Widen Your Aerobic Window for Running Greatness

My opening statement is probably an article in itself but you could probably focus on 2 simple things in regards to energy systems work and that would be enough for pretty much any sport you can imagine.

Get as fast as you possibly can and then train your body to recover between these bouts of sprints as fast as it can.

That's it.

As far as the recovery side of this equation goes, you want a resting heart rate somewhere in the high 40's to low 50's. If it is any higher then you'll be working too hard for menial tasks let alone intensive one's.

Think of the a fitness fanatic versus a couch potato doing a single flight of stairs and notice the difference in their demeanor at after the top step. The same amount of work done has different affects on those with different fitness levels.

If your resting heart rate is lower then the high 40's then you can actually be too parasympathetic (rest) and you need a heavy dose of speed and power work.

The anaerobic threshold is the point at which you move from aerobic to anaerobic metabolism which is where you go from cruising to fatigued. The brain doesn't like this as it's shifting you from your homeostasis point (your body's baseline) and what is bloody interesting here is that in order for YOU to stop pushing further away from your baseline, your brain will 'tell you" that you're fatigued to force you to slow down and /or rest to get back to aerobic metabolism.

Anaerobic Threshold (beats per minute) - Resting Heart Rate (beats per minute) = Aerobic Window

So if you're anaerobic threshold is 170bpm and your resting heart rate is 52 then your aerobic window in 82.

The wider the better.

With a weak aerobic system your heart rate struggles to decrease between runs and then each sprint drives you further into anaerobic metabolism (fatigue) and you get stuck there.

I've been guilty of this in the past before I really nailed down how energy systems work. I'd start my pre-season running by going straight to anaerobic type work so I'd have 1 - 2 real good efforts in me and then I'd be done for a while as it took forever for my heart rate to get back down.

If you're heart rate is too high then this should be the very first port of call as far as your aerobic/endurance training is concerned. This will widen your aerobic window on it's own.

After that then you can look at increasing the time it takes to hot your anaerobic threshold.

To test your anaerobic threshold do a 6min cardio test taking your heart rate every 60secs during the test, add those 6 heart rates up and get an average and that's your anaerobic threshold, or close to.

In the Aussie Rules Untouchable Training Program, there is a huge focus on decreasing your resting heart rate in the Pre-Xmas Pre-Season Training Phase and then we look at increasing your anaerobic threshold in the Post-Xmas Pre-Season Training Phase (coming soon!).

Aussie Rules Training Goal Kicking Competition!

Welcome to the Inaugural ART Goal Kicking Competition where you have the opportunity to test your goal kicking accuracy against other local/amateur footballers.

Here's how it works.

1 - Each week on the Facebook page I'll put up a video of my own entry which will show you the shot on the goal that we will be doing that week. The posts will be pinned to the top of the page so you won't need to scroll through the entire page to find it!

2 - You have 5 shots on goal on your preferred kicking foot.

3 - For kick 1 to 5 you receive 1 point for a goal and 0 for a miss.

4 - If you score a goal on your 5th kick then regardless of your score to that point you get a bonus 6th kick that can net you 2 points.

5 - The total score you can receive per round is 7.

6 - What you need to do is video your 5 kicks and post in the thread provided on the Facebook page along with your score. There will be a separate thread made for each week.

7 - If you can't video your 5 kicks then you can still log your score but it will count as 1 less then what you actually get - video is proof!

8 - I'll keep a running tally of the scores each week and pop them up on Facebook also.

I have 5 weeks of kicks lined up.

I already popped week 1 up with my score on Facebook so head over, post your 5 kicks and score and let the games begin!

Pre-Xmas Pre-Season for Players - What, When, How

Last week I posted a video aimed at assisting caches in planning their training for the pre-xmas block and now it's the players turn.

There are some similar focus points such as speed and aerobic capacity but we also look at what you should be doing in the gym if you've been throwing bars already or not.

Here'a a quick look at the what, when and how's.

Like the coaches program I'll throw a 25% discount for the next week or two for a price tag of $75.

After the video head to this link, clink the Players image and follow the prompts.

Timing Sprints with VStopwatch APP

Here's probably the easiest and a pretty accurate way to time your sprints, on your own using just your phone.

Find the Video Stopwatch APP by looking for this logo:

I made a quick video to guide you through the steps on how to do it:

I like to use split times for my sprints as well as shown in the video above so if you're doing a 10 meter sprint then a hat up at the 5 meter mark, if you're doing a 20 meter sprint then set up a hat at the 10 meter mark and so on.

Pre-Xmas Pre-Season Training for Footy Coaches - What, How and When

Today I've got a video that I've out together which is part of a series but with pre-season training on the horizon, this particular one is very timely.

