It is very commonly heard nowadays that weight training soccer is a major factor of sports training in today’s times as it creates tougher and quicker muscles. The soccer fitness plan discussed in this article will help you prepare your players for playing soccer at a higher level.
In soccer weight training, the goal is to have muscles that are strong, fast, and have great stamina rather that to add pounds of muscle mass. Although the lower body strength is more important in soccer but we still carry on with the upper body weight trainings for overall conditioning and strength.
I think fitness training should start with the legs. You can start the warm up session with squats. 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.
Next tell them to stand having their shoulders and feet width apart. After that they must lower their body while holding on to the bar till their hips are a little bit below the top of their knee. In weight training soccer, after coming to this point the players should quickly stand up fully and breathe out. Encourage them to repeat this for 20 reps even when they are dead tired.
They should be given a break of 5-10 minutes before switching to the leg curl machine to work on hamstrings. They are required to perform 4 sets of 15 reps each. In between each set of Leg Curls, they’ll also be doing 4 sets of 15 reps on the Stiff-Legged Dead lift. It is important for the hamstrings to be strong as the speed is significantly enhanced by them.
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.
Now when the they are warmed up they must go on by including enough weights so that the next set of 10 reps is harder to do. They should continue with that weight for 5 sets of 10 repetitions total, while stretching their chest and shoulders, and resting for around 2 minutes between each set.
Now we move to the second workout of this session of soccer strength training which are the pull-up exercises. This exercise should be done with the palms facing their body so that their biceps and back can become strong. Finally the upper body exercises include abdominals and performing 5 sets of 20 or more reps of leg raises. The last in this work out are the crunches do 5 sets of 50 or more.
In short weight training soccer is only a small portion of the complete training program required to make great soccer players. To know more about various weight training exercises relevant to the game of soccer, subscribe to our youth soccer coaching community that has videos, articles, pod casts, and newsletters available for you.
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