When will your club start collective training sessions for the 2014 season ?

[Bingo]

I don't think there is a right or wrong answer to this. I've read a few bits and pieces on Aussie rules and their traning regimes and they regular test players over 10km runs. I'm sure that it isn't in roads but they clearly value this type of training.

Without doubt running ability differs from been fit to play football and fit to run 5km/10km. Totally different disciplines.

But I think that preseason running does no harm. And i'd not just tell someone to run xxkm per day but you can go for a 5km, 5mile or 10km run that can be easily adpated into a very good workout by putting in some hill work, intervals, tempo running etc.

[trueblue1234]

Is tempo runs any good? I've started doing a few runs on the treadmill just to keep myself ticking over. Will do 2 mins jogging pace then 1 min sprint, just repeating this process over and over for 25-30 mins. Would I be as well doing this over a straight tempo run at a decent speed? I know I don't get near the same distance but was kind of thinking it would suit football training better.

[Milltown Row2]

Is tempo runs any good? I've started doing a few runs on the treadmill just to keep myself ticking over. Will do 2 mins jogging pace then 1 min sprint, just repeating this process over and over for 25-30 mins. Would I be as well doing this over a straight tempo run at a decent speed? I know I don't get near the same distance but was kind of thinking it would suit football training better.

Yeah thats about right, mix it up with hills and another one I do is start at 7.5 mph and every minute add on (7.6, 7.7 7.8 and so on) might not seem much but over 20 odd minutes you are flat out sprinting at the end, breaks up the monotony of the treadmill

In a match I refereed I measured the distance I covered during the game (I've done a few) the most travelled was 5.7 miles over the 60 minutes. If I was taking a team I'd be doing running at the start but would need to involve short hills, sprints and running at 3/4 pace. Plenty time for pitch work after the xmas holidays. I've been running a good bit now but anytime I've played lately it's hard to adjust to the pitch conditions and match fitness. Has nothing to do with my age

[Bingo]

Is tempo runs any good? I've started doing a few runs on the treadmill just to keep myself ticking over. Will do 2 mins jogging pace then 1 min sprint, just repeating this process over and over for 25-30 mins. Would I be as well doing this over a straight tempo run at a decent speed? I know I don't get near the same distance but was kind of thinking it would suit football training better.

It can have any form really - 1km on, 1km off. One we would do would be say a 2km warm up (easy run), pick up for a 1km (marathon pace), pick up again 1km (half marathon pace), pick up 1km (10km pace), peak for 1km (5km pace) and back down again through the 1kms to a a 2km cool down. Its a good run out. That for running though.

For football you'd be doing shorter distances and maybe taking recoverys before picking up pace again.

[blanketattack]

Our neighbouring parish said they'll be training Christmas day if still in the local c'ship (final fixed for Dec 28)

[Zulu]

I don't think there is a right or wrong answer to this. I've read a few bits and pieces on Aussie rules and their traning regimes and they regular test players over 10km runs. I'm sure that it isn't in roads but they clearly value this type of training.

Without doubt running ability differs from been fit to play football and fit to run 5km/10km. Totally different disciplines.

But I think that preseason running does no harm. And i'd not just tell someone to run xxkm per day but you can go for a 5km, 5mile or 10km run that can be easily adpated into a very good workout by putting in some hill work, intervals, tempo running etc.

Exactly, there is no right or wrong in terms of methods of training. Should you do 15 mile road runs for football? No, as it isn't a particularly good way to spend your training time but can you do 3-8k runs? Absolutely yes. Do you do that from January 1st to August? No because you'd cease to gain benefits after a period of time and you should mimic the demands of football more and more as your training progresses. You don't need to mimic the demands of football in every block of your training program, particularly the first and second blocks.

[neilthemac]

slow twitch fibres in the muscles are developed with long, slow stamina runs
fast twitch fibres developed with power and speed

if you want to get slower, go ahead and run distances long distances!

[Zulu]

There's a lot of debate about the effect different training has on your muscle fibres so to state that as a fact is incorrect. Besides, the amount of training you would have to do to significantly change your muscle fibre type would be far in excess of what GAA players would do in their pre-season. I cannot make this clearer, if you do 2 to 3 months of 3-8k (2-3 nights per week) running you will not, no way, no how, change your muscle fibre profile or significantly impact upon your speed. That's a physiological fact and even if you did have a minor effect on your muscle fibre ratio or speed, your subsequent change of training from longer distances to shorter faster running would reverse it entirely.

[brokencrossbar1]

I would not have any scientific knowledge of the rights or wrongs of it but during the last AI run Cross would have regularly gone on 10k road runs or cross country runs.  They would have been all at the same pace and would have been based on a level of interval running similar to what Bingo, Zulu and MR2 detailed.  They would have interspersed it during the week with plenty of 200 m running and as games came closer with shorter stuff.  It didn't seem to slow them down too much.  When I played we would have regularly gone on heavy runs. 

[Zulu]

That's because it doesn't slow you down BC1. The lads who are saying this are classic cases of knowing a bit but not a lot about the subject.

[brokencrossbar1]

That's because it doesn't slow you down BC1. The lads who are saying this are classic cases of knowing a bit but not a lot about the subject.

I would tend to agree with you and place my trust in fitness coaches who do it professionally.

[fearsiuil]

This article by Ken Earley in today's Irish Times has some opinions on training methods for fast twitch players.


