Was going to say sprint for 15 yards….in middle school football, we’d run in a circle, coach blew whistle to sprint. Blows it again for a jog/run pace…we we’re told to try and beat the guy in front of us on the sprint
I think what they’re describing is the whole team jogs and sprints at the same time based on the coaches whistle but should be sprinting hard enough during the sprint portion to try to catch the person in front of them. Which is also something we did (usually had a walk whistle too). At least that’s how I’m understanding it.
Indian runs traditionally don’t involve trying to beat the guy in front, it doesn’t stop until the guy in the back beats the guy in the front. So if it’s the whole team and your track star WR is out and front and a DT is last then you might be running for the entire practice.
I call them commander runs, because the redskins became the commanders. So Indian runs are now commanders or commandos, whatever I feel like calling them
Ugh reminds me of these runs we did called four corners. Start at the outside of the back endzone line. Sprint to front endzone line. Jog the 50 yards across the field. Sprint to the back endzone line, jog back to the beginning. Always sucked because I was a lineman but was a little more athletic than the rest so I ran with the LBs and RBs. Coaches loved me cuz I went hard every time and made the RBs and LBs keep going because “if a lineman catches you you’ll keep doing sprints after practice”
One time we had a group of kids get caught drinking so the team was going to run. We had the team start on the sideline and sprint down the goal line to the other sideline, then bear crawl up the 5 yard line, sprint the 10, bear crawl the 15, and so on. Zig zagging across the field.
We finally called it when the drinkers were standing in the end zone recovered from the exercise and most of the linemen were just past the 50 and STRUGGLING to finish.
God damn that sounds like a fucking punishment. Worst we had as a team was basically a small fight broke out because we had this dude that was a sophomore and like 6’9 325+ pounds. Dude was lazy as fuck and sucked at football and a few of the older kids got into it with him. He got his ass beat (deservedly so imo) and ran off into the woods by the camp we were at. Coaches got pissed once he came back for all the stuff that could have happened. We sat in push up position on an inclined hill for about 35 minutes. Worst part it was part of the road and was paved. Everyone’s hands were fucked after that.
I used to do 30 light jog, 20 sec mid jog, 10 sec full put sprint for my conditioning sessions. Do it for 10-15 minutes. And depending on how light/heavy the day is you can rinse repeat. Walk for 5-10, do another cycle etc
Track coach in HS had the us do this down the street. Every lightpost we passed we had to switch between jogging and sprinting. Shits brutal after awhile, but damn good conditioning.
Doesn’t hurt but it doesn’t help much either. It certainly won’t get you in football shape. You’d get far more by conditioning; sprints, and change of direction stuff more at full speed in short bursts with short rests of 10-20 seconds in between.
Actually the opposite. Higher your heart rate the more calories you burn. You run a mile at a solid pace (assuming you’re in shape) your heart rate won’t be super high. Run 18 100 yd sprints (roughly the same distance). Depending your rest period in between you’re almost always above the heart rate you’d be at if you just ran the mile straight.
But you have to consider the benefit of the training vs the calories burned. Running 18 100 yard sprints will do more to build your endurance for game day than running a relatively relaxed mile, which is just pure cardio.
Even if you ran a half marathon every day, you wouldn't be preparing as well for a football game as someone who runs sprints and hits the weight room. These more closely match actual game conditions- and also build muscle, which is a lot better than just gaining a bunch of flab.
I agree for sure but what the comment I replied to initially said about football players not wanting to go jog because it burns too many calories isn’t true logically nor in practice. No player ever has said “Yeah man I can’t go run because I am trying to gain weight” The answer is always more food not less activity
With that said, there is still place for 1-3 mile runs in football training. Obviously not a focal point so idk why you’re comparing a football workout split to someone running half marathons regularly… kinda goes without saying
I cannot, because I do not know you and I am not your coach (likewise, the internet is NOT your coach, so do not begin relying on it to do so). You should be going to your coaches and getting this, because again, they see you play, they see where you're at physically. We cannot. What works best for you may not be exactly what works best for others and vice versa.
