The sled is a jack-of-all-trades for just about everything – strength, speed, conditioning, hypertrophy, etc. – but one of the qualities that it’s rarely used for is power. I’m on a mission to end that, though, since this particular exercise is as good as it gets in my mind for developing explosive full-body power. I’m not sure what to call this one since it’s not a gym staple by any means, so I’ll go with the “explosive sled chest press” even though it’s more than just a chest exercise. Maybe a more fitting name would be a horizontal split jerk?
Regardless, here’s why I’m such a big fan:
Although this is an upper-body movement at its core, make no mistake: this is an integrative, full-body movement that builds power from head-to-toe. The lead leg is pushing hard into the ground in sync with the upper body, the back hip is coming through following the initial push, and the core has to remain braced throughout to generate maximal force.
To piggyback on the previous point, the hard “push” of the lead leg paired with the driving through of the back hip makes this really underrated for building sprint speed, as it's comparable to acceleration in a few ways: similar body angles, a powerful first step, upper body involvement (think: arm drive), and similar muscle actions in the lower half.
It’s as joint-friendly as it gets. You’re getting an explosive “push” in – much like the split jerk – albeit in a horizontal manner that's easy on the shoulders. This is especially useful for people who have pain when performing other explosive upper body movements like any sort of push press, split jerk, or plyo push-up.