It details what strength/fitness quality you need to train, how you need to train it and when you need to train it.

Being so early in the piece some qualities don't need to be trained yet and some things need to be trained differently then they would be trained later on.

All you need to do is to insert your skill and tactical drills into your training sessions and you're done.

Check out the video and special offer below:

After the video head to this link, click the Coaches image and follow the prompts to get $25 off the entire program all laid out for you - all 15 sessions covering aerobic capacity, speed, skills and strength.

Coaching made easy!

Footy Off - Season Checklist

My team's pre-season starts Next week (Nov 15th) and even though I won't be there until practice game time, I still tick off every box needed to prepare myself for footy season 2017.

From second the final sounds to the very second of team pre-season training, you're in the off-season training period.

I class this as the most important part of the season training wise because you have time, you have energy resources and no competition.

Training and games will eat into about 5hrs of activity time during the season plus hanging around time each week. On top of work and family that doesn't leave a lot of extra time to get quality training in.

Training and games especially take precedence over everything else during the season as you need to be cherry ripe for each and every Saturday and there's only so much energy stores to go around.

The fight for energy stores needs to be altered to reach Saturday at 100% but in the off-season you don't need that.

In fact training to and "above" 100% is what causes adaptation to training. You only get better by doing more then before or something better then before.

Now of course we all know that there are 100 things you need to train for footy but we're amateurs, we don't have the resources to do all of that so I like to keep it to the big rocks:

1. Rehabilitation
2. Strength / Armour
3. Aerobic Capacity
4. Speed

If you suffered from am injury that ended your season prematurely, or you played through one to finish off the year then it needs to be rehabilitated. Not rested but rehabilitated.

From 18 rounds of footy plus finals on often heavy grounds, specific dynamic actions can become overused and those muscles can break down in quality so that blistering speed you had in February can be a figment of your imagination come August.

Muscle tissue quality (we're talking contractability, range of motion etc) decreases over a long season so you might need to do a little regeneration work to get that back to an optimal level to train off.

This might be achieved through stretching, gentle bodyweight circuits, foam rolling, diaphragmatic breathing or whatever mode you like to use. My preference is the Be Activated Protocol.

For may years I did the age old sequence of gym from September to March then just went to footy training and some of you probably in that phase too. Resistance training is a must in my book for footy and not just for getting swole and strong. A strong body is a resilient body.

I have never had a soft tissue injury in my 50 years of football. Even coming off a 5 year break to start footy back up at 32 (I think), I have played all but 4 games and this is down to my strong body. 

If you're one of those blokes who breaks down each and every year at some point then you HAVE to do a full 6 months in the gym from September to March and them maintain some gym work during the season.

Without strengthening your body you're resting, but you're not recovering and same problems come back time and time again. The off-season is the time when you you should be hitting 5 - 6 times a week to build up strength, which is a slow process ans can't be done in 4 weeks from start to finish.

If you're slight of build like I was a youngster (55kgs at 18) then you'll need to build some armor to compete with the big boys. Building muscle and gaining weight requires excess energy to be used to do this process and trying to hold onto excess energy when footy training rolls around is crazy talk.

Old school coaches talk about "having a fitness base" which really makes no sense and they probably don't know what they actually mean by it.

What it actually means pretty much is to build aerobic capacity which is the ability of aerobic energy system which is responsible for fueling low intensity bouts of activity as well as recovering from intense bouts of activity.

Again this is a medium to long process to really nail this and requires some patience but you can't build optimal footy endurance without adequate aerobic capacity.

So to the players who roll up in January and go straight into the metabolic sprint work and to the coaches who think running with the balls or again just doing 400's is going to get you fit then think again. It can (if you avoid injury), but only to a certain and limiting extent.

Lastly, for the millionth time on this blog, speed is king. If I had 4 weeks and 2hrs a week to train a footy player I'd train speed the entire time.

Players play elite grades of footy because they're fast. Their skills might not be as good, their game sense might be a little bit off but by god that can all be overlooked when no-one can catch you. We've all played with these guys.

Like strength, because it is based on rewiring the central nervous system, this also takes time to develop and it might take 2 - 3 real good off-seasons to hit your full potential.

This makes it ultra critical that this is started as soon as possible but remember it needs to be performed in a totally non-fatigued state.

During pre-season you;ll always have residual fatigue from team training, during the season we're all about Saturdays but the off-season is wide open. You don't need to run to exhaustion at this time so you can perform each session totally fresh. S[peed should also be trained each and every week of the year regardless of when it is as it deteriorates quicker then anything else when it is not trained.

How many boxes have you clicked so far?

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