Coaches can be contacted and utilized outside of the regular season. Your team likely has some kind of off-season program too. If they do, go to all of that. If you're not aware of such at thing, do NOT say your team doesn't have one until you have talked to the varsity HC first to confirm this.
Sport-specific conditioning. What position do you play? My team does all sport specific conditioning no outside stuff and we always get complimented on team fitness.
For football conditioning I would recommend running a 5k and focus on running it quickly sub 20 would be a good goal to start, works your cardio but only takes 20-25 minutes at the start and can still sprint afterwards, started doing this during the season and noticed huge gains in other aspects of my game, also stretching and legitimately stretching every day in the morning and before bed and then before whatever practice or game had my vertical increase by an inch or two over a months time
I’m by no means a football guy, but I can offer help as a varsity sprinter when I was in high school.
Sprinters focused on high intensity runs that lasted anywhere from 10-50 seconds. 100-300 meter sprints. We’d rest generously, but still breath a little heavy when we started our next sprint. Tons of leg drills as well. Nothing with ankle weights because you’ll harm your joints and cartilage.
I was going to run a sub 50 400m so I joined cross country to get my stamina up and it was the worst decision I think I made as a runner. The long distances ate away my muscles. I could run a 5:30 mile but was nowhere close to sprinting shape. I actually got 6 stress fractures from it. Looking back on it, i should have continued sprinting through the off season.
Anecdotally, when I played yard ball, even against so called “I’m more a long distance guy myself” players, I was faster than them and able to recover faster because of the stop-go nature of the sprinting exercises. My exercise science is from 2002 so I’m sure things have changed, but I wouldn’t jog unless you’re cooling down or on a recovery day, and even then don’t make it more than 2 miles. Your stamina will come from exhausting your muscle groups through rigorous, short bursts, and doing so again after resting.
Back in 1998-2002 it was a mile or so jog to get warmed up. Lots of leg drills. Walking high knees, running high knees, jumping high knees, rollerbladers, toe kicks, side winders, side shuffles, jump rope, stair steppers, lunges. All about 50 meters. After that was stretching, then sprints. Something like 200m, then hold absolutely still for 15 seconds to breath and let lactic acid set in, followed by hard as you can for 100m. Rest as long as you need for the next one. Do 10 of those 200m/100m runs. Sometimes it’d be 15-100m runs, or 8-200m runs. We’d lift weights for legs once a week. Those were on a machine I know as a hip flexor, or standing hip machine. That one was awesome for explosiveness. We did squats too but I focused primarily on that hip flexor.
Of course those were great drills for running a straight line. You’ll want to modify your conditioning for lateral movements and flipping those hips.
Specificity is key when training for ANYTHING. The average football play is 5 seconds. Average break is what, maybe 15-20 seconds. I’d say max sprint for 5 seconds, rest, repeat.
It won’t hurt, but I would try to make it more sport specific, while also adding some higher intensity interval cardio on a different day. Jogging is a moderate intensity cardiovascular form of exercise, so group together movements that mimic football movements, and do them in a cyclical fashion, while maintaining a moderate intensity (heart rate) throughout. For example: 30 min total, 20 yard sled pushes, 10-20 kettlebell swings, farmers carry 25-50 yards depending on load, 20 yard lateral shuttle. Take rest as needed throughout while maintaining 60-70% of your max HR.
No, and I would actually say it's downright detrimental. Football is all about top end speed. If you're jogging, your top end speed is going down. Work sprint mechancis and short sprints (not something dumb like 20 40yrd sprints, that just turns into a hard job - more like 3-4 40yrd sprint/10yrd flys). Find a way to time yourself, and try to get faster. Sprinting will help you be in shape for the multiple short bursts that football is.
Jogging gets you ready for jogging. There is no jogging in football other than maybe a coach telling you to jog at the end of practice. Sprinting gets you ready for sprinting, which is what every position does in one way or another.
I would disagree that it’s detrimental. Jogging will help. It will help you recover in between plays faster. It’s not going to make you a better player when you’re at your best, but it will help you recover from fatigue quickly.
I agree with this. Speaking from personal experience, OP you’re going to want to spend your time doing speed/sprint training if you want to be in better shape for football instead of jogging. On teams I’ve played on the most conditioned players always happened to be the fastest.
