Wednesday, March 17, 2010

Learn The Art Of Soccer Conditioning



I’m not sure about yours but it’s my belief that soccer conditioning is possible the best method of building and maintaining team’s fitness levels. When it comes to soccer fitness, the word conditioning to a layman means a fitness regime to work upon bettering the physical built of players.

Every coach must make sure that player’s performance is improved with every training session which includes both individual and group exercises for this purpose. Conditioning has 5 factors as its foundation which they must be attended to; like agility, endurance, speed, warm up, and strength. These are the building blocks of any conditioning program. Let’s quickly take a look at these.

Warm up: It has 3 phases that affect conditioning. To begin with, the body gets ready to handle the taxing sessions ahead. Next, it eliminates the possibility of muscle pulls and sprains. Lastly, it helps the players improve their flexibility which is of such paramount importance in soccer.

Strength: It’s pointless to argue over the fact that the players who are match winners are the ones full of energy and with best body structure. Soccer conditioning which incorporates weight training allows players to build muscles and get strong also paves the way to making physically powerful players. When players are strong, it significantly affects the speed, balance, shielding, headers, balance and shooting abilities.

Endurance: The aptitude of a player to be in command of the entire match is what endurance is. If they do not have enough strength, it will cause loss of energy causing the team to fare poorly. What is so wonderful about it is that there is no need to design any specific soccer exercises. All aerobic activities such as sprints, forward runs, long passes and so on help build endurance. Just ensure that players keep working with these and do a lot of running both on and off the field.

Agility: This goes a long way in helping the players attack as well as defend. If the players are agile, it can make the difference between a successful dribbling and a turnover. It also helps in a decisive successful tackle and a penalty kick against the opposing team. Though, as a supplement to dribbling and tackling, working on your quickness also helps with finishing, receiving, shielding and jumping.

Speed: It is crucial in soccer but not everything. As is said in soccer, it is the ball and not the players who should do the maximum running. But let it be understood that players who are good runners and quick eventually help their teams win. Hence, it makes sense to include a lot of activities in soccer workouts that make the players develop speed.

Have faith and apply these tips to your soccer conditioning program to make your players more confident about winning matches. Our youth soccer coaching community has several valuable resources. There are tons of valuable soccer resources in the form of articles, newsletters, and videos to help you become an expert coach. Subscribe to it and benefit from them.


Andre Botelho is an expert in Soccer conditioning. He influences over 35,000 youth coaches each year with his coaching philosophy, and makes it easy to explode your players' skills and make training fun in record time. Download your free Soccer Fitness guide at: Soccer Practice.


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