For my first training session I concentrated on both fitness and football related aspects using the circuit training method. Before I started my training I made sure I warmed up appropriately. I did different cardio vascular warm up exercises included in my warm up sheet and then passively stretched and did different mobility exercises in order to get my body physically ready for exercise and to avoid any possible injuries that can occur when going into a intensive training session.
I started off my training at an average level of intensity by setting out a circuit of 10 different activities (see diagram). The different fitness exercises included shuttle runs to improve my sprinting, tricep dips to improve my strength in my arms, dribbling around cones- to improve my footwork technique and agility skills, skipping for cardiovascular exercise, heading the ball to improve my heading style, step ups for cardiovascular endurance, squat thrusts for strength in the legs and toning, sit ups for abdominal strengthening and press ups for strengthening of the upper body. All these combine to give me a good overall fitness related work out. I did this circuit once and was on each station for each 30 seconds. I decided to give myself a short recovery period of 10 seconds because I feel its important to push myself to the highest demands at all times as this will make you fitter over time.
Once I had completed my training session I did a cool down to loosen my muscles up to avoid stiffness and to remove any possible lactic acid. I did a slow jog, side steps, high knees and bounding, followed by a slow walk and stretching and mobility exercise. Evaluation: I felt for my first session this went pretty well and I enjoyed it. I feel how ever that I didn’t push myself hard enough and could have done longer on each station or even done another circuit in order to improve my fitness. I must insure that I work hard for the full session and push myself to the max in order to achieve my goal of getting a good cardiovascular work out in order to improve my endurance.
I will progress in my next training session by working on each station for longer- adding on 10 seconds on to each station- and if I get tired give myself a 20 second recovery period. I will keep the training circuit the same however and see how I get in and see if any improvements need to be done after I have done this. Session 2: After the success of my last training session I decided to keep things pretty similar as I felt the training worked well for me. However I had to show progression from one training session to the next so I decided to add 10 seconds to each station to push my self harder, to increase my level of endurance and to get into my training zone. I stuck with the same training equipment but just worked on each station for longer to see what effect this would have on me. I found that the training my heart rate had gone up several beats and this shows that I have worked harder and I was well into my training zone which is a good sign.
I made sure I followed all safety aspects of training and that I prepared well for session knowing exactly what I was going to do and the amount of intensity I was going to put on each station. Obviously I find some exercises easier than others. For example I can work much harder on my sit ups then on my press ups because my upper body strength isn’t as good as my lower body, so this will be improved throughout the training I’m sure. Evaluation: I found this week a little bit harder because of the progression I had made, this is a good thing because as I train for longer and harder I will defiantly improve as this is a natural thing that occurs. Even after the first two training session I can feel some improvement in my fitness levels and I hope once I have completed the training I would have benefited from it and will be an overall better athlete.
I feel however I need to work on not only on my overall fitness but my football related skills, which are crucial in becoming a good footballer. So next training session I will set out some skill related exercises in my training session such as dribbling, shooting and heading etc. This will hopefully help me get fit and improve my football ability. Session3: This week I decided to focus on my skill based activities for my circuit training based around football. This will help me to improve certain parts of my football ability and will enable me to work on my skill levels whilst increasing my cardio vascular endurance. My target this week was to do two circuits of the different stations which included heading, passing, shooting, dribbling and different sprint exercises.
I felt this would be beneficial to me as it would allow me to focus only on my football and not worry about different exercises that only worked on my level of fitness. When doing the particular activities I ensured I did each one efficiently and safely by doing a warm up, ensuring each station was set up properly by making the stations organised and spread out and doing general safety checks such as making sure I had my shoe laces tied up etc I followed a specific warm up this week because in previous sessions I have found my legs straining and felt that a key reason might be that I didn’t do the warm up as efficiently as possible so I followed the warm up shown in the pep and did different stretches for a reasonable amount of time to avoid any soreness or stiffness.