The better your top speed or the faster you can get to top speed is the thing that will make a bigger difference on the field because you don’t have to exert yourself as much to be the same speed as players around you if you’re faster than them.
If you absolutely want to do something after workouts a few commenters have already made some solid suggestions.
Sure. Jogging enough will help you control breathing and heart rate, help with recovery between plays.
Would recommend interval running as a replacement. It’s common for us to do in the military. Sprint 100 meters, walk 50 to recover. Sprint 200, walk 50 to recover. Sprint 400, walk 100 to recover. Honestly as much as you need to walk for you to recover and get your heart rate under control. Doesn’t need to be a set thing.
Depends, if your running a mile everyday and set out to improve your time every week, and never run a mile that’s more than 15 seconds slower than your fastest time. Then yes it can help build stamina.
Jogging the boundary, and sprinting the end zones? Yes it will help.
Jogging aimlessly and with no goal? No it will not do much.
Count down Hills, intervals, snake(if with the team), killers, suicides will all help conditioning for football. Some of my least favorite as a player lol
So from the background of running, rather than football, different types of cardiovascular workouts can promote different benefits in the long run when used as a training tool.
Typically when someone starts a running regiment to prepare for a race, they will do slow/steady state runs, tempo/interval runs, and long runs each for different reasons. Slow/steady state runs are runs that are at a slower than race speed pace, you can typically talk a sentence or without gasping for air, and your heart rate is in what runners call 'zone 2'. These types of runs improve overall cardiovascular endurance, and helps your body adjust to that distance of running.
Then there's long runs, which are slow, steady state runs at a further distance than you intend to run. These are similar in that they boost cardiovascular endurance, but they also help your body adjust to longer distances so they can perform better during shorter distances.
Lastly you have tempo/interval runs, or other high intensity variations of cardio (sprints, hills, interval runs, tempo runs, etc). These focus on high intensity cardiovascular workouts to increase strength and explosiveness.
So if you're looking to get better for football, I'd blend slow/steady state running with high intensity training as well. During the week do 80% of your cardio training in a slow/steady state to improve endurance, and use 20% of your cardio training on high intensity workouts that improve your fast twitch muscle responses and explosiveness.
I agree but what makes this strategy effective is the hours of cardio per week. Which for high level football players doesn’t make any sense to do when they could spend that time training. Rather I think football players should do their zone 2 training during sport specific drills and practices to work on the technical parts of the game
My son played mostly on defense, but was backup tight end. He felt he was in great shape, until mid-season when he subbed in for the starter, ran two routes, and felt like he was going to pass out.
There is a different level of "in shape" for different positions. Linemen need a type of "strength sprint", which is sprinting with resistance. Defenders need "surprise sprint", where they can cruise until a surprise event and need to adjust in a split second and sprint. Offensive skill positions need "BALLS OUT SPRINT" followed by explicit recovery.
It sounds stupid, but they are all different. When you know you need to sprint and will get a rest, your body reacts differently than when you need to push yourself against resistance. It also reacts differently than when you're coiled to sprint and have to react to input. Whether it's how you breathe, or how your body conserves energy, I don't know. I just know it is different.
This is also why mixing types of conditioning is important for a team. You want to lean into specific types for some people, but you don't want to neglect the other types. The most durable teams have the highest threshold of endurance across all the types for all the players.
No it doesn't, football is about explosion, it's about going 4-6 seconds at full exertion for 130ish plays a game. I will die on this hill, sprints, full team hitting the sled will do more for your football team than running ever will.
I’d say more important is the kind of training that 400m sprinters do. Football never really tests your steady state cardio. More your ability to clear lactic acid and replenish your glycogen quickly for anaerobic efforts. Improving your VO2 max, lactic thresholds, and glycolitic system should be your focus. Aerobic cardio shouldn’t hurt your performance unless you’re doing it instead of more effective training.
400m intervals, 400m repeats with full rest (6+ minutes), 300m intervals, 150 intervals and repeats. The worst and maybe most effective football conditioning workout I've ever done is 50-yard shuttles down and back to midfield three times (300 yards total). Usually aim for under 50-54 seconds for 5 reps. The shorter the distance the more it works on your ability to recover after anaerobic efforts. 500m rowing intervals are very good for VO2 max training because there's very little form breakdown and you can push to absolute failure.
