WHY I STRAINED MY CALF AND HOW I'LL REHAB IT

My very first non-contact soft tissue injury in my entire football career occurred on the weekend - the dreaded calf strain.

And worst of all, the old man calf strain too!

It was in the dying stages of the 1st quarter and I'd already taken a strong pack mark and goal and was hungry for more - as usual.

The ball came into the forward 50 and was bouncing around as I trued to pick it up and at some point it took a light turn of it's trajectory so naturally I followed suit, changing direction to keep tracking the ball.

At that point I felt was I've experienced in the past as a calf cramp except this usually happens deep in the last quarter when it does happen, not the 1st quarter.

The other differing thing was that it felt like cramp but then it didn't "un-cramp" and I hobbled to the huddle for the quarter time break.

The club as a whole had an horrendous week with 7 - 10 injuries already stretching player availability with 3 - 4 of those players still playing on the weekend who in a perfect world would be taking a week or 2 off to recover.

To add insult to injury we had a major flu bug go through the club last week with another 5 or so blokes (and the coach!) playing this weekend even though they had all missed work at some point during the week because of it.

The weekend prior I had jarred my back in the 3rd quarter and had been hobbling around for the most of the week but was able to play but more on that later.

I reluctantly strapped the ice pack on and I was done for the day, with no real idea of what grade of strain I'd done.

On the positive, my body seems to have a great ability to recover from these low to medium grade injury episodes in the past so rehab started right there and then.

SATURDAY

- Apply ice pack for 2nd quarter of my game
- Had my usual post-game protein shake to get some amino acids flowing through the body which are the building blocks of muscle and can assist with rebuilding with whatever damage I had done.
- I purposefully stayed n my feet for the most part and stayed on the bench to watch the game
- Took the ice pack off for the half time break while I had a shower
- Reapplied the ice pack again in the 3rd quarter until the end of the game.
- Once I got home I set up the couch and did a couple of rounds of heat pack on the calf while watching a terrible game of footy on the TV

A quick on note on icing injuries - ice restricts blood flow which is great for reducing swelling but my reading tells me that 2 bouts of about 20mins icing is enough to to treat the acute symptoms of an injury. Blood flow delivers blood to the injured area where it can bring oxygenated blood into the area while taking away any waste products in there which is now where the healing takes the place. If you ice for too long then you are taking longer to start the healing process. And I've never been a huge icer anyway even when I had a string of rolled ankles back in the day where I'd play basketball on a Wednesday night, roll an ankle, walk around on it until it felt good enough to play again and play the game out - essentially going straight from injury to healing I suppose - and being able to play footy on a Saturday.

SUNDAY

- Without a choice I was up to do junior footy as our usual coordinator was away this weekend so I couldn't not go even if I couldn't! I limped down the stairs and rubbed some heat cream into the calf before I left the house but that was all I had time for. I umpired and coached the under 8's and then went straight to the under 10's where I coached them while staying on the field to coach them as well so I was on my feet from 10am to about 1:30pm and it felt good after that. I always say to blokes to walk around on rolled ankles and similar injuries - ALWAYS!
- When I finally got home I had a hot bath with some magnesium salts to relax all the surrounding muscles of the leg and because I love a good hot bath.

MONDAY

- I started the day with a round if my electric stimulation machine for 20mins on/off/on which supplies the area with very tiny contractions which is equivalent to a very easy training session increasing blood flow to the area and thus continuing on with the healing process. It can also be used as a warm up tool which I was also doing to see if I could possibly get out and try some form of a run but it didn't take well enough.
 - I was still able to do a little lower body strength gym session though
- I noticed at some point today that my limp had gone already - a good sign.

TUESDAY

- As I type this I'm almost pain free with a little pain when I try and to go right up onto my tippy, tippy toes and range of motion wasn't quite 100% in plantar flexion either.
- I'll head down to the grassed area I run on and try and see what running I can get in which will be low to medium intensity - nothing resembling a sprint at all

REST OF THE WEEK

- I'll try some medium speed stuff today and hopefully I'll be able to get a proper sprint and change of direction session in on Thursday.

