Loren Landow wins nsca award after transforming Notre Dame
Notre Dame Trematerra Family Director of Football Performance Loren Landow has been named the recipient of the 2026 National Strength and Conditioning Association Impact Award, the organization announced Friday morning — a national honor that arrives at a moment when the transformation he has overseen in South Bend has become impossible to ignore.
Awarded since 1997, the NSCA Impact Award recognizes an individual who has made significant contributions that have impacted a segment of the overall strength and conditioning field. For Landow, the recognition caps a career of elite-level athlete development — but it also shines a national spotlight on exactly what has changed inside Notre Dame's program since he walked through the door in January of 2024.
"I'm deeply honored to receive the NSCA Impact Award," Landow said. "Any impact I've made throughout my career is a reflection of the incredible athletes, coaches, mentors, and colleagues who have trusted me, challenged me, and inspired me. I've been fortunate enough to surround myself with so many outstanding people, and this recognition is as much a testament to them as it is to my own contributions. I'm truly grateful for the opportunity to serve this profession and the recognition of this award."
The Results Since January 2024 Tell the Story
The most direct and undeniable evidence of Landow's impact at Notre Dame is the record. Since his arrival in January of 2024, Notre Dame has compiled an outstanding 24-4 overall record, including an appearance in the College Football Playoff National Championship game — a level of sustained success that represents one of the best two-year stretches in modern Notre Dame football history.
That kind of record is never the product of one single factor, but the timing is impossible to overlook. Landow's hire marked a fundamental shift in how Notre Dame approaches the physical development, conditioning and durability of its roster — and the results on the field followed almost immediately. A program that has long preached a line-of-scrimmage, physically dominant identity under Marcus Freeman finally had the performance infrastructure to match that vision, and the transformation has shown up everywhere from health and availability to fourth-quarter execution to the program's ability to compete physically with the most talented rosters in the country.
What Changed Inside the Program
Landow's career-long specialty has always been bridging the gap between collegiate development and professional-level performance training — and that is precisely the standard he imported to Notre Dame's strength and conditioning operation. His résumé prior to South Bend includes preparing countless NFL Draft prospects for the Combine and Pro Days, the most scrutinized athletic evaluation events in professional sports, along with coaching more than 70 NFL All-Pro players and more than 25 first-round selections over the course of his career.
Before Notre Dame, Landow served as head strength and conditioning coach for the Denver Broncos from 2018 to 2023, working daily with professional athletes whose bodies and performance windows are their livelihood. He also owns and directs Landow Performance in Centennial, Colorado, where he has trained thousands of athletes across the NFL, NHL, MLB, UFC and WNBA, in addition to Olympic medalists and world record holders.
That is the standard of training, programming and athlete management that Landow brought to South Bend in January 2024 — and the strides have been visible across every dimension of the program since.
Durability and availability have been a hallmark of Notre Dame's roster over the past two seasons in a way that was not always the case previously. A program that wants to compete deep into the College Football Playoff every year needs its best players on the field in November, December and January — not just September — and the conditioning and injury-prevention programming Landow has implemented has been a critical factor in keeping Notre Dame's roster healthier and more available through the most physically demanding stretches of the season.
Physical dominance in the trenches has become a defining characteristic of Notre Dame football under Freeman, and the strength gains, explosiveness training and functional power development that Landow's program emphasizes are foundational to that identity. The offensive and defensive line improvements that have become a central storyline of Notre Dame's roster construction are inseparable from the physical preparation infrastructure that supports them every single day in the weight room.
Speed and explosiveness across the roster — the kind of timed, measurable athletic development that NFL teams scout for at the Combine — has become a more pronounced trait of Notre Dame's roster since Landow's arrival, a direct reflection of his background preparing draft prospects for the exact testing metrics that NFL evaluators prioritize.
A professional-caliber culture of training has taken hold inside Notre Dame's program, with players now operating under the same developmental philosophy and competitive standards that Landow used to prepare All-Pro players and Olympic medalists. That cultural shift — treating every Notre Dame player with the individualized attention and rigor of a professional athlete — has elevated the baseline expectation for what it means to be physically prepared as a Fighting Irish football player.
A National Award That Reflects a Program-Wide Transformation
The NSCA's recognition of Landow is a credit to an entire career of elite athlete development — but for Notre Dame fans, it also serves as external validation of something the program has felt internally since the moment he arrived. The Fighting Irish are stronger, faster, more durable and more physically dominant than they were before January 2024, and the 24-4 record with a national championship game appearance is the clearest possible evidence of what that transformation has produced on the field.
Marcus Freeman's vision for a line-driven, physically imposing Notre Dame program required a strength and conditioning infrastructure capable of delivering on that vision at the highest level. Landow has done exactly that — and the NSCA Impact Award is national recognition of a strength program transformation that Notre Dame has been experiencing in real time for the past two years.