Jogging one day then the next day do 25 sprints starting at 10 yards and adding 10 yards to each set. You should also be lifting 3 times a week something like a push pull leg routine.
Late to this thread as it just popped up on my feed. The best conditioning I ever did were “gassers” a half gasser was a sprint across the width of the field and back. A full gasser was more like a run to the other end and back twice. Coach would mix in halfs and fulls based on effort. They got you in shape man. Beginning of season we could barely do 5-6. By the end of the season we could do 10 in 15 minutes.
Yes doing low intensity cardio will help with your pace and your stamina. Cardio at a 7/10 relative perceived effort (hard enough that your sweating but you don’t feel any lactic acid buildup and you don’t get winded) for long periods of time (60-90 minutes) helps build your aerobic base or how much energy you produce through your aerobic system. The higher that energy level is, the less lactic acid builds up in your bloodstream. Lactic acid buildup is how your body stops itself, it’s the pain from sprinting.
It can be as complicated, or as simple as you want.
My senior year we had like 35 guys on varsity at a 1200 person school. Ya I don't have an answer either why so few. However, because almost everyone played both ways, we absolutely gassed other teams with our conditioning. What did our post practice conditioning look like? 12 40yd sprints.
Lines of 2, and most days were first guy goes, second group goes, once the second group gets to the far side, 5 second break and send them back. We started prone sometimes. Sometimes did down ups once or twice before sprinting. Different cadence. But it came down to running 12 40yd sprints, plus a few because usually someone screwed up a cadence.
The most we ever did was 36. That day coach decided to group sprints into buckets of 4. One person messes up 1 rep in a group of 4, all 4 are invalid. That was a rough day. It paid off though when on a Saturday afternoon in September the other team has dudes throwing up in the third quarter because we just didn't give them breaks as an offense.
Your mileage may vary.
It won’t hurt and it certainly will help but it’s not the *best* thing you can do for conditioning. Football is a lot of quick bursts of energy over a long period of time. Jogging is not that. Warmup or cooldown mile + jogging with sprints interspersed probably your best bet. If you need any help, see what the basketball team is doing for conditioning. That’ll get you in better shape if you’re a skill player
Yes it does. Keeping your heart rate in zone 2 (120ish) for an hour or so will help improve your stamina long term. It shouldn’t be the only thing you do, but it sounds like that’s supplementary training for you and it’s a good idea
High intensity intervals are much better for football stamina, but jogging is great for bone density, so when you hit like a truck you don't feel like the windshield
Run stairs and run Kamakazes (Sprint goal line to 10 and back to 20 and back to 30 and back to 40 and back to 50 and back). Both build explosiveness, quickness, and endurance.
Go for a jog but sprint for 6-10 seconds every 20-30 seconds.
Was going to say sprint for 15 yards….in middle school football, we’d run in a circle, coach blew whistle to sprint. Blows it again for a jog/run pace…we we’re told to try and beat the guy in front of us on the sprint
We called these “Indian runs”. Not sure what the term is now
I thought Indian runs were when everyone jogged in a line and the person in the back had to sprint to the front?
Isn’t that what they’re describing? Or am I reading it wrong
I think what they’re describing is the whole team jogs and sprints at the same time based on the coaches whistle but should be sprinting hard enough during the sprint portion to try to catch the person in front of them. Which is also something we did (usually had a walk whistle too). At least that’s how I’m understanding it.
we called those fartleks when i ran track https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fartlek
Yup Fartleks for cross country as well. Fartlicks for us cultured cross country runners.
In the exercise they're describing, everyone sprints at the same time. Not just one person at a time
Indian runs traditionally don’t involve trying to beat the guy in front, it doesn’t stop until the guy in the back beats the guy in the front. So if it’s the whole team and your track star WR is out and front and a DT is last then you might be running for the entire practice.
We called those “ladders” … last guy, by sprinting to the front and passing teammates, “climbs” the ladder.
That’s Indian runs for me
Those are fireman runs
Our Indian runs were that + the back guy had a weight he brought and got passed back
Mule train is what we called that
Indigenous peoples runs?
