Damian Chalis

I accidently deleted your email for the report, can you resend mate? Thanks

Don't Forget The Archie Sale

To celebrate the birth of my little boy, the Aussie Rules Training Off Season Training Manual has been slashed to $47 for the month of February, down from $77!!

Get in on this offer as its a short month and it'll be gone before you know it.

Monthly Running Program Part 2

Earlier this week I posted a monthly running program geared for Aussie Rules Football.

I received an email from a reader in that I had left something out which was right.

On week 3 for short distance I left out 10 x 30m on week 3 which now has the weekly volume matching up with the program.

He also asked a scheduling question and I also realised that I didn't address it. Each day is to be done on it's own and also with a days rest between them at least.

Thanks for the email Matt.

Looking forward to the NAB Cup this weekend too?

What's everyone's thoughts on the new set up for this year?

Monthly Running Program

I was bored on the tram the other and whipped this up, a monthly template for your running for football.

Now granted everyone is training and this is more of an off season running plan so this won't come in handy until October/November this year.

The template is broken up into long, medium and short distance sprints, there is no 10km runs here, and Collingwood's Fitness Director David Buttifant agrees.

It progresses up in volume over 3 weeks then drops it back on the 4th week and off you go again. I believe if more players took planed deloading periods during their training they would actually see greater results and less injuries as the year goes on. AFL players do it so why don't you?

Short Distance (SD) is anything 0 - 40m with a focus on starting speed and acceleration.

Medium Distance (MD) is anything 40 - 200m focusing on reaching then maintaining top speed.

Long Distance is anything 1km and above focusing on aerobic endurance.

To calculate the rest period we're going to use a work:rest ratio. For those unfamiliar with them it refers to timing your set then using a predetermined equation as your rest period. So if we opt for a 1:3 work:rest (w:r) ratio, then if your 1st set takes 3:30mins, then you'll rest 10.30mins between sets.

That might seem like a lot of rest but we're after quality here, not a lot of shit running volume.

For SD use a full rest which still won't be very long anyway as the sets will only take 5 - 7secs or so.

For MD use an almost full rest, about 80 - 90% rest but no shorter.

Week 1

SD 10 x 20m / MD 3 x 200m / LD 1 x 2km, 2 x 1km (between the 2km and 1km sets use a 1:2 w:r ratio and also sue a 1:2 w:r ratio between the 1km sets)

Week 2

SD 10 x 20m, 5 x 30m / MD 4 x 200m / LD 1 x 2km, 3 x 1km (1:2 w:r ratio between 2km and 1km sets then 1:3 w:r ratio for the 1km sets)

Week 3

SD 10 x 20m , 10 x 30 / MD x 5 x 200m / LD 2 x 2km, 3 x 1km (use a 1:3 w;r ratio for the 2km sets and a 1:2 w:r ratio for the 1km sets)

Week 4

SD 5 x 30m / MD 3 x 150m / LD 1 x 2km

The weekly volume looks like this:

Week 1

SD - 200M / MD - 600M / LD - 4km = 4.8kms

Week 2

SD - 350m / MD - 800M / LD - 5kms = 6.15kms

Week 3

SD - 500M / MD - 1000M / LD - 7kms = 8.5kms

Week 4

SD - 150m / MD - 450m / LD - 2kms = 2.6kms

Give it a go.

By the way the Aussie Rules Training Off Season Manual that was on offer for posting a comment last month was won by carltonblue. Congratulations!!

The Archie Sale!

He brings me smiles each and every day, and now he can make you smile for at least 1 day because the Archie Sale is on for the month of Feb.

The Aussie Rules Training Off Season Training Manual has now been slashed to $47.

So all orders completed by the end of Feb will get the deal.

With the nightmare pregnancy that is still going (wife hasn't made it out of hospital yet and he's 3 weeks old and she was in 3 weeks pre!), this is almost a once in a lifetime chance as we won't be diving back in for another anytime quick.

Order you copy NOW!!

