AFL RESOURCES – FITNESS
The AFL Community Website has some excellent resources to assist coaches and players build and maintain their fitness from the pre-season right through to the end of the season.
Strength and Conditioning:
http://www.aflcommunityclub.com.au/index.php?id=78
Pre-Season Training (10 Commandments):
http://www.aflcommunityclub.com.au/index.php?id=334
The Competition Phase:
http://www.aflcommunityclub.com.au/index.php?id=335
Football Specific Fitness Games:
http://www.aflcommunityclub.com.au/index.php?id=332
Maintaining Football Specific Fitness In Season:
http://www.aflcommunityclub.com.au/index.php?id=333
Preparing For Finals:
http://www.aflcommunityclub.com.au/index.php?id=331
STRENGTH AND CONDITIONING
– by Murray Green
During the Pre-Season Murray Green kindly offered to lead the Under 14’s and Under 16’s through a number of strength conditioning sessions. An outline of the program is provided below:
The strength training program covers body weigh resistance training and is ideal for any person of any age. This type of training sets the foundation to good health and allows for easy progression to more advanced training techniqes.
The program is broken up into three parts.
- The warm up.
- The workout
- Cool down and recovery
The warm up will be:
- 3 mins Jog
- 2 mins Dynamic stretch
If you aren’t sure what Dynamic Stretching is here is a 6 minute YouTube overview:
http://www.youtube.com/Dynamic Stretching Long
And one for shorter attention spans
http://www.youtube.com/Dynamic Stretching Short
Plus a soccer specific one which would also be useful for proper footy
http://www.youtube.com/Dynamic Stretching Soccer
The workout will be:
- Body weight Squat 15-20 Reps
http://www.youtube.com/Body Weight Squat
- Push up 15-20 Reps
http://www.youtube.com/Push-Up
- Pull up 15-20 Reps
Annoying video first then a brief demo one
http://www.youtube.com/Pull-Up Annoying
http://www.youtube.com/Pull-Up Demo
Complete this 3 times with 30 seconds rest between each exercise
Cool down and recovery:
- 2 mins light jog
- Full body stretch starting at calves then work your way up: quads, hamstrings, hip flexors, glutes (bum), lower back, chest, shoulders, triceps, biceps
This covers most of the exercises Murray showed
http://www.youtube.com/Full Body Stretch
Frequency:
It is important to hold each stretch for 20-30 seconds and to breath while stretching.
Also remember to drink water before, during and after training.
Please also see the attached articles that provide information on healthy eating guidelines for AFL players.
This training program shoul be completed 2-3 times per week with 2 days rest between workouts. As I mentioned on Tuesday night, good nutrition and adequet rest are just as important as training. Also I am asking all players not to consume ‘Energy’ drinks before training or games as they have been known to cause nasty side effects when combined with cardio training.