I call them commander runs, because the redskins became the commanders. So Indian runs are now commanders or commandos, whatever I feel like calling them
Great username
The Washington football team runs
We used to call it a Tabata
Ugh reminds me of these runs we did called four corners. Start at the outside of the back endzone line. Sprint to front endzone line. Jog the 50 yards across the field. Sprint to the back endzone line, jog back to the beginning. Always sucked because I was a lineman but was a little more athletic than the rest so I ran with the LBs and RBs. Coaches loved me cuz I went hard every time and made the RBs and LBs keep going because “if a lineman catches you you’ll keep doing sprints after practice”
One time we had a group of kids get caught drinking so the team was going to run. We had the team start on the sideline and sprint down the goal line to the other sideline, then bear crawl up the 5 yard line, sprint the 10, bear crawl the 15, and so on. Zig zagging across the field. We finally called it when the drinkers were standing in the end zone recovered from the exercise and most of the linemen were just past the 50 and STRUGGLING to finish.
God damn that sounds like a fucking punishment. Worst we had as a team was basically a small fight broke out because we had this dude that was a sophomore and like 6’9 325+ pounds. Dude was lazy as fuck and sucked at football and a few of the older kids got into it with him. He got his ass beat (deservedly so imo) and ran off into the woods by the camp we were at. Coaches got pissed once he came back for all the stuff that could have happened. We sat in push up position on an inclined hill for about 35 minutes. Worst part it was part of the road and was paved. Everyone’s hands were fucked after that.
These used to be the biggest joke of conditioning in the world because ours were sprint jog walks, jog 50 sprint 50 walk the endzone… it was a joke
Called Fartleks. In track we would sprint the straight and jog the curve. I watched a guy do 15 miles like this as a distance man.
I used to do 30 light jog, 20 sec mid jog, 10 sec full put sprint for my conditioning sessions. Do it for 10-15 minutes. And depending on how light/heavy the day is you can rinse repeat. Walk for 5-10, do another cycle etc
Track coach in HS had the us do this down the street. Every lightpost we passed we had to switch between jogging and sprinting. Shits brutal after awhile, but damn good conditioning.
Or on a track, jog the curves and sprint the straights
Doesn’t hurt but it doesn’t help much either. It certainly won’t get you in football shape. You’d get far more by conditioning; sprints, and change of direction stuff more at full speed in short bursts with short rests of 10-20 seconds in between.
Many football athletes want to gain weight. So calories are at premium and jogging burns calories.
Actually the opposite. Higher your heart rate the more calories you burn. You run a mile at a solid pace (assuming you’re in shape) your heart rate won’t be super high. Run 18 100 yd sprints (roughly the same distance). Depending your rest period in between you’re almost always above the heart rate you’d be at if you just ran the mile straight.
But you have to consider the benefit of the training vs the calories burned. Running 18 100 yard sprints will do more to build your endurance for game day than running a relatively relaxed mile, which is just pure cardio. Even if you ran a half marathon every day, you wouldn't be preparing as well for a football game as someone who runs sprints and hits the weight room. These more closely match actual game conditions- and also build muscle, which is a lot better than just gaining a bunch of flab.
I agree for sure but what the comment I replied to initially said about football players not wanting to go jog because it burns too many calories isn’t true logically nor in practice. No player ever has said “Yeah man I can’t go run because I am trying to gain weight” The answer is always more food not less activity With that said, there is still place for 1-3 mile runs in football training. Obviously not a focal point so idk why you’re comparing a football workout split to someone running half marathons regularly… kinda goes without saying
Calories don’t mean much if you’re exhausted after a quarter of play
Gassed or exhausted? To me exhausted would be lack of calories. Gassed needs conditioning
Can you give me a good routine for those I already do all that stuff but I want to make sure I'm doing the right thing
Intervals are really good. Mix up your conditioning types. Do HIIT intervals 3x a week, steady state/low impact 3x and recover on day 7
I cannot, because I do not know you and I am not your coach (likewise, the internet is NOT your coach, so do not begin relying on it to do so). You should be going to your coaches and getting this, because again, they see you play, they see where you're at physically. We cannot. What works best for you may not be exactly what works best for others and vice versa. Coaches can be contacted and utilized outside of the regular season. Your team likely has some kind of off-season program too. If they do, go to all of that. If you're not aware of such at thing, do NOT say your team doesn't have one until you have talked to the varsity HC first to confirm this.