David Buttifant Seminar Recap

Last Sunday I attended a Centrality based seminar by Collingwood's Director of Sports Science, David Buttifant and Anthony Rocca, titled "How to Win You Own Personal Premiership."

I wasn't sure what the seminar was going to entail but I was going to attend regardless although I was hoping for something more training based in hind-site.

The event overview was:

David

How to Plan Your Way to Success

How to Succeed Where Others Fail

Anthony

Overcoming and Thriving Through Adversity

David

How to Recover From Injuries Like an AFL Footballer

Panel Discussion

Instead of going into too much detail I'll just dot point my notes:

• failing to plan is planing to fail
• train slow, be slow
• it's a lot harder to increase an endurance dominant player's explosiveness then to increase an endurance dominant player's explosiveness
• The best players have an excellent explosive profile
• Collingwood don't do any long distance running except for their 2km time trial instead opting for game simulated training like 4 v 5, 3 v 3, 2 v 3 games
• players average 12 - 16kms/game
• the point of training is to minimise the distance covered, thus training stress but reaping the optimal training effect
• a daily set up at this time of the year consists of 15 - 30mins core work for the younger players and whoever needs it, 45 - 90mins of weights breaking players into groups depending on goals and abilities, refuel with supplements, miscellaneous conditioning such as sprinting technique, boxing etc and lastly range of motion wok and restoration
• when planning your training progress intensity from easy to hard and progress skills simple to complex
• power is tested every 2 - 6 weeks on a smith machine which is hooked up to some contraption - i missed what is was
• range of motion is tested weekly
• skin folds are tested every 2 weeks for those who come back a little heavier then they should
• uses the Sandwich Approach to feedback which a positive comment followed by a negative followed by a positive comment
• recovery methods they use include ice bath with mobilisation, whole body vibration, massage, sleep, proprioception, body flow, autogenics and supplementation
• ice baths increase growth hormone and thus protein synthesis
• vibration training decreases potentiation where glute activation increase potentiation so vibration may be best served for power endurance while it also increases somastatin and decreases myostatin which in turn decreases growth hormone
• mostly uses trigger point massage which provides its greatest benefits when performed 48 - 72hrs game
• advocates mediation which decreases hear rate, cortisol and ventilation and actually does 2 x 10min sessions/day himself
• doses creatine for 10g max
• pre weights have 5 - 15g protein to decrease muscle degradation during training
• supplements zinc and magnesium
• protein is set at 1.5 - 1.8g per kg of body weight/day
• has the team do weights the day after a game
• in a shocker to me, he has only included glute activation for the team recently which means he could have maybe saved Nathan Buckley if he had done it earlier as the team physio had been bugging him about it for a while
• according to teams GPS readings, the top 4 teams do less work then the bottom 4 teams but get better results
• uses a daily recovery index which tracks sleep, energy, mental state, range of motion, soreness and recovery with each being marked out of ten and if you average a 6 or under on any given day then you need to reassess
• allows 50g of fat/day max
• measures creatine kinase which increases with training load and finds that the younger players average a higher reading and questions the training loads of some of the under age teams which is why they deload the younger players more often

Overall I still enjoyed the seminar and David also mentioned that Centrality and himself were maybe going to some more specific seminars in the future too.

Your New Program Split

Today we'll discuss the split that is to be followed for this program.

The program, as well as being based around accumulating more and more volume but without exceeding your recovery abilities, also has a few "sub' principles.

They are:

• frequency
• concentrated loading
• neural charge workouts
• eccentric less training

Frequency

As a general training rule, the higher the intensity you work at, the less frequent you can do such as back squat 1 rep max attempts. On the flip side though the less intensity you work at, the more frequently you can do it such as walking.

The High Performance Mass program relies on using a lot of volume at high intensity with high frequency. Normally one might use 1 of these principles and not do it right so it's a delicate set of scales to balance.

Initially the program prescribes you to train most 4 of your 5 lifts 3/week using a load that is about 80% of your max for 11 - 16 sets per exercise per workout. In week 3 you get all the way up to 38 sets per session and couple that with assistance work (which we haven't touched on yet) and you could be looking at 70 odd sets (which I did!!) per workout.

