SSCAC: Strength & Endurance

[Keith Burnett]

The pictures of your Greysteel gym are very nice. It would be wonderful to have your attention to train a little more effectively , given age. Not complaining about my guys...but they have a lot of people and 8-9 racks so it's a little more hectic .

Anyway, looking at the little ergometer cycles you have there. Are they suitable for some reasonable conditioning? What is the make and model?

thanks

[Jonathon Sullivan]

We use the bikes for interval conditioning. They're getting cold now that we can push the Prowler and have the C2 rower. Don't have the make/model in front of me. They're from the early $hoe$string days of Greysteel--the absolute cheapest goddam thing we could find. (I started Greysteel with less than $5k for my budget.) They're not great, merely serviceable. I may junk one of them to make room for something else soon.

[Keith Burnett]

We use the bikes for interval conditioning. They're getting cold now that we can push the Prowler and have the C2 rower. Don't have the make/model in front of me. They're from the early $hoe$string days of Greysteel--the absolute cheapest goddam thing we could find. (I started Greysteel with less than $5k for my budget.) They're not great, merely serviceable. I may junk one of them to make room for something else soon.

I suspected that was the case....but I highly respect your choices so just wanted to make sure. At my SS gym they have a Schwinn AD2 and I use it to warm up. However,it's a basic airbike and I don't know how good it would be for some type of interval conditioning (resistance does not seem significant without high revolution pedalling). It's rather bare bones but reasonably priced. The C2 rower looks great but I am looking for a home device and space is an issue. The new C2 airbike is likely to be very good but it is also $1K. Since I live in California, it's no big deal to condition outside. For a while I tried sprint intervals and my body is just not up to the pounding.

the gym does not have a Prowler.....I'm sure they have thought of it..... Death by Prowler (as a read) sounded daunting given my age (65).

Many thanks.....

[Jonathon Sullivan]

the gym does not have a Prowler.....I'm sure they have thought of it..... Death by Prowler (as a read) sounded daunting given my age (65).

Using the technique in Rip's recent video, prowler is suitable for almost everybody. John finished his prowls for this week, just a few minutes ago at age 91. He threatened to report me for elder abuse, but he left the gym on his own two feet.

[Keith Burnett]

Using the technique in Rip's recent video, prowler is suitable for almost everybody. John finished his prowls for this week, just a few minutes ago at age 91. He threatened to report me for elder abuse, but he left the gym on his own two feet.

That's pretty amusing, unless of course he does actually report you. Then EPS (Elder Protection Services) would raid Greysteel and put your prowler in a foster home...and you....in the slammer.

I've seen John , who you made a youtube star, and he is pretty sharp.

I am going to have to figure out how I will need to approach a conditioning program.

[Pringle]

So if I were interested in developing several domains of fitness to an above-average level, even if removing the ability to maximise one single domain in the process, a sensible programming process might look like this:
-LPSS, no interfering training
-Intermediate strength training with HIIT done 24 hours between strength sessions, scaling upwards
-Then, if wanted, perhaps further dimensions in calisthenic or strength-endurance work, probably staying on an intermediate program indefinitely

Is that about right? The idea of sequential programming is intuitive but I could work out whether, for instance, doing LPSS then an aerobic 'base building' sequence for a few weeks or couple of months and then integrating them might make sense.

[Jonathon Sullivan]

That's not unreasonable, if I'm reading you right, but it wouldn't necessarily restrict you to indefinite intermediate training. A lot would depend on your goals, preferences, commitment, talent, and genetics.

[coachcraiglawrence]

Thanks Dr Sullivan for a great presentation!

Starting strength is about general strength. For endurance, there are many different training schemes. It is not limited to only HIIT or LSD (Maybe only HIIT and LSD in literature?).

Soccer style conditioning often starts with the book "Soccer Conditioning for Soccer by Dr Raymond Verheijen. Any strength coach would recognize the strength info in the book is very poor. Still, the book does do a good job of describing the specific performance needs for a soccer player. It also covers some physiology. While it it old info, it describes economical training of these systems and has very useful information (mixed with old or wrong info)

In cross country, they try to get new kids just running 6 days/week. They want them to cover at least 3-4 miles run each day (or 30-35 minutes). They pre-run 1 miles to warm the muscles and then do static stretching (hips, itbands, glutes, calfs often get tight without stretching). They also repeat the stretches after their runs. The summer base program has a long run on Monday, a recovery run (easier pace on Tuesday/Thursday), Wednesday is running trails with very long hills, Friday is a tempo run (at a faster pace), and Saturday is a moderate run. Sunday is normally an off day. They look to increase weekly milage at under 10% per week to prevent injuries.

There may not be a need so much for strength athletes to stretch extensively, but for cross country runners it is a big part of preventing injuries. Perhaps, this is because of the partial range of motion and high volume of repetitions that happen each day. They also tend to use foam rollers as a means of self massage to loosen tight calfs, hams, glutes, or it-band regions when needed.