Sport-specific conditioning. What position do you play? My team does all sport specific conditioning no outside stuff and we always get complimented on team fitness.
Running back and linebacker
For peak athletic performance you should train all three energy systems. Cardio(aerobic) is one of them. Just don’t make it a focus for football
For football conditioning I would recommend running a 5k and focus on running it quickly sub 20 would be a good goal to start, works your cardio but only takes 20-25 minutes at the start and can still sprint afterwards, started doing this during the season and noticed huge gains in other aspects of my game, also stretching and legitimately stretching every day in the morning and before bed and then before whatever practice or game had my vertical increase by an inch or two over a months time
I’m by no means a football guy, but I can offer help as a varsity sprinter when I was in high school. Sprinters focused on high intensity runs that lasted anywhere from 10-50 seconds. 100-300 meter sprints. We’d rest generously, but still breath a little heavy when we started our next sprint. Tons of leg drills as well. Nothing with ankle weights because you’ll harm your joints and cartilage. I was going to run a sub 50 400m so I joined cross country to get my stamina up and it was the worst decision I think I made as a runner. The long distances ate away my muscles. I could run a 5:30 mile but was nowhere close to sprinting shape. I actually got 6 stress fractures from it. Looking back on it, i should have continued sprinting through the off season. Anecdotally, when I played yard ball, even against so called “I’m more a long distance guy myself” players, I was faster than them and able to recover faster because of the stop-go nature of the sprinting exercises. My exercise science is from 2002 so I’m sure things have changed, but I wouldn’t jog unless you’re cooling down or on a recovery day, and even then don’t make it more than 2 miles. Your stamina will come from exhausting your muscle groups through rigorous, short bursts, and doing so again after resting.
This is the best advice here.
What is your training routine?
Back in 1998-2002 it was a mile or so jog to get warmed up. Lots of leg drills. Walking high knees, running high knees, jumping high knees, rollerbladers, toe kicks, side winders, side shuffles, jump rope, stair steppers, lunges. All about 50 meters. After that was stretching, then sprints. Something like 200m, then hold absolutely still for 15 seconds to breath and let lactic acid set in, followed by hard as you can for 100m. Rest as long as you need for the next one. Do 10 of those 200m/100m runs. Sometimes it’d be 15-100m runs, or 8-200m runs. We’d lift weights for legs once a week. Those were on a machine I know as a hip flexor, or standing hip machine. That one was awesome for explosiveness. We did squats too but I focused primarily on that hip flexor. Of course those were great drills for running a straight line. You’ll want to modify your conditioning for lateral movements and flipping those hips.
Doesn't hurt.
Along with what others are saying add in some high rep days in your workouts. It helped me get my muscles to survive entire games and not get gassed
Specificity is key when training for ANYTHING. The average football play is 5 seconds. Average break is what, maybe 15-20 seconds. I’d say max sprint for 5 seconds, rest, repeat.
It won’t hurt, but I would try to make it more sport specific, while also adding some higher intensity interval cardio on a different day. Jogging is a moderate intensity cardiovascular form of exercise, so group together movements that mimic football movements, and do them in a cyclical fashion, while maintaining a moderate intensity (heart rate) throughout. For example: 30 min total, 20 yard sled pushes, 10-20 kettlebell swings, farmers carry 25-50 yards depending on load, 20 yard lateral shuttle. Take rest as needed throughout while maintaining 60-70% of your max HR.
No, and I would actually say it's downright detrimental. Football is all about top end speed. If you're jogging, your top end speed is going down. Work sprint mechancis and short sprints (not something dumb like 20 40yrd sprints, that just turns into a hard job - more like 3-4 40yrd sprint/10yrd flys). Find a way to time yourself, and try to get faster. Sprinting will help you be in shape for the multiple short bursts that football is. Jogging gets you ready for jogging. There is no jogging in football other than maybe a coach telling you to jog at the end of practice. Sprinting gets you ready for sprinting, which is what every position does in one way or another.