WHY DID THIS HAPPEN?

Could of been 100 reasons why but as stated above last week I jarred my back which hindered me all week. It was actually pretty good come Wednesday and then Thursday it flared back up again to the point where I had to text the coach and say I was doubtful to play!

- I have a lower back "blow out" 1 a year as it's my "stress response" area (like migraines, shoulder, knee pain in times of stress - you'll probably have 1 too) which tells me my overall stress was getting up there anyway as your back doesn't just "go" for no reason even it seems it does.

- So throughout the week I was limited in what training I could do and didn't actually get to run at all from Saturday to Saturday - a very rare occurrence for me.

- By hobbling around all week my gait pattern may have been altered slightly making me vulnerable when the high intensity stuff was to be done (i.e game).

- I'm left with what I'll call "dysfunction" on my right leg from doing my knee 3 -4 years ago too which will also have a bearing on things as well.

- You know what? Maybe the calf just went on it's own.

However it happened, knowing what was going on in the lead up can drive my rehab where I can focus on getting more rest this week, get to bed earlier and do some extra corrective based training in the gym this week to hopefully get up for this weekend and more importantly, not to have it reoccur which would probably end up being a longer term injury then this one.

IS ENOUGH BEING DONE FOR PLAYER DEVELOPMENT?

I love On the Couch on Fox Footy and is my footy panel show of choice by a long way.

This week they had a segment on the current skill level of AFL players and here's a summary of the discussion which appears in the video below from about the 20min mark onwards:

GARRY LYON - Disposal of the footy is the worst it's ever been...kicking efficiency is the lowest it has ever been since stats have been taken...full time professionals should not make skill errors like this...it;s nothing short of embarrassing (while showing clips of a bunch f clanger kicks from the weekends games including 3 terrible kicks in 10secs from 1 game)

PAUL ROOS - AFL footballers AREN'T full time professionals...they have 10 - 12 weeks off in the off-season, 2 half days er week in the pre-season and a day and a half off during the in-season per week and then some 4 day breaks during bye rounds etc...coaches simply don't have enough time with the playing group

JONNO BROWN - Monday or Tuesday is recovery work and the players are not allowed on the field at all on those days

GARRY LYON - Can't the Captain or the Coach pull rank over the fitness staff and say until we can kick from A to B, let's put all the recovery stuff aside?

PAUL ROOS - Once the players have completed the recovery day then that's when we want to get them back on the field and do some kicking but then they have a half day study day as warranted from the Player's Association.

GERARD HEALY - Incoming draftees don't have the skills when they come into an AFL club...I was talking to Buck's and he said they simply don't have time to teach someone to get an opposite foot so if they don't have one already...

JONNO BROWN - Are list sizes too big?

PAUL ROOS - The AFL is the only professional sport in the world who have 4 - 6 developmental coaches at the actual club but they should be at the TAC clubs developing players...Junior development is a massive issue all over Australia

GARRY LYON - How big of an issue is the skill level of junior players coming through?

PAUL ROOS - Let's look at t this way...the Sydney Academy has 30 kids and it's an elite environment at under 18 level. My (Roosy's) son joined the Sandy Dragons this year and at his first training session there was 80 kids which is too many and that's not an elite program.

Later in the episode following this discussion they had North Melbourne Coach Brad Scott and on the subject of Ben Brown said:

"...Ben Brown has 100's of shots per week and I will pull rank on the fitness staff if they suggest he's done enough - and the more shots the better..."

Gerard then asked him about increasing the draft age to which he has been pushing even since his playing days saying this:

"...in their draft year kids are already doing Year 12 as well as TAC footy in the hope of getting drafted and are simply being pulled everywhere...increasing the draft age to 19 would allow them to have a full year of being semi-professional before going to the AFL thus allowing an extra year for natural maturity...list sizes should be smaller, say about 30, with the ability to top up during the season where needed from their VFL reserves team...at the moment coaching resources are being spread across 45 players when at the elite level we should be focusing on the top 30..."   

