Training Frequency
- Advanced Training Status allows 4-7 sessions per week.
- In-season allows 1-3 sessions per week.
- Upper/Lower Split allows upto 4 sessions per week and more overall exercises to be performed without an excessive increase in training time due to exercises being conducted over more training days (allows for resistance training on both Mon & Tues).
- More technical sessions required during the in-season so there is simply not enough time for large amounts of resistance training. There is also a substantial amount of fixtures in this period so more recovery maybe required.
Training Schedule
The In-Season
One Game Per Week:
The athlete was asked to begin the strength and conditioning plan at the start of the competitive season, and as such the training plan begins here.
The in-season
training has been designed to maintain and build on the potential fitness gains made
during the pre-season. During the in-season training load is set to five days
per week (Impellizzeri, et al. 2006), this therefore allows for a light training day to
be given during mid-week as done by most premier league teams (Owen, et al.
2009). A full rest and recovery day is given on the Sunday or Monday (depending on what
day the game falls) allowing for recovery to occur. However the player would
have the option of completing a low intensity run or swim, as this has been found an
acceptable recovery method, by avoiding impact loading on the muscles likely to
be sore after a game (Reilly, 2000).
Two high
intensity training sessions have been used each week as this has been found to
lead to increases in maximal speed (Dupont, Akakpo & Berthoin, 2004)
without decreasing playing performance.
The day
preceding a game was used for tactical skill drills such as passing or heading followed
by a match specific tactical session, this would be based around practicing the
specific skill the manager wants to address for facing this particular team
(Owen, et al. 2009).
The training load and intensity for this period is shown below in Figure.1. Further to this the training goals, weekly session plan, and individual session plans are given for this period below in Table.1.
Figure.1 The daily training volume and intensity for the in-season when one game is played per week.
Table.1 The training goals, weekly plan and individual session plans for the in-season when one game is being played per week
Figure.2 The daily training intensity and volume for the in-season during weeks that involve two matches
Table.2 The daily training program for the in-season in weeks that involve two matches
Although the program was started during the in-season, a pre-season routine for the start of the following season was devised, this is broken down into two sections; the early pre-season, and late pre-season.
The early
pre-season training plan was built around training 5-6 times per week
(Impellizzeri, Marcora, Castagna, Reilly, Sassi, Laia, et al. 2006), with the
suggested training load of 1-2 sessions per day, lasting between 90 and 120 minutes (Tesitore,
Meeusen, Cortis & Capranica, 2007).
The early
pre-season would make up the base phase of training where the primary goals are
to build on aerobic and anaerobic fitness, and increase muscle hypertrophy. In
order to achieve this workload is primarily high, but the intensity remains
relatively low.
Strength
training sessions are to be completed twice per week; this would involve 8-12
repetitions (exercise dependent) at 60% 1RM over 3 sets, as found most
effective for hypertrophy (Kramer, Adams & Cafferelli, 2002). Alongside
strength training sessions, plyometric based sessions were introduced, these
found able to improve 10m sprint time, agility test time and countermovement
jump (Cesar & Davide, 2010). A low amount of ground contacts were used to
build on the neuromuscular development, whilst allowing for progressive
overload to be built into the programme (Baechle & Earle, 2008).
Anaerobic and
aerobic fitness would be built up during this phase primarily through a mixture
of endurance runs and small sided games. A mixture of these was used in order
to improve fitness as well as maintain player satisfaction (Mohr, Krustrup
& Bangsbo, 2003), as players were found to be more satisfied when a ball
was used.
Finally
soccer specific skills training occurred twice per week, this would involve
first completing the skill in a blocked manner (where no variation occurs), in
order to improve skill acquisition (Williams & Hodges, 2005), followed by
performing the skill in a random manner (where variation occurs, such as
changing the height or distance of pass), enabling the player to parameterize
the skill differently from one trial to the next, resulting in a more flexible
movement schema. The training intensity and load for this period can be seen below in Figure.3 whilst the daily training plan can be seen in Table.3.
Figure.3 The daily training intensity and load during the early pre-season
Table.3 The daily training schedule for the early pre-seaon
Following on from early pre-season, late pre-season starts to become much more sport specific, now that the base fitness has been built, intensity can be increased thus there is a lowering of the workload (Baechle & Earle, 2008).
Strength
training sessions now become focused around increasing strength and powers, in
order to achieve this sessions training large muscle groups such as legs, back
and chest, involve high intensity loads of around 6RM for 5 repetitions
completed over 3 sets, found to increase muscle strength, countermovement jump,
and standing jump (Kotzamanidis, Chatzopoulos, Michaildis, Papaiakovou &
Patikas, 2005). The second strength training session of the week alternates
with a plyometric session, as it was found that high intensity plyometric
sessions should be completed biweekly (Souhaiel, Souhail, Zouhair &
Shepherd, 2010).
High
intensity anaerobic training sessions are used to increase VO2max without
affecting jump, or power ability (McMillan, Helgurad, MacDonald & Hoff,
2005). These sessions would involve 4 minutes of high intensity (90% HRMAX)
running, followed by 3 minutes of active recovery (60-70% HRMAX) where skills
such as passing and heading would be completed in pairs, this would then be
completed a further three times (4 intervals in total). This found to improve VO2max,
aerobic power and aerobic capacity (Impellizzeri, et al. 2006). In addition to
this a high intensity agility session would occur, whereby drills such as the
zig-zag test would be completed, this helping to improve the players agility
aswell as being a high intensity training session. The plan follows the
guidelines of Owen, Wong & Chamari (2009) whereby 40 minutes of
high-intensity training should occur on weeks that also involve a match. The training intensity and load for this period is shown in Figure.4, whilst the daily training program is seen in Table.4.
Figure.4 The daily training intensity and volume during the late pre-season
Table.4 The daily training program for the late pre-season