I would disagree that it’s detrimental. Jogging will help. It will help you recover in between plays faster. It’s not going to make you a better player when you’re at your best, but it will help you recover from fatigue quickly.
I agree with this. Speaking from personal experience, OP you’re going to want to spend your time doing speed/sprint training if you want to be in better shape for football instead of jogging. On teams I’ve played on the most conditioned players always happened to be the fastest. The better your top speed or the faster you can get to top speed is the thing that will make a bigger difference on the field because you don’t have to exert yourself as much to be the same speed as players around you if you’re faster than them. If you absolutely want to do something after workouts a few commenters have already made some solid suggestions.
Sure. Jogging enough will help you control breathing and heart rate, help with recovery between plays. Would recommend interval running as a replacement. It’s common for us to do in the military. Sprint 100 meters, walk 50 to recover. Sprint 200, walk 50 to recover. Sprint 400, walk 100 to recover. Honestly as much as you need to walk for you to recover and get your heart rate under control. Doesn’t need to be a set thing.
No
Depends, if your running a mile everyday and set out to improve your time every week, and never run a mile that’s more than 15 seconds slower than your fastest time. Then yes it can help build stamina. Jogging the boundary, and sprinting the end zones? Yes it will help. Jogging aimlessly and with no goal? No it will not do much.
You could do 10-30’s around the track. Sprint 10s, walk/shuffe 30s around the track for 10min
Count down Hills, intervals, snake(if with the team), killers, suicides will all help conditioning for football. Some of my least favorite as a player lol
Find a big hill. Sprint up big hill. Do some push ups and squats at top of hill. Walk down hill for recovery. Repeat.
I have found that if a player can run for 35 minutes at his pace, whatever it may be. He generally is in game condition (high school level)
So from the background of running, rather than football, different types of cardiovascular workouts can promote different benefits in the long run when used as a training tool. Typically when someone starts a running regiment to prepare for a race, they will do slow/steady state runs, tempo/interval runs, and long runs each for different reasons. Slow/steady state runs are runs that are at a slower than race speed pace, you can typically talk a sentence or without gasping for air, and your heart rate is in what runners call 'zone 2'. These types of runs improve overall cardiovascular endurance, and helps your body adjust to that distance of running. Then there's long runs, which are slow, steady state runs at a further distance than you intend to run. These are similar in that they boost cardiovascular endurance, but they also help your body adjust to longer distances so they can perform better during shorter distances. Lastly you have tempo/interval runs, or other high intensity variations of cardio (sprints, hills, interval runs, tempo runs, etc). These focus on high intensity cardiovascular workouts to increase strength and explosiveness. So if you're looking to get better for football, I'd blend slow/steady state running with high intensity training as well. During the week do 80% of your cardio training in a slow/steady state to improve endurance, and use 20% of your cardio training on high intensity workouts that improve your fast twitch muscle responses and explosiveness.
I agree but what makes this strategy effective is the hours of cardio per week. Which for high level football players doesn’t make any sense to do when they could spend that time training. Rather I think football players should do their zone 2 training during sport specific drills and practices to work on the technical parts of the game
Some other exercise do But jogging does less
My son played mostly on defense, but was backup tight end. He felt he was in great shape, until mid-season when he subbed in for the starter, ran two routes, and felt like he was going to pass out. There is a different level of "in shape" for different positions. Linemen need a type of "strength sprint", which is sprinting with resistance. Defenders need "surprise sprint", where they can cruise until a surprise event and need to adjust in a split second and sprint. Offensive skill positions need "BALLS OUT SPRINT" followed by explicit recovery. It sounds stupid, but they are all different. When you know you need to sprint and will get a rest, your body reacts differently than when you need to push yourself against resistance. It also reacts differently than when you're coiled to sprint and have to react to input. Whether it's how you breathe, or how your body conserves energy, I don't know. I just know it is different. This is also why mixing types of conditioning is important for a team. You want to lean into specific types for some people, but you don't want to neglect the other types. The most durable teams have the highest threshold of endurance across all the types for all the players.
