Teaching Soccer

Probability you might not believe this, but just hear me out on this. Weight training soccer is very essential while coaching the player on sports that needs a lot of strength, and, or explosive power. If player do not need strength and power to a large extent even for them, strong abdominal and lower back muscles are helpful.

This article explains the basic principles of weight training for soccer using common activities for demonstrating those principles.

A vital principle in soccer strength training is, Specificity. The idea is that to train your players to practice in a manner which is similar to that when they play on the fields. Take for example running and swimming, a great exercise for runners and swimmers respectively.

In order to enhance strength an essential thing to be stressed upon while exercising is speed. The role of players in team sports, their age, physical and mental capacity to take stress and their player’s level must be considered when coaching them in weight training programs.

Soccer Fitness

When this kind of information is available to a coach while planning a fitness training program, it ensures a good start.

Physical conditioning usually requires activities that improve specific training. Like for developing aerobic and strength and power fitness exercises, running and weight lifting are also performed by swimmers.

One more feature in weight training soccer often ignored is prevention of injury.Another area of weight training soccer which is commonly neglected in is injury prevention. The effects of injury prevention are not evident directly but  they are essential in player’s performance and confirm that the player is fit to play at the most important occasions of the calendar.

Running, sprinting, turning and twisting, side-stepping, and getting ready for a shot are all the exercises performed in soccer. The “anterior and posterior chain,” are the chain of muscles which are required to perform these actions must be given importance to develop strength, stability and power.

The most useful workouts are the core lifts, like squats and deadlifts for forming these muscles. An all-round soccer fitness program may also help, but these two core lifts work wonders for leg, hip, back and abdominal strength.

You may also include a swimming program to focus added attention on the shoulders, arms and back muscles.

Usually strength enhancing programs include heavy weight lifting with few repetitions. As we have talked earlier some sports require mass and power but some others like soccer requires a good combination of strength with flexibility, speed and resistance; especially the midfielder.

Even if primary strength, power or endurance gains are absent, developing particular muscle groups would also help to increase performance. These muscle groups are the lower back and hamstrings, and the quadriceps muscles that direct knee joint function.

Now having equipped with knowledge always keep in mind that in weight training soccer doing weights might not give much benefit. You can also join our youth soccer coaching community that has a plethora of informative articles, weekly newsletters, and videos to help you better understand the concepts of youth coaching.

Andre Botelho is a recognized authority in youth soccer coaching and has already helped thousands of youth coaches to dramatically improve their coaching skills. Learn  how to explode your players’ skills and make training fun by downloading your free ebook at: Soccer Practice Tips.

If you get to know that weight training soccer does not encourage on adding to muscle mass rather it stresses upon the strength of muscle groups that support the joints. This requires special fitness training program without the ball and off the field in order to give time to focus on particular muscle groups.

Focusing on these target areas will generate superior movement and flexibility causing higher velocity and strength.

Core: Technically the first area to focus on is the abdominals, commonly known as the core. “Core” is the portion of the body which starts from the breast bone till the lowermost part of the pelvis area. This area is the basis of strength, the gravitational center, and the balancing point of the body.

Hence all the physical actions are initiated from the core A good and established abdominal core also leads to a well-balanced back, mainly the Lumbar part. This also generates a good posture.

Soccer Fitness

Legs: The quadriceps pump the heart. This means that these are the biggest muscle groups of the body and are responsible for pumping a huge amount of blood volume. So, in weight training soccer walking can be useful as it helps to increase blood circulation inside the body with each step.

Strong and balanced leg muscles are required for the hips, knees and the ankles to stand all the power and energy produced in hitting the ground.

Back, Chest and Neck: These parts of the body work as a connection between the “core” and the ends (legs, arms and the head). These areas must never be neglected in soccer strength training because their growth is linked with the rest of the body.

Arms: Arm is a useful part in playing soccer as they help in maintaining balance like when you jump to head a ball or when you suddenly alter directions. Keeping your arms in the air makes a forceful jump.

Plyometric: For best results, weight training should go together with a well-planned plyometric program. They work alongside to create an individual and a team that will show improvements well within the first half of the season.

The significant point is to give importance to the core as only a well-developed soccer fitness program to develop the core will certainly target these areas.

Program: Normally such a program should be designed which is measureable and specific to an individual’s requirement and used at the introduction of the season. Concentrating on specific areas of the body starting with the core and searing outwards to each section of the body is vital to the total development of an individual.

In conclusion, this concept of weight training soccer can be better understood through mental training of the team where both the team and individual players encourage each other to own the program. You are invited to become a member of our youth soccer coaching society and find an answer to all questions as the site offers loads of information in form of articles, videos, and newsletters.

Andre Botelho is the author of “The Expert Youth Soccer Coaching Guide” and he’s a recognized expert in the subject of youth soccer coaching. Learn  how to explode your players’ skills and make coaching sessions fun in less than 29 days! Download your free pdf guide at: Kids Soccer Drills.