You don't need a dressing-room spy to know something is up with van Persie

'I was due to take Robin off after 60 or 70 minutes, but I think if I'd taken him off everyone would have said: 'What are you doing?' But in truth Robin needed to come off after 70 minutes maximum, but I had to keep him on. We were chasing the game, we had to get a goal back."
You could see David Moyes's point. His gamble nearly came off when van Persie stuck a header in the net only to be ruled offside. Imagine the howls of outrage if he'd hooked him with 20 minutes to go.
But a man in Moyes's position has to be prepared to make unpopular decisions. Van Persie's injuries have been the biggest single reason why Manchester United's title defence has collapsed. His fitness should be Moyes's top priority, above even getting an equaliser against Newcastle.
Moyes described rumours that Van Persie had requested a transfer as "absolute nonsense," but you don't need a dressing-room spy to know that something is up with the player. You just have to look at his appearance record. He's missed one-third of United's league matches and they haven't won in the league when he hasn't played.

Injury problems
Van Persie used to be seen as "injury-prone" until he played 90 consecutive league matches between March 2011 and September 2013. The question of whether the return of his injury problems is linked to the Moyes training regime – described by Wayne Rooney as "a lot more running: long running, quicker running, sharper running" – has become a matter of speculation.
The Dutch fitness coach Raymond Verheijen has fiercely criticised Moyes since the day last summer when Moyes said of Van Persie: "We have overtrained him this week to try and make sure we build up his fitness but he has never complained about a thing."
Verheijen didn't like the word "overtrained".
"The only way to solve this problem in Jurassic Park is to improve education of these dinosaur coaches, fitness clowns and scientific cowboys. All over the world in preseason you see the pattern overtraining-fatigue-injuries'. . . Obviously, players like RVP should learn to protect themselves better against 'overtraining'," he said.
Verheijen has a good reputation in the game, having trained South Korea's 2002 World Cup team and the Russian side of Euro 2008, both of whom won plaudits for their fitness. One Verheijen disciple, Craig Bellamy, describes him as "difficult" and "arrogant", but says, "he has an annoying habit of being right about fitness issues".
Like Van Persie, Bellamy overcame a reputation for injury-proneness in the latter stages of his career. His book Goodfella contains fascinating insights into the training methods of certain Premier League clubs.
Fans tend to assume Premier League fitness training must be state of the art but, according to Bellamy, that's not the case. He says his form during his first spell at Liverpool in 2006-'07 suffered because of the training methods of Rafa Benitez and Pako Ayesteran. Like Moyes, they prescribed plenty of running.
"I am a fast-twitch fibre player and I was plodding around the perimeter of the training complex," Bellamy writes. "I felt like I was being trained to get a decent time in a marathon, not to sprint away from a central defender. . . Pako said they wanted to take some of my speed off and bring my endurance up. I knew if they did that, they would lose me as a player . . . I never felt more unfit in my life . . . On a Friday before a game, we would be doing heavy lifting squats and that took a lot out of my legs. I was actually being detrained."

Refusal to train
At Manchester City, Bellamy fell out with Roberto Mancini over his refusal to do double training sessions. Bellamy argued his knees and hamstrings couldn't take so much training; Mancini assumed he was lazy. The coach had the old-fashioned attitude to training: what doesn't kill you makes you stronger.
Many fitness coaches now believe overtraining is as bad as no training. In the William Hill-nominated book The Sports Gene, physiologist Jesper Andersen tells author David Epstein that on average, footballers in the Danish first division have a lower proportion of fast-twitch fibres in their muscles than does the man in the street. Since pace is the most-prized physical attribute in football, how can this be?
Andersen blames football's one-size-fits-all training methods. Fast-twitch fibre players shouldn't train as much as slow-twitch fibre ones, but in football everyone usually does the same training. Andersen discovered that the Danish youth ranks were full of fast-twitch fibre players, who were mostly weeded out by chronic injuries before the age of 18. You wonder how many of them were written off as "injury-prone" – football's way of blaming the victims.
Verheijen had another pop at Moyes on Saturday: "The training method of this coaching staff is prehistoric . . . In 7 of 9 seasons at Everton: injury crisis after pre-season and very poor start of season. This pattern has clearly repeated itself . . ."
That may be unfair to Moyes. When you analyse Everton's injury record in his time there, the clearest trend is a sharp drop in the overall number of injuries, from a high of 69 in the calendar year 2004, to a low of 37 in 2011, suggesting the fitness regime had improved. In the case of Van Persie, though, further improvements are needed, and Moyes has no time to waste.

http://www.irishtimes.com/sport/soccer/english-soccer/you-don-t-need-a-dressing-room-spy-to-know-something-is-up-with-van-persie-1.1621503?page=2

[Bingo]

slow twitch fibres in the muscles are developed with long, slow stamina runs
fast twitch fibres developed with power and speed

if you want to get slower, go ahead and run distances long distances!

I'd counter that by saying that to develop more fast twitch fibres that you go on a long run and at the end of it increase the speed which will develop these fast twitch fibres. But again I'd not take any footballer for a 15 mile run which many seem to be thinking "running" constitutes.

[ballinaman]

slow twitch fibres in the muscles are developed with long, slow stamina runs
fast twitch fibres developed with power and speed

if you want to get slower, go ahead and run distances long distances!

I'd counter that by saying that to develop more fast twitch fibres that you go on a long run and at the end of it increase the speed which will develop these fast twitch fibres. But again I'd not take any footballer for a 15 mile run which many seem to be thinking "running" constitutes.

Have a look what they are doing in AFL....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eQxdjrE-A3A

[neilthemac]

slow twitch fibres in the muscles are developed with long, slow stamina runs
fast twitch fibres developed with power and speed

if you want to get slower, go ahead and run distances long distances!

I'd counter that by saying that to develop more fast twitch fibres that you go on a long run and at the end of it increase the speed which will develop these fast twitch fibres. But again I'd not take any footballer for a 15 mile run which many seem to be thinking "running" constitutes.

Have a look what they are doing in AFL....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eQxdjrE-A3A

thats a fitness assessment
not training
whats your point exactly?