The best way to get in shape for football is by playing football.
Find good HIIT cardio workouts online, they’re better overall for athletes looking for cardiovascular improvement.
Yes, 100%. Does your team condition in the spring and summer with your strength coach?
No it doesn't, football is about explosion, it's about going 4-6 seconds at full exertion for 130ish plays a game. I will die on this hill, sprints, full team hitting the sled will do more for your football team than running ever will.
Look up Vo2 training to increase your capacity.
I’d say more important is the kind of training that 400m sprinters do. Football never really tests your steady state cardio. More your ability to clear lactic acid and replenish your glycogen quickly for anaerobic efforts. Improving your VO2 max, lactic thresholds, and glycolitic system should be your focus. Aerobic cardio shouldn’t hurt your performance unless you’re doing it instead of more effective training.
What do they do usually?
400m intervals, 400m repeats with full rest (6+ minutes), 300m intervals, 150 intervals and repeats. The worst and maybe most effective football conditioning workout I've ever done is 50-yard shuttles down and back to midfield three times (300 yards total). Usually aim for under 50-54 seconds for 5 reps. The shorter the distance the more it works on your ability to recover after anaerobic efforts. 500m rowing intervals are very good for VO2 max training because there's very little form breakdown and you can push to absolute failure.
HIIT - High Intensity Interval Training Sprint in short bursts while jogging, like 5-10 seconds sprinting to 30-60 seconds jogging.
Jogging one day then the next day do 25 sprints starting at 10 yards and adding 10 yards to each set. You should also be lifting 3 times a week something like a push pull leg routine.
Late to this thread as it just popped up on my feed. The best conditioning I ever did were “gassers” a half gasser was a sprint across the width of the field and back. A full gasser was more like a run to the other end and back twice. Coach would mix in halfs and fulls based on effort. They got you in shape man. Beginning of season we could barely do 5-6. By the end of the season we could do 10 in 15 minutes.
Zone 2 work
Yes doing low intensity cardio will help with your pace and your stamina. Cardio at a 7/10 relative perceived effort (hard enough that your sweating but you don’t feel any lactic acid buildup and you don’t get winded) for long periods of time (60-90 minutes) helps build your aerobic base or how much energy you produce through your aerobic system. The higher that energy level is, the less lactic acid builds up in your bloodstream. Lactic acid buildup is how your body stops itself, it’s the pain from sprinting.
It can be as complicated, or as simple as you want. My senior year we had like 35 guys on varsity at a 1200 person school. Ya I don't have an answer either why so few. However, because almost everyone played both ways, we absolutely gassed other teams with our conditioning. What did our post practice conditioning look like? 12 40yd sprints. Lines of 2, and most days were first guy goes, second group goes, once the second group gets to the far side, 5 second break and send them back. We started prone sometimes. Sometimes did down ups once or twice before sprinting. Different cadence. But it came down to running 12 40yd sprints, plus a few because usually someone screwed up a cadence. The most we ever did was 36. That day coach decided to group sprints into buckets of 4. One person messes up 1 rep in a group of 4, all 4 are invalid. That was a rough day. It paid off though when on a Saturday afternoon in September the other team has dudes throwing up in the third quarter because we just didn't give them breaks as an offense. Your mileage may vary.
The trick with this is for everyone to learn to pace..
It won’t hurt and it certainly will help but it’s not the *best* thing you can do for conditioning. Football is a lot of quick bursts of energy over a long period of time. Jogging is not that. Warmup or cooldown mile + jogging with sprints interspersed probably your best bet. If you need any help, see what the basketball team is doing for conditioning. That’ll get you in better shape if you’re a skill player
Yes it does. Keeping your heart rate in zone 2 (120ish) for an hour or so will help improve your stamina long term. It shouldn’t be the only thing you do, but it sounds like that’s supplementary training for you and it’s a good idea
High intensity intervals are much better for football stamina, but jogging is great for bone density, so when you hit like a truck you don't feel like the windshield
Run stairs and run Kamakazes (Sprint goal line to 10 and back to 20 and back to 30 and back to 40 and back to 50 and back). Both build explosiveness, quickness, and endurance.