I was talking with a bloke who is part of the strength and conditioning team of a Melbourne based TAC team and he was saying that more attention (video anaylsis etc) is paid to the players who have the better chances of getting drafted to AFL clubs over the rest of the players raising the question of are TAC teams more interested in developing under 18 players or simply there to see how many kids we can get drafted from our club - backing up what Paul Roos has talked about above.

The full episode can be found here:

https://www.foxsports.com.au/afl/tv-shows/on-the-couch

Earlier this week there was an article that came out showing that in Australia preventable ACL injuries are becoming an epidemic proportions including kids as young as 5 doing ACL injuries which is insane and something I have not heard of at all in my lifetime.

There's plenty of reasons for that including early specialisation, society behavioral changes (technology, sitting, not as much movement) and possibly a gap in what I can only call "medium play" where kids go from the couch to competition sports with nothing in between.

Personally I think that metro and if possible, country leagues, should set up their very own development training centers and actually invest in their own players to provide actual strength and conditioning that isn't from a PT or HIT Group class background as well as specialist coaches to help with skills, tactics etc.

Yes this would cost a shitload but these leagues could receive help from the AFL and local/state/federal governments and would over time be an extra income stream for the leagues.

The league would also be looked upon more favorable among players looking to change teams, move locations etc as well as coaches. 

What's everyone's thoughts on this?

IN-SEASON TRAINING DO'S #6 - MICRO DOSING

As discussed, the in-season doesn't lave a lot of time to train all that you need to for footy.

With say a 90min Tuesday night session and then a 45min session Thursday you've got just over 90ins a week to train:

• Warm Up
• Speed
• Agility/Change of Direction
• Skills/Tactics
• Endurance
• Warm Down

Let's say your 2 warm ups and warm downs take a total of 15mins each or 30ins total - that leaves just 60 mins to cover the other 4 aspects of training at an average time of 15mins per aspect per week.

It just doesn't seem like enough time does it?  

Micro dosing refers to using very quick and efficient blocks of your training time to training the physical aspects of footy such as speed, agility/cod and endurance as you want to dedicate as much time as possible to skills and tactics but not at the expense of everything else.

When micro dosing you'll need to...

• Determine the optimal exercise variations to use that will elicit the greatest stimulus in the shortest amount of time
• Implement the most familiar activities you're group has previously used to minimise stoppage/instruction time
• Program your session so each micro dosing aspect actually potentiates the next aspect all throughout the session essentially implementing the micro dosing aspects as an extended warm up

Let's take speed development as an example.

A specific speed session performed on it;s own might look like this:

1 - Warm Up consisting of Be Activated Reset, Glute Activation, Sprint Mechanics Drills, Sub-Maximal warm up sets

2 - Acceleration consisting of various positional starts of 5 - 20m sprints 80  -100m over 4 - 8 sprints

3 - Max Velocity consisting of 30 - 40m Acceleration to Velocity sprints + Flying Sprints x 5 - 20m over 3 - 5 sprints.

NOTE - Speed sets need to followed by full rest before the next set as you CANNOT and WILL NOT develop any speed at all when any fatigue is present.

This means that a dedicated speed session could take up to 70mins or longer with 3 - 5mins rest between all sprints which is pretty much your training week done.

So from the session laid out above you'll need to decide:

# What are the most important aspects of the session that I HAVE TO KEEP IN?

# What are the least important aspects of the session that I could eliminate to cut back time but not take too much away from the quality of the session?

# Can I break the session up further to fit my training week, yet still train what I need to from a speed point of view?

My suggestions would be to:

* Develop a warm up template that every players gets to know over time so you can easily insert different activities into it to hit new ranges of motions, actions and movements that might incorporate some  of the aspects of the speed warm up

* To again cut the warm up time and thus overall time down you could implement a ball/skills initial warm up with handball and/or touch drills to ramp up speed and intensity which can decrease the amount of warm up speed sets you'll need to do.