Here's the proposed schedule:

Mon - Upper Body Pressing x 3 exercises, Lower Body Pressing x 1 exercise

Tue - Upper Body Pressing x 3 exercises, Lower Body Pressing x 1 exercise

Wed - Neural Charge Workout / Eccentric Less Training

Thu - Lower Body Pressing x 3 exercises, Upper Body Pressing x 1 exercise

Fri - Lower Body Pressing x 2 exercises, Upper Body Pressing x 1 exercise

Sat - Lats and Biceps (again not touched on yet)

Sun - Neural Charge Workout / Eccentric Less Training

Concentrated Loading

You'll see that on Mon and Tue you do all 3 upper body pressing exercises 2 days in a row but settle down, we're not going over train here! The focus of the concentrated loading is to really up the volume for the upper body pressing exercises early in the week and then drop it back later in the week. For the lower body we use the concentrated loading in the second part of the week with lower volume early in the week.

The frequency and concentrated loading principles are the wheels that make this program go around so it is ESSENTIAL that you choose the right wt or you won't even make week 3. And through all of this, you've still got to remember that you HAVE to avoid any grinding reps!!

Now just quickly on exercise selection, for upper body pressing you want to use 1 shoulder press movement, 1 incline or flat bench press movement and 1 flat or decline bench press movement for a total of 3 upper body pressing movements. For lower body you basically want to choose 1 squat and 1 deadlift variation and you'll stick with those exercise for as many cycles as you can.

So now your week might look like this:

Mon - Military Press, Incline Press, Bench Press, Back Squat

Tue - Military Press, Incline Press, Bench Press, Deadlifts

Wed - Neural Charge / Eccentric Less Training

Thu - Back Squats, Deadlifts, Military Press

Fri - Back Squats, Deadlifts, Incline Press

Sat - Lats and Biceps

Now depending on you past training methods and experience you may need to work up to this exact split and I have even tinkered with it to fit my schedule and limitations better.

Neural Charge Workouts

The central nervous system is what puts the breaks on your training. When you do that last bench press rep and its taking 10secs to reach lockout, that's the nervous system failing you right there. This is one of the reasons why training to failure is not a good idea. If you do it on your 1st exercise then the rest of your workout will suffer, especially as you push to use heavier weights for the other exercises.

Neural Charge workouts are simply 3 - 5 exercises circuits that use fast, explosive movements or exercises performed explosively for 3 - 5 reps specifically aimed at ramping up your nervous system when it feel a little drained, so filling up your petrol tank so to speak. These can be used at anytime you like - before workouts as a warm up when you feel sluggish, on off days to prepare the nervous system for the next days workout and even in the am before a pm training session.

A sample workout may be:

Supine Medicine Ball Toss x 5 reps

Tuck Jump x 5 reps

Inverted Row for speed x 5 reps

Plyometric Push Up on a bench x 5 reps

10m Sprint

x 4 - 6 circuits

10mins and you're done!

Eccentric Less Training

For those with ectomorphic body types, this could be your holy grail. Each exercise has a concentric / muscle shortening contraction and an eccentric / muscle lengthening contraction. It's the eccentric contractions that make you sore and run down so to keep accumulating volume we need to use that exercises that eliminate it and thus eccentric less training is born!

What this also needs is that you need to get your innovative hat on and find something that you can use as a sled which will enable you drag weights. I use a milk crate or 2 connected by chain and filled with weights for the sled with a TRX attached for the handles and it works a treat. It can also act as a prowler but it's nowhere near as good as a proper one like the picture at the top of this post.

I will try and post a video of my make shift crate sled too.

Eccentric Less Training can also be used at any time as they are very easy on the nervous system and thus won't tap into your recovery abilities. A stated for those with skinner body types who have a hard time increasing and maintaining muscle mass, this should be a staple of your training as usually it's these same people whose recovery abilities aren't as great.

Remember to leave a comment to go into the running to win a copy of the Aussie Rules Training Off Season Training Manual for the month of January.