In soccer training weight training soccer plays an important role in creating tougher and quicker muscles, this you might have heard a lot of times. The program of soccer fitness talked about in this article will aid you make your players ready for playing soccer at an advanced level.

The new theory of soccer weight training is to have strong and fast muscles with higher stamina rather that to keep on adding pounds of muscle bulk. Upper body weight training for soccer is not as important as is for the legs, but we still do it for overall conditioning and strength.

You should start your fitness training with the legs first. It should be started with the crouching exercises first. Now place the bar with which your players can make 20 reps. Considering that they have good strength, hence give them 220 pounds to start with. This practice is performed by getting below the bar, and putting it across their upper back and then stand up with it.

Instruct them to step back out of the racks and stand with their feet, shoulder width apart or wider. They must hold it as they go down until their hips are slightly lower than the top of their knees. Coming up to this point in weight training soccer, they are supposed to stand up fast and exhale. Tell them to continue this practice for at least 20 reps even when they are completely exhausted.

Soccer Fitness

They should be given a break of 5-10 minutes before switching to the leg curl machine to work on hamstrings. 4 sets of 15 reps each should be completed by them. The Stiff-Legged Dead lift with 4 sets of 15 reps should be completed between each set of Leg Curls. As player’s speed is greatly improves by strong hamstrings, so they should be very tough.

Then conclude your leg workout with 3 sets of 25 reps on the Standing calf-raise machine.

Start the upper body workout with the Incline bench press.
When they are done with the warm ups, they should continue with extra weights so that the next set of 10 reps becomes tougher. The players must repeat the 5 sets 10 times with weights, while stretching their chest and shoulders and at the end of each set stop and relax for 2 minutes.

The second exercise for this portion of the soccer strength training is pull-ups. Players should do this with their palms facing their body to work their biceps as well as the back. Finally the upper body exercises include abdominals and performing 5 sets of 20 or more reps of leg raises. Then finish with 5 sets of 50 or more crunches or sit-ups.

In short weight training soccer is only a small portion of the complete training program required to make great soccer players. You should consider joining our youth soccer coaching society to know more about various weight training exercises relevant to the game of soccer; the community also provides videos, articles, pod casts, and newsletters available for you.

Andre Botelho is known online as “The Expert Youth Soccer Coach” and his free ebooks and reports have been downloaded more than 100,000 times. Learn how to skyrocket your players’ skills and make practice sessions fun in record time. Download your free ebook at: Soccer Practice.

You should know how true it is to work on your team’s weight training soccer program, while they are being trained with weights. In case you are not giving much attention to it, you are losing lots of advantages of soccer-specific fitness.

Only a certain number of coaches’ know the correct ideology of soccer strength training. Today’s young soccer players must be “complete athletes”.

They are required to have swift movements plus the strength of upper body to resist challenges. These players are required to have exceptional level of aerobic and anaerobic resistance to last that period. One would be destroying his players, the game and even himself if he just tells his players to lift weights like any body builder.

In body building and the sports which need strength primarily, players struggle to develop themselves in terms of size, bulk and ultimate strength. They will not worry if it destroys their aerobic endurance levels or their quickness and flexibility.

Soccer Fitness

If you also tend do is follow the typical 3 sets of 10-12 repetitions all year round, you’re far from getting the best from your fitness training sessions.

Let’s understand why

Lower body strength is vital in soccer as it is necessary in for kicking, jumping, tackling, twisting, and turning and also useful in improving speed. Whereas the upper body strength is required for stopping the ball and keeping the opponents away.

In weight training soccer, “strength” can be divided into three categories.

Absolute or Maximum Strength: The highest level of power your muscles can exert in a single, quick motion. A player for example doing 250lbs leg press has mightier strength than another doing 200lbs only.

During soccer, this kind of strength is helpful in keeping the opponent off and defending the ball. More importantly, it forms the foundation of muscular pace and power.

Muscular Power: Power is a result of both absolute strength and the speed of movement. Increasing any one of them, without reducing the other will generate a value added power called explosive power.

A large number of the magazines promote generalized weight training programs that will merely increase power. But even those generalized soccer fitness programs can be improved if you deliberately enhance the speed of contraction.

Strength Endurance: Strength or muscular stamina is the ability of a muscle group to carry out repeated and high-intensity movements. Strength endurance and power both are essential for soccer.

At some point in your soccer training routine, as a coach, you must focus on developing strength endurance. If you follow the simple 3 sets of 8-12 reps each, traditional weight programs are not very useful for developing soccer-specific strength endurance.

Make a favor to yourself and put some time in improving your weight training soccer program correctly and I assure you that it will pay back 10 times in the game. You are welcomed to our youth soccer coaching community coming up with brand new methods and techniques it has thousands of relevant articles, videos and periodic newsletters.

Andre Botelho is a recognized expert in youth soccer coaching. He influences well over 35,000 youth coaches each year with his unique coaching philosophy, and makes it really easy to explode your players’ skills and make training more fun in record time. To download your free youth soccer coaching guide visit: Weight training soccer.