* With 2 sessions per week you could do 1 session of acceleration and 1 session of max velocity as an extended warm up. This would mean you could get away with 3 - 4 sprints for each aspect taking 10mins each time.

* During speed set rest periods you could again insert ball/touch drills to keep players engaged and occupied and limit standing around.

* Sprinting is the highest nervous system based exercise you can do so placing this after your warm up but before you're main skill drills can potentiate your players minds and bodies leading to better skills which is exactly what you're after.

* You might cut acceleration sets down to 3 - 4 and max velocity sets down to 2 - 3 sets.

Don't take this as an excuse to train at a lower level, for micro dosing to have it's effects it must be performed at 100% or you'll end up undertraining and that quality, not receiving the stimulus it requires to even be maintained, will start to drop off and performance will suffer.

IN-SEASON TRAINING DO'S #5 - THE HIGH-LOW SYSTEM

The high-low system is something that ha been around for years but is used most in athletics circles, and was popularised by Ben Johnson sprint coach, Charlie Francis.

Now besides Ben being stripped of Gold in 1988 for steroid use and Charlie's terrible fashion sense, the high-low system stands as my go-to programming type personally.

The high-low system refers to training days consisting of high nervous system activity and training days of low central nervous system activity, of which you would alternate throughout the week.

By placing all your high nervous system activity on the same day/s, you can achieve the following:

- Greater Overall Training Volume of High and Low Activity

- A Consolidation of Stressors (future post alert #3) which matches up perfectly with the competing demands principle of in-season training

- More Recovery and Regeneration Days Per Week

As mentioned above high days include exercises that require a high neural output such as:

- Maximal Sprints

- Max Effort Gym Work @ 85+%

- Dynamic Effort Gym Work

- Jumps

- Throws

Even though the intensity might be low with various jumps and throws, they still require great power in the output side of things and thus belong on high days.

Low days include exercises that require low neural output such as:

- Aerobic Capacity Work

- Sub Maximal Gym Work @ 80% or less

- Hypertrophy Gym Work

- Stretching/Mobility/Flexibility Activity

Simply alternate these days throughout the week or whatever but do not do 2 high days...EVER.

This system works perfectly during the off-season but for the in-season I'd class your footy game and training days as your high days simply because of the use of your legs.

Iv you're gonna train legs in the gym then do so on a Tuesday or a Thursday and keep it low volume and high intensity for the most part.

Max Effort on a Tuesday and Dynamic Effort on a Thursday is what you're looking at.

So your week might look like this:

Monday - Recovery/Aerobic Circuit + Upper Body Gym

Tuesday - Leg Gym AM + Sprints/Footy Training PM

Wednesday - Off Legs Recovery/Aerobic Circuit

Thursday - Leg Gym AM + Jumps or Sprints/Footy Training PM

Friday - Upper Body Gym + Neural Charge PM

Saturday - Game

Sunday - Couch

WILLIAMSTOWN VFL TRAINING

Last night I had to stay home and look after my son so I didn't attend training but instead we went and checked out Williamstown VFL training down the road after Archie's Karate.

I love watching how teams from all different levels train and how the different aspects can be added into my personal and my team's training.

We probably got there after the initial warm up and stayed for about 45mins and here's what I saw.

DRILL #1 - LANEWORK

Just your basic lanework here with 4 or 5 lanes.

As you would expect the skills were ridiculously good!

What I did notice was that after marking the spot up kick, every player took 3 or 4 real fast momentum steps before kicking, even though the groups were only 20m apart.

I suspect this is done to get the kick to the destination as quick as possible which is what you need to break up defensive zones, not kicks with too much height, and thus too much time in the air.

DRILL #2 - DIAGONAL LANEWORK

Same thing but you kick to the diagonal group now as indicated the video above.

This changes up the kick a lot but keeps the very same fundamentals of the kick in tact from the previous drill.