This type of program is based upon aerobic recovery being say 24 hours (shorter than novice strength training recovery). The 6 days is a balance allowing aerobic improvement, but still having a day off to reduce the injury rates that seem to happen if they do not get a day off.

Hills are the main type of sport specific strength training. Up hill seems to be more concentric work. Downhill more eccentric. It impacts the stride length. The surface varies that they run on. They sometimes do fartlek runs (vary the tempo say hard for 2 min / easy for 1 min and repeat). Sometimes, they do repeats that are all out with sprint with full recovery between reps. Other times they do intervals that are not as fast, but do not have full recovery. Sometimes, they do progressive runs where they continue to pick up the pace the last 2-3 miles of their 8-10 mile run. The volume is milage or time. The intensity is commonly pace, but could be hills.

while cross country runners run most days. They typically have 2-3 days that are hard with easier days for recvoery between. One Challenge is doing strength train without impacting their ability to perform the hard runs. They progressively increase the duraration and intensity of the runs over time. Over time many (particularly those who don't stretch or increase volume to fast) get over-use injuries. They tend to take off 1 week after track and 1 week after cross country, but otherwise typically run 6 days/week for 50 weeks per year.

Please keep up the good work.

[Mark Rippetoe]

How many days a week do kids practice soccer, how long does the practice last, how long are the games, and how long is the season?

[coachcraiglawrence]

How many days a week do kids practice soccer, how long does the practice last, how long are the games, and how long is the season?

Short Answer: Older teenager on a serious team, likely 2 maybe 3 practice times per week of 1.5 to 1.75 hours each. The keeper gets an additional keeper training session it is likely 0.75 to 1.25 hours. There is at least one game per week with two 40-45 min half. It is common for tournaments of 3-4 shortened games. Sometimes the team plays friendlies. I mostly coached youth, but I think the fall season would be about 16 weeks. Some coaches let kids play high school in spring. Other places it is discouraged. High school probably meets every weekday for games or matches.

They start the kids young like U6 or younger now. Between U6 and U12 they progress from 3v3, 4v4, 7v7, and 9v9. The field space increases and the duration of the game increases as they get older. At U6, it is 1 45 min practice during the week and 1 short game on weekend with like 4 6-8min quarters. The kids rotate. At U12, they player I think two 30 min half. At U14, they player 11v11 with an adult size field. Some academy higher level teams will do this at U12. I would say from U10 onward teams have 2 practices per week and 1 game. A recreational team would have two 1.25 to 1.5 hour practices per week. They would play one game per week, but might have tournaments with 3-4 games in one weekend. A recreational season would be 12-13 weeks long with 10 games. There are two outdoor season's per year. They now have indoor or futsal leagues in the winter months. A select or academy team would have a slightly longer seasons and a summer camp.

A top academy team U12+ would practice 2-3 times per week. The keeper would have a special keeper training session additionally by a keeper coach. The striker or players may have occasionally a skill session added. They play spring and fall seasons. They have try outs in May/June. Before starting the summer they have a week long camp that runs typically 4 hours each day. The team is typically together for the year.

I don't have experience with high school. I suspect they practice or play each weekday. The high school season is only the spring. Depending upon the areas it is often lower level than the competitive leagues, but may be strong in some locations. Texas is a hot place for soccer.

A Pro or national team trains every day. Some coaches train multiple times per day. I've seen presentations of coaches with EPL academy's that have kids doing the lifts so I think some teams may be doing it. An adult match is 45 min. halves. Many leagues allow open substitution, but top level games may limit the number of substitutions available for a team and the player is not allowed to return after leaving.

In Europe the season runs almost year round. They have I think a month off. MLS has different time windows from other leagues. Soccer is very global.

I used to work with a coach who played at Flamengo in Brazil. He was signed as a pro at age 12. He road the bus to training across town, and back to go to school in the afternoon. He was late one time and almost got cut. He was never late again. When the kids had a scrimmage if the other team had a player who did better than you he made the team and you got dropped. They said you had the best facilities and best training so you should have an advantage and never let that kid have better skill. That was how he described the culture. It's not the same in US. In Brazil, the parents were not around as they were often at work.

This coach had a U12 academy team that was good but small sized players. He did endurance training on Tuesday. He did some without the ball because he said the kids were not yet fit enough to use the ball. A quick heart rate check with pulse for 6 seconds * 10. On Thursday, he had some agility and speed work incorporated into the practice. These drills where lots of alactic (2-8 seconds duration) training. Many soccer coaches think lactic (high intensity 30 sec to 3 min) soccer training is used occasionally for mental toughness rather than for soccer specific situations. He added the conditioning at the last 20 minutes of practice. He observed the players in the drills to find out who was serious and who was not about their training.

The problem with soccer coaching is there are so many things to cover that you always have to know what to leave out and what to repeatedly emphasize.

Unfortunately, 70% of kids drop out of soccer after U12-U14 age group.