readiness before hard sessions, so you can place the S&C where it won't wreck the skill work. Remote combat coaching is really a scheduling-and-recovery problem, and the coach who manages that well is the one who adds without interfering.
The other piece is honesty about the concurrent-training tax. You can't maximise strength, conditioning and skill all at once, so something is always being prioritised and something maintained. Naming that trade openly - this block we build the engine and hold strength, this block we sharpen power and cut volume - keeps the fighter and their skill coaches on the same page, and stops the S&C quietly competing with the fight camp instead of feeding it.
So our version of his approach is: assess the fighter's physical qualities to find the limiter, target it with explosive strength-speed and durability work built on a strength base, schedule it around skill and sparring so the sport always wins the recovery argument, and re-test to prove it's working.
Program around the sport, watch the readiness
Coaching a fighter remotely is a scheduling-and-recovery job, and that's where the platform earns its keep. In Coachway you build the S&C block in the workout builder and place the hard sessions where they won't collide with the fighter's key sparring days, so the strength work supports the skill work instead of flattening it. The assessment baselines and the readiness signals you schedule around - test scores, recovery, how sparring felt - come back through check-ins, so you can prove the S&C is closing the gap and pull volume when the fighter's cooked. The method is Daru's; the platform keeps the program and the readiness data in one view.
For the conditioning and periodization around it, the companion breakdowns on Joel Jamieson on conditioning and Stew Smith on periodizing the athlete cover the energy-system and phasing sides.
The fighter S&C fit (assess, target, schedule)
A short template for building a fighter's strength and conditioning around their sport. The qualities are the usual suspects - assess them, target the limiter, and fit the work into the skill schedule.
Fighter S&C fit
| Quality | Assess | Train (if it's the gap) |
|---|---|---|
| Power / speed | Jump, throw or explosive test | Explosive strength-speed, ballistic work |
| Strength base | Key lift relative to bodyweight | Enough max strength to support power |
| Conditioning | Sport-specific work-capacity test | Energy-system work matched to the sport |
| Durability | Movement quality, tolerance to volume | Robustness, position and tissue tolerance |
| The fit | Skill/sparring schedule & recovery | Place S&C so the sport wins the calendar |
How to use it: assess the qualities, decide which one is limiting the fighter, and train that rather than everything. Then schedule the S&C around the skill work so it complements sparring instead of colliding with it, pull volume as a fight nears, and re-test to confirm the gap is closing.
FIGHTER S&C FIT (via Coachway) - assess the qualities, target the limiter, fit the work around the sport - POWER / SPEED -> assess: jump/throw/explosive test | train: explosive strength-speed, ballistic work - STRENGTH BASE -> assess: key lift relative to bodyweight | train: enough max strength to support power - CONDITIONING -> assess: sport-specific work-capacity test | train: energy-system work matched to the sport - DURABILITY -> assess: movement quality, volume tolerance| train: robustness, position & tissue tolerance - THE FIT -> assess: skill/sparring schedule & recovery| place S&C so the SPORT wins the calendar HOW TO USE: Assess the qualities, decide which ONE is limiting the fighter, and train that rather than everything at once. Schedule the S&C AROUND the skill work so it complements sparring instead of colliding with it, pull volume as a fight nears, and re-test to confirm the gap is closing. S&C serves the sport - never the reverse.
Strength & conditioning for fighters - FAQ
How is strength and conditioning for fighters different from general training?
The biggest difference is that S&C is the support act, not the main event. A fighter's priority is skill work and sparring, so strength and conditioning has to build the physical qualities that help - power, rate of force, durability, sport-specific conditioning - without stealing the recovery the fighter needs for technical training. It's less about maximum numbers in the gym and more about producing force fast, tolerating collisions and volume, and lasting through rounds. That makes it a concurrent-training problem: strength, energy systems and skill all competing for one body's recovery, and the coach's job is to sequence them so they add up instead of interfering.
Why assess a fighter before programming?
Because 'get stronger and fitter' is too vague to be useful, and every fighter has a different limiter. An assessment - looking at power, force production, movement quality and conditioning - tells you which quality is actually holding the fighter back, so you train that instead of piling on generic work. It also gives you a baseline to re-test against, so you can prove the S&C is doing something rather than hoping. The video's fighter-assessment framing is exactly this: measure the physical qualities first, find the gap, then build the program around closing it.
How do you fit S&C around skill training and sparring?
You schedule it so the hard physical work and the hard skill work don't collide, and so neither leaves the fighter too fatigued for the other. In practice that means placing heavy or highly-fatiguing strength and conditioning sessions where they least interfere with key sparring or technical days, keeping some sessions short and potent rather than long and draining, and pulling volume back as a fight approaches. The fighter's sport always wins the scheduling argument; S&C fits into the gaps and supports the skill work, not the reverse.
Should fighters train maximum strength or power?
Both matter, but combat rewards the ability to produce force fast - power and rate of force development - more than a grinding one-rep max. A base of strength underpins power, so you don't ignore it, but the expression a fighter needs is explosive: fast hands and hips, quick level changes, hard first shots. So the emphasis leans toward strength-speed and explosive work built on enough of a strength base to support it, rather than chasing maximal slow lifts for their own sake. As always, the specific balance depends on the fighter's gaps from the assessment.
More athlete-preparation breakdowns
- · Joel Jamieson on conditioning - energy-system work for combat and field athletes.
- · Mike Boyle on single-leg training - joint-friendly lower-body strength for athletes.
- · The full library: fitness creator coaching breakdowns.
Prepare the athlete, protect the sport
all guidesJoel Jamieson on Conditioning (Coach Breakdown)
Joel Jamieson's energy-system conditioning, broken down for coaches: build the aerobic base first, layer a smaller dose of high-intensity on top, on one repeatable weekly template - not random HIIT.
Read the guideStew Smith on Periodizing the Tactical Athlete (Coach Breakdown)
Stew Smith on periodizing the tactical or occupational athlete, broken down for coaches: phase from an aerobic-endurance base into a strength block, emphasising one quality at a time so a broad-capability client peaks for the demand.
Read the guideEric Cressey on Rotational Power (Coach Breakdown)
Eric Cressey on why hip-to-shoulder separation - not raw strength alone - unlocks power for rotational-sport athletes, broken down for coaches with how to program the sequencing and ballistic work.
Read the guideFree tools for this: Strength Standards Calculator · How to Create a Workout Plan · RPE Calculator
Coach S&C that serves the sport
Fighter S&C is a scheduling-and-recovery job: the strength work has to help, not flatten the sparring. In Coachway you program the block in the workout builder, place it around skill days, and track readiness in check-ins so you add without interfering. Start your 14-day free trial and prepare athletes without competing with their sport.