I added the extra bits onto the lanework drill myself in the video above.

DRILL #3 - UP AND BACK NO DEFENSE

The list was split in to 2 teams, Yellow v Blue but I'm not sure what the mix was (seniors v reserves etc) but it doesn't matter anyway at this level where everybody is exceptionally skillful.

The objective of this drill was for each team to simply transition the ball from back to forward and immediately switch to get the ball back from back to frowards again so up and back.

Each group had their own ball and used chip kicks, medium switches and spot up kicks to move the ball.

It was't a race between teams either, they just had to have clean skills from goal to goal to goal - which they did.

DRILL #4 - UP AND BACK AGAINST DEFENSE

Staying in their yellow and blue teams they performed the same drill but no one team was offensive and the other was defense.

Again the ball had to go from one to the other and back again but this time the defensive team would apply token pressure and the offensive team would stay offensive for a period of time before having a quick break and switching roles.

DRILL #5 - STOPPAGE AGAINST DEFENSE

Still in the yellow and blue teams now they would simply start the ball where the coach said whether it be a kick out like they had just been doing, or a stoppage on either wing.

The coach would usually nominate who wins the clearance and then they would kick it into their forward 50 where most of the tie the opposing team was allowed to mark the ball and then they had to bring it out out defense, move it forward, take a mark and have a set shot at goal.

The opposing team would need to spread from the contest during the clearance but then immediately shift into defense when the opposite team marked the ball.

At this point they'd start from somewhere else on the ground and so on.

If the ball was turned over then the defensive simply dropped the ball on the ground, the offensive picked it up and the drill continues from a stoppage kick.

What most people might find most interesting was that there were absolutely zero HATS to guide the players, which is something local/amateur footy needs to try and implement to have carryover to game situations.

It's hard to do because of the wide variety of skill levels, fitness abilities and game sense at L/A levels but if you can find a way to somehow implement it into your team's training I'm sure it will pay off come a Saturday - even if it's just 5 - 10mins worth with just your senior group and top end reserves players to keep the drill flowing without too many skill errors.

I actually hope to get down some games this year but geez that Newport winter wind is a mood killer!

IN-SEASON TRAINING DO'S #4 - COMPETING DEMANDS

You definitely know that it's the in-season when you're playing an 12 degrees, gail force winds and driving rain!

Today let's tale a look at what's called competing demands of training.

Competing demands of training refers to how the various aspects of football (strength, speed, endurance etc) affect each other when being trained in a maximal context, at the same time.

Let's say your on a pretty fixed income, like most of us are, and you're saving for a car.

Each weekend you can't help yourself and you hit the town, putting a dent in those car savings each time and ultimately taking longer to reach your ultimate goal of purchasing a car, or just not purchasing it all.

Your demand to save money and spend it at the same time ate in total opposites of each other so you end up with no car and no money.

Now take training for maximal speed and maximal endurance at the same time.

If you are aware of the high-low system (future post alert) then you'll know that sprint and endurance training are polar opposites as well.

Sprinting requires huge input from the central nervous system but little metabolic input.

It also results in huge nervous system fatigue in the short term.

Endurance training requires a lot of input from your various energy systems that can result in huge metabolic fatigue (lactate etc),but little stimulation to the central nervous system in the short term.

With inputs from both ends of the speed-endurance spectrum you've got a few issues to worry about.

#1 - When training 2 qualities s far from each other such as spreed and endurance, the body doesn't know hat it needs to adapt to which can result in a whole heap of nothing in the end. You'll feel like you've achieved something when you really haven't.

#2 - You finish training and have a good meal to facilitate recovery so you're good to go for your next session - nice job. When you go to bed the real regeneration and adaptation takes place which requires a lot of recovery capacity. Your not just born with recovery capacity, you need to build it through your current training program and you can also feed it through sleep, nutrition and other recovery modalities. When you don't have enough recovery capacity, then at some point you're going to under-recover which is what a lot of people call overtraining.

