Being a football player just like any other athlete comes with responsibilities towards your body to keep it up and running. The Football workout routine is so demanding and needs the expertise of a coach to keep the player curated into the right form both in mental agility as well as build your physical structure into an athlete.
Irrespective of the fact that it is the playing season or the offseason, football workout must go on for a college football athlete. Yes, the intensity of the workout is subject to incline or decline depending on the time it is performed. But you don’t have any sort of excuses to back-off from the football workout. Doing so will be disastrous for your career and game, you might end up degrading your skills.
Before you get befuddled with the How’s you should define your Why. Having a clear goal lets you set a definite target and strategy to follow.
Goals for Football Workout
Luckily there is a foolproof football workout routine that focuses not only on the long term but also on short and medium-term goals. The short term goals are very important as that keeps the momentum going and they should be very detailed and easy to achieve. The term could be one day to one week but should not exceed more than that with clear instructions such as hitting the gym and the field on alternate days for a week or taking a small decision to wake up an hour early to take a sprint.
- Mid-term goals have fitness in its focus. As the term could be between one month to two or three, the goals should be in mind all the time. Keeping a note somewhere noticeable with specific goals to gradually increase the weights you take or decreasing the time taken for a sprint by seconds. The goals need your attention not when you feel like it, but it needs continuous attention daily for proper benefits.
- Long-term goals should reflect your personality and who you want to grow into shortly. The plans shouldn’t be based on someone else’s life but customized for you to challenge yourself. In this case, visualization is the key. Constantly dreaming about the future you with all the challenges in mind will make a clear route map reducing unfortunate surprises.
In a nutshell, football workout is all about your mental willingness which happens even before you get to practice with imagining every factor in detail. This needs a great emphasis to make the remaining content worthwhile for you.
Custom Potential and Conditioning Program
There is a training program in almost every college that could benefit only if they have a schedule with the changing expertise and requirements of each trainee in mind. That doesn’t mean the schedule should include each exercise and routines, but it should define the daily focus and should be followed thoroughly.
Off-days are a myth and every activity you do counts in making you better or worse. So the days you call cheat day sometimes should rather be a healthy retreat to rest healthy and recover.
The six-day schedule is the best blended with strength, agility, flexibility, and endurance training customized for players in each position. For example, while defensive backs have to focus more on speed and agility, strength is more of a concern for linemen where they have to spend more time. Even when mixing the workouts overdoing any of them can be harmful.
Resistance Recovery Training (3-4 days/ week)
Strength and Power Training is basically for rapid recovery from resistance, and the football workouts include compound lifts, such as squats, power cleans, bench press, etc. These engage multiple joints which enhance trainee’s capability to stabilize and pour strength to each motion while in-game.
The major requirement in this training is the focus on hips and back which are the lifelines for every football player and he should encompass the core circuits, planks, tire flips, etc to his routine. The point to be remembered is the intensity of this training routine should not be more than 3-4 days a week. Otherwise, you might impart an excessive burden on your body.
Agility and Speed Training (2-3 days/week)
Anyone familiar with football knows that the game requires short bursts of haste gaming where the player has to stop and go in split-seconds to master the ball. Speed and agility are like the basic amenities for football, you don’t have a future in the game unless you are agile and fast enough to get past the defense. This focus should be on activities like a sprint, cone drills, ladders, etc.
Tolerance Training (2-3 Days/week)
In football, training tolerance is all about the ability to endure the repetition Infinite sprints to knock yourself out is what you should strive for as that’s exactly what happens in an actual game. For off-season doing it 2- days a week will do and the intensity can be increased as the playing season comes close.
Strength Training Basics for Football Players
- WAY TO WARM UP
Wherever you are, be it the gym or the field, for any type of exercise you should start with a warmup. A five-minute jog with minimal effort will do to get your heart pumping. The aim is to get warm and then start stretching without giving extra time to any single stretch or you may lose strength. Static stretching should only be done after a football workout.
- FOOTBALL WORKOUT SCHEDULE STRUCTURE
It is strictly your choice to split your routine into upper/lower or push/pull. Apart from all that, you should be careful not to overwork on any single muscle group which could lead to fatigue. It is advised to start with the biggest and center muscles such as the chest, back glutes, etc, and move to the smaller ones. This is done to keep triceps clear till the end to properly work out the chest before fatigue.
- PHASING
- First: Lifting
With low reps, do lifting to strengthen and gain more muscles with proper nutrition and recovery for six weeks. Gain more weight. - Second: Endurance
Muscle endurance by increasing reps and reducing the rest period. - Third: Turbo
Rest period reduced using reciprocal inhibition by resting part of your body while you work on another by alternating exercises.
- First: Lifting
- FOOTBALL EXERCISES
- Squats: This exercise is basic to build your strength. But doing it right is the key.
- Bench: Helps you in developing your upper body area and triceps.
- Cleans: These are confusing with many variants and should be very careful before doing but will help you a lot if done the right way.
Recovery Tips
Remember Rest days aren’t off days, so keep your body hydrated, eat right, take care of the soreness from the workout. These days too, your body has metabolic activities going on and is either repairing or ruining your effort. Do the right things to make it better.
Nutrition
Make Complex Carbohydrates your friend and avoid alcohol, sugar simple carbohydrates, and processed food. 1-2 grams of protein per a half kilo of your body weight per day is all your body can process at a time. Remember not to avoid all fats either.