Every year I see footballers reach pre-season and immediately try to make up for everything they didn’t do over the break.
Doing too much, too quickly, is exactly what can leave you with a nagging injury that hangs around for the rest of the season. Building up appropriately is vital for a healthy season.
The primary objective of pre-season is building your fitness and preparing your body for football. Knowing how to start and how to build your capacity can get confusing, so a structured, gradual approach is typically best.
Don’t try to get fit in one week
If you’ve had several weeks off, your body needs time to readjust to training.
Going from very little activity straight into repeated running sessions, gym work and football training can create a huge jump in workload. I like to build athletes up over several weeks.
That might mean starting with fewer sessions, shorter running volumes or slightly easier gym sessions, then progressively increasing the demands.
This is a crucial phase for athletes, and I routinely check in with players in this time to ensure that their body is responding appropriately to what we are demanding of it.
Start before team training starts
Ideally, your first pre-season session shouldn’t be your first hard session in two months.
Before returning to full football training, I like athletes to have already started rebuilding some basic fitness.
This might include:
- Running
- Strength training
- Sprint exposure
- Ball work
- Change of direction
You don’t need to be at peak fitness before pre-season begins, but arriving with some preparation usually makes the transition much easier.
Don’t forget to sprint
Longer runs can help build general fitness, but football also involves repeated high-speed efforts. Suddenly performing sprints repeatedly at max effort can be a big jump, and so this needs to be implemented under supervision.
I like to gradually reintroduce faster running and sprinting before those demands become unavoidable at football training.
The key is progression, not avoidance.
Keep your strength work
Strength training still has a place during pre-season.
You may need to adjust the volume as football training increases, but stopping gym work completely isn’t usually necessary. Keeping it going can in fact be important for maintaining what was built during the off-season.
I still like footballers to maintain their lower-body strength, hamstring, calf and groin work while building their running load. Fitness and strength typically go hand-in-hand.
Recovery is part of training
Not every session should leave you wrecked.
Sleep, food, hydration and rest all influence how well you recover between sessions.
Some soreness is normal during pre-season, but consistently heavy legs, poor performance, unusual fatigue or repeated niggles can be signs that the overall load needs adjusting.
For me, the signs of a successful pre-season include a strong base of fitness, conditioning, strength, and psychological preparedness for the season ahead.