#3 - When training maximal speed and maximal endurance at the same time, not only does the body have no idea which quality to adapt to, but now you're using up all of your energy systems which then need all the different recovery methods to regenerate. putting a lot of strain n your body to regenerate everythng at once. Going back to my analogy above, now you're saving for a car, hitting the nightlife and saving for a house all at once - but on the same money as above as well.

By training the qualities that rely on similar structures and energy systems to perform, you can be ultra efficient with your training and thus ultra efficient with your recovery as now the body can:

A - Focus on adapting to 1 major quality instead of 2

and;

B - Put all it's recovery efforts into regenerating 1 major energy system instead of 2 or more.

This is not to say you can only train 1 aspect per session, but put the focus on 1 aspect per session and micro-dose (future post alert #2) everything else on a maintenance level temporarily.

Here are the ma qualities we all train:

Aerobic Endurance - low intensity but long duration and continuous activity

Anaerobic (Glycolytic) Endurance - high fatigue over long, medium or short duration activity with incomplete rest

Alactic (Sprint) Power - high intensity but short duration activity with full rest

Maximum Strength/Hypertrophy - any gym training that might might cover all of the above

Learning New Technical Elements - new skills and/or tactics being introduced

Now how we train these qualities together is what will make or break us sooo....

Aerobic Endurance - alactic power, strength endurance, max strength/hypertrophy (afterwards)

Anaerobic (Glycolytic) Endurance - strength endurance, aerobic restorative activity, aerobic/anaerobic (mixed) endurance

Alactic (Sprint) Power - aerobic endurance, explosive strength, max strength/hypertrophy (afterwards), aerobic restorative activity

Maximum Strength/Hypertrophy - maximum strength, flexibility, aerobic restoration activity

Learning New Technical Elements - prior to any other training

So if you've planned that sprint/lactate session for tomorrow night then think again.

MY 2018 PRE-SEASON BY THE NUMBERS

Round 1 tomorrow for my team and I so I thought I'd have a peek at my full off/pre-season just to see actually work I've performed.

It started all the way back on Aug 30, 2017...

# 226 Training Sessions

* 44 Days Off

# 1 Sick Day

* 84% training rate

# 116 Gym Training Sessions

* 40 Sprint Training Sessions

# 21 Non-Running Aerobic Training Sessions

* 6 Running Aerobic Training Sessions

# 8 Footy Team Training Sessions

* 2500m of Acceleration Sprint Distance (5 - 6 meters per second)

# 1965m of Max Velovity Sprint Distance (6 - 10 meters per second)

* 4465m of Total High Speed Sprint Distance (5 meters per second or faster)

# 1360m of Lactic Running Distance

* 5825m of Total Bodyweight Sprinting Distance

# 1330m of Total Resisted Sprinting Distance (4 - 60kgs)

* 7155m of Total Sprinting Distance

# 10.3kms of Total Aerobic Training Distance (100% Max Aerobic Speed)

* 42.6kms Biking Distance (Low End Aerobic)

# 9.6kms of High Speed Biking

NOTES:

 - I'm 40 this year

 - I play out of the square 85% of the time during games with the odd run at half forward and on the ball

 - I'm a sprinter/power athlete so I aim to maximise that in my training while reaching an average/above average level on aerobic markers

- Weather Forecast Tomorrow: Pissing With Rain

LEARN HOW TO ACTUALLY LEARN

Some time ago I came across some writings from Olympian track coach Stuart McMillan who coaches Andre De Gassi, the soon to be fastest man in the world (not ever though!).

This year he introduced a weekly collection of random thoughts of his titled "A Very Stable Idiot" which includes topics from athletics to learning to politics to whatever else you can think of.

A lot of the stuff is over my head but I still look forward to this every week.

A couple of weeks ago in the week 13 edition and he discussed a podcast called The Art of Manliness by Dr. Peter Brown on learning how to learn.

