Hey forum, I just started playing rugby, and it is a great sport (seeing as playing D1 football is not an option). However, our season lasts all year for the most part, because we play a fall preseason. I want to continue to add strength through my lifting, but I’m wary of overtraining as my legs are put through the ringer four days a week from playing. Any suggestions for an in season lifting regimen would be great, thanks.
rugby is a great game!! try this website
www.waikato.ac.nz/ education/ls/leisure/Rugby/pwgthm.htm
or do a search from www.waikato.ac.nz. it is run by brett smith at waikato univesity in new zealand (home of the all blacks - the greatest rugby players in the world). it looks like a pretty good routine… best of luck! what position are you playing? nic 
I tend to do legs either on a day where im doing rugby practice but early in the morning so I can recover slightly before the evening training session, as long as i keep it short and sweet and make sure that its far enough away from game day I dont seem to suffer.nicky just to wind you up - whose ranked number one - ENGLAND, swing low sweet chariot.
The program is ok, but Id suggest if you wanna dominate look into renegade training for rugby, IT has completely changed the way i can play the game.
Some of the stuff on that site is assinine:
Most athletes in virtually all sports will tell you of the benefits of a comprehensive warm up in the morning before the game/event. This warm up should include 15-30 minutes of light aerobic activity, 10 minutes of “non-fatiguing” general body strength work followed by 15-20 minutes of flexibility work. This type of session prepares the body (and mind) for game day. Traditionally rugby players have complained that any exercise on Friday and/or Saturday would fatigue them for the game however if they are that unfit then it is unlikely that they will last 10 rather than 80 minutes
Pregame warmup needs to be tailer designed to each team and in some cases each player, I train harder on my own then we oftern do at practice, however pregame I dont like more than a jog, and a few 70-80% sprints adn streching. Who would do strength training pregame, seems rather worthless. Some of his other ideas are rather worthless as well, jogging long distance at low intensity rarely helps the stamina in rugby, fowards need to be able to run wrestle and recover jog, and backs need to be able to call upon sprint speed multiple times in a row. Anyways I seem to be ranting, check in with coach D or just do a load of GPP, sprint recover sprint, and lifting and you’ll be a much better player.
thanks fellas, I’ll check that site out. I play both tight and loose head prop for SDSU, we’ve gone 8-3 so far in preseason and won two tourneys, and we have one more against long beach. I’ve only been playing for a couple of months so I’m still learning the sport, but I’ll try to post some game pix on the pic forum soon, peace.
I’m assuming you have practice 3 days a week, and 1 game. I split my lifting into upper body pushing (pecs, delts, tris) on a monday, legs on wednesday (the day between my practices), and pulling (back, biceps) on friday. I train for a mix of strength and size, with about 3 or 4 sets 6 per exercise. I do running on the side as well (long sprints) but no leg work on friday, which is the day before my game. I play lock, so our training goals should be pretty similar. Don’t forget to do some neck exercises too, as that can be very helpful to a prop, as well as anybody else who plays.
Question for others: Isn’t renegade training for football? Or are there other sport specific ones? I’d love to see one for rugby, but as rugby is more of an aerobic sport, I don’t see how training for football would be incredibly useful.