How to Create a Personalized Training Plan Based on Real Data

Introduction

In this article, we explain how to create a truly personalized training plan, step by step, and how the technology available today makes that process faster and more precise than ever.

Why Most Plans Aren’t Really Personalized

Real personalization starts with a question: what does this athlete specifically need for their sport, at a given moment, for a specific goal, based on the data their assessments provide?

To answer that question, you need data. And to have data, you need to assess.

Step 1: Assess Before You Program

Assessment is the foundation of everything that comes after.

The data you should have before building any training plan aimed at improving lower-body strength and power is:

Strength and Power Assessment

  • Countermovement Jump (CMJ): measures lower-body power
  • Squat Jump (SJ): measures explosive strength without elastic reutilization
  • Drop Jump (DJ): measures reactive capacity and the Reactive Strength Index (RSI)
  • Max strength tests (1RM) in key movements

Asymmetry Assessment

  • Performance difference between dominant and non-dominant limb
  • An athlete with more than 10-15% asymmetry needs corrective work before increasing loads

Fatigue and Wellness History

  • Pre-training wellness questionnaires
  • Performance evolution across repeated tests
  • Accumulated rating of perceived exertion (RPE)

Without this data, any plan you build is a hypothesis. With this data, it’s a prescription.

Step 2: Interpret the Data With Scientific Judgment

Having the data isn’t enough. You need to know what it says.

What Does the CMJ Tell You?

A low CMJ relative to the SJ indicates an elastic reutilization deficit, the athlete needs stiffness and plyometric work. A high CMJ with a low SJ indicates good reactive capacity but a max strength deficit, they need more strength work and stimulation of the muscular contractile component.

What Does the RSI Tell You?

The Reactive Strength Index (flight time / contact time) is one of the best indicators of neuromuscular efficiency. A low RSI with a good CMJ suggests the athlete has power but can’t express it quickly, they need reactivity work.

What Do Asymmetries Tell You?

In most cases, asymmetries above 15% in unilateral jump tests are an injury risk indicator and a clear signal that bilateral work volume should be reduced while the deficient side is worked on.

Nexo Kinetics performs the automatic interpretation of assessment results through internal algorithms based on international scientific literature. For example, it compares the countermovement jump capacity of the right limb with the left to find the percentage difference between the two and detect asymmetries.

Step 3: Define the Training Block’s Goals

With the data interpreted, the next step is to define what you want to achieve in the training block (typically 4 to 6 weeks).

Goals must be measurable and tied to the deficits identified in the assessment. For example, in the case of a symmetrization goal, an objective could be to bring the percentage difference in lower-limb power performance below 10%.

At the end of the block, a new round of tests lets you objectively verify whether the goal was met.

Step 4: Design the Plan’s Structure

With the goals defined, the block plan is built on that foundation:

  • Exercise selection based on the deficits identified in the assessment
  • Load undulation configured to vary volume and intensity throughout the block
  • Deload weeks planned from the start
  • Measurable goals for the end of the block

An example with the Unilateral CMJ assessment: if the percentage difference between legs is between 15 and 20%, exercises are performed adding one extra set with the weak leg, and unilateral exercises are prioritized.

Example: Bulgarian split squat + single-leg jumps landing on two legs, always starting with the weak leg and finishing with the weak leg, meaning the lower-performing limb performs one more set.

Step 5: Deliver the Plan and Follow the Athlete

A plan in a PDF that the athlete saves on their phone and never looks at again is useless. The plan has to be alive: accessible, updatable, and loggable.

The minimum the athlete needs to execute the plan well:

  • Access to the plan from their phone, exercise by exercise
  • Execution videos for every movement
  • The ability to log sets, reps, and weight used
  • Pre- and post-training wellness questionnaires
  • Visualization of their progress over time

All of this is integrated into the Nexo Kinetics athlete app. The coach sees in real time how the athlete executed each session, what weights they used, and how they reported their wellness, without needing a WhatsApp message to find out.

The Full Circle: From Data to Plan and Back to Data

Real personalization isn’t an event, it’s a cycle. You assess, program, monitor, reassess, and adjust. Each block improves because it’s informed by the previous block’s data.

That cycle, which used to require Excel, WhatsApp, a separate test spreadsheet, and hours of manual work, can now be managed from a single platform.

That’s exactly what Nexo Kinetics does: it closes the loop between sports assessment and training programming, in a workflow that saves the coach time and improves the athlete’s results.

Turn every test into a training plan

Nexo Jump measures vertical jump, contact time and RSI with millimetre precision — and the software turns that data into programs for your athletes.