I haven't exactly nailed down how this can be related back to football but if you;re a coach who something who wants to learn about anything, then this stuff should interest you.

Here were the points I made from this part of the blog:

#1 - The learning strategies that we drawn to are low-yield strategies like reading and re-reading or doing things over and over again which only feeds short term memory so they're great for cramming before an exam but as soon as you;re done then the information easily falls out so it's ordinary fr long term memory which is what skill aquistion is.

#2 - Constantly making material/skills easier and clearer to learn seems like it;s working but the brain isn't really being challenged enough to learn anything new, or a new way of learning and if it's an easier learning method then what you're accustomed to then learning via easier methods don't always stick.

#3 - Even if you intend to learn something and make it a priority this also won't guarantee learning as new learning needs to be connected to some existing knowledge or you won't learn it

#4 - There's also no evidence that a personally preferred method of learning is optimal but it will result in you sticking to the learning process for longer, giving you more chance for the information for the be sent to the memory bank.

#5 - If you want to make learning stick then practice getting it out of the brain and not into the brain, so after you're read it a time or 2 then put it aside and asl yourself what are the main idea's of this, how does it relate to what I already know and then out it in your own words

NOTE - This is what I've been doing for 15yrs!

#6 - Practice recalling the information later when it's harder to recall which strengthens the connection of that material in the brain and your ability to recall it.

#7 - When it feels like you;re not making progress then that's probably when you are.

#8 - Moving learning from short to long term memory occurs during sleep and long term learning is an actual physical change in the brain which is why it takes time

Let me know tour thoughts on this.

IN-SEASON TRAINING DO'S #3 - TRAINING RESIDUALS

Perhaps the 1 training ideology that has the greatest implications on in-season programming is training residuals.

Training residuals refers to the time it takes for a specific quality that once trained to adequate level, starts to deteriorate without direct training.

This is a huge concept to implement at this time of the season because training time has been decreased as you now need 1 - 3 days to allow for recovery from games.

You can still training during the recovery stage, but with the focus being on recovery and regeneration, you are not stressing the upper thresholds of your abilities and as the old saying goes - use it or lose it.

Obviously with less training time, you know need to find a way to at least maintain what you've built in the pre-season (speed, endurance etc) but more importantly you need to find the resources and time to fit it all in.

You can't train everything at 100% all the time and if you do, you're probably one of those players that tears up the track but average at best on the field.

Essentially your burning through all your "game resources" during the week and have little to give come game day.

You can probably name a player you currently play with, or have played with that fits this description.

There's no embarrassment if you are either, I was one of them in my younger days, because training residuals is a very little know concept outside of elite competition.

So here's the information you need to put this in action.

SPEED

- Max speed performance will stay with you 2 - 8 days
- Needs to be trained optimally once every 5 days

AEROBIC CAPACITY

- Max aerobic performance will stay with you for 25 - 35 days
- Needs to be trained optimally once every 30 days

ANAEROBIC CAPACITY

- Max anaerobic capacity will stay with you for 14 - 22 days
- Needs to be trained optimally once every 18 days

MAX STRENGTH

- Max strength performance will stay with you for 25 - 35 days
- Needs to be trained optimally every 30 days

BODYWEIGHT

- The maintenance of bodyweight is a game to game proposition as you'll lose different amounts of fluids each game, plus take in different amounts f fluids each game as well.
- Aim to get back to your pre-game bodyweight as soon as possible and by the next morning at the latest.

As you can see above you can now sit down and literally fit all the training in you need on Tuesday and Thursday training nights, and fitting each strength/fitness quality in before it starts to deteriorate as well.

You also need to ensure that when you do train what needs to be trained that it is trained at literally 100% intensity.

You can maintain performance with as little as 30% of the training volume it took to build that quality, so long as intensity is 100%.

If you fail to reach the intensity required then the intensity/volume trade off gets out of whack and now your training with fat too volume at moderate intensity and your performance will decrease.

Remember failing to plan is planning to fail.

IN-SEASON TRAINING DO'S #2 - PRIORITISE WHAT YOU NEED

With the in-season training model comes less training time because of game soreness, fatigue and unfortunately, a bit of softness when the weather takes a turn.

When there is less training time then you need to prioritise what HAS to get covered, what would be ADVANTAGEOUS to get covered and what is a BONUS if it gets covered.

"HAS" CATEGORY

There's a couple of ways to decide what should go in this category so here are your options.

#1 - The things that you focused on during the pre-season (skills, tactics, speed, endurance etc) must be at least maintained during the season.

The main reason for focusing on these aspects is that you've already invested a lot of time and effort to build these qualities, so to just let them slip away seems a waste of time.

Another reason is that these aspects will be your players' strong point (more then likely), so to win games and play at the best their abilities, they'll need to be able to express these aspects throughout the entire season.

#2 - You can look at less specific factors and replicate them at training such as training at speeds that are faster then a game, thus making a game sub-maximal compared to your training speed which will more often then not result in better skills and decision making during games if they can be displayed at high speeds at training.

Personally a bit column 1 and column 2 is the way to go in my opinion.

After you're prioritised what you need, and a list of 1-to-whatever is a good way to do this, then you need to look at how to set up your training in the short and long term, to make sure what HAS to be covered does indeed get covered.

In future posts I'll delve into how to set this up but by taking a lot of other things you probably don't even know about, that can negatively affect how this all comes together.

Here are the priorities of my own training baring in mind that I only train with my team when work allows (1/week at best but probably looking at 2 every 3 weeks going forwards I reckon).

#1 - Speed (Acceleration/Max Velocity)
#2 - Team Footy Training
#3 - Aerobic Capacity
#5 - Lower Body Strength

In the past I've used specific training blocks to train these physical aspects where 90% of my training goes into that specific trait x 2 - 4 weeks and then I'll let it recover and move to something else.

The premise there is to train that capacity very hard to the point where my performance might even drop in the short term for example my speed might drop by 5 - 10%, which is then time to let it rest, recover and regenerate to an even greater level, if done right.

The other way to go about it is to train 3 - 5 things all the time, which is more of a top up/maintenance type set up which is something I might do if I start team training regularly.

IN-SEASON TRAINING DO'S #1 - IN-SEASON TRAINING MODEL

Some round 1's have been completed and some are still to come, so it is now time to look at the in-season training model.

During the pre-season you have all the time in the world to train everything you need to.

Even better, you can dedicate all the energy resources you want to your training as there are no games, or mini-peaks, that are required each week.

Your room for error is greater as there is time to change things up if something is not working.

Your have greater time for experimentation as well because again, you have tome to alter your plan as needed without affecting short term performance.

During the season you have pretty much none of these luxuries.

Your training time has gone from a potential 60mins per day or 7hrs per week, to a poultry 4hrs and then a game.

Without a plan you're probably trying to cram 7hrs of training into 4 hrs, as well as be 100% fresh for games on a Saturday.

This does not fit and it does not work.

The aim of your in-season is to at a minimum, maintain ALL pre-season gains in strength, speed, power and endurance.

A drop in any of these categories will affect all other categories make no mistake about it.

The shitty thing is that as the season pushes on, fatigue is higher, grounds become heavier, sore spots and injuries start to mound up and motivation can waiver and all of sudden you're playing in an elimination final when you need to be at your absolute best, but your performance markers are at their lowest.

Not a great sign.

Similar to the PRE-SEASON TRAINING DO'S series, I'll be posting plenty of updates on IN-SEASON TRAINING DO'S, something is literally missing at local/amateur level.

If you're still in a pre-season training mindset as a coach or fitness coach, then you're missing the boat.

If you don't want to wait for all these updates then you can easily purchase the in-season training program I have available below and start implementing right away, otherwise sit tight.

COACHES - http://aussierulesuntouchable.com/program-inseasoncoach-2/

PLAYERS - http://aussierulesuntouchable.com/program-inseasonplayer/