The Trainings of a College Rugby Player

Tuesday- Practice

Pre-Practice- foam roller, dynamic and static stretching

Practice-
warmup/jogging/stretching/ball drills
10 minute conditioning circuit of calisthenics and bag drills
full 15’s scrimmage (non tackling)
cool down

I went and practiced with the local men’s club, since apparently we aren’t doing 7’s practice anymore because everyone in town is too lazy to go. This was their first week of “real” practice to get ready for their upcoming season. It was decent, not too difficult. I could tell I was in better shape then most of them, judging by the circuit and how gassed some of them were after the scrimmage.

We didn’t get that much actual rugby stuff done, as we spent at least half an hour on all the warm up stuff, rolling around in the dirt doing every retarded stretching thing a person can think off, followed by slow jogging forever. But at least I got a ball in my hands for a bit.

Thursday- Max Lower and Conditioning

Lifting
Box Jumps- 5x3-5
“Olympic” squats- worked up to 225x5 PR
Db Lunges- 2x20 total steps
Reverse Hypers- 3x15
Ab circuit- 2 sets through

Conditioning
Swim 2 laps, run 1 lap x10

So today was the first week of “olympic” style squats, meaning I made the effort to descend as far as possible, instead of just going an inch or so below parallel. I’m counting today as a PR since earlier in the summer I hit 225x5 but I wasn’t going as deep as possible. We decided to swim for conditioning today because 1-It sounded like a hurricane was happening while we were lifting, and 2-We wanted to sprint tomorrow. Because of that, we basically killed our legs by adding in the lunges and really going hard on all the assistance stuff as well.

The plan was to swim in the pool at the gym, which is a full length pool that the swimming team competes in, but they closed right when we got there. So instead we swam at our apartment’s pool, which is a lot shorter, so we just tried to get in a ton of laps.

Friday- Rep Upper and Conditioning

Lifting
Db Incline- 50’s x16,14,15
Lat Pulldown/Db Cleans- 3x10-15 on each
Shoulder Press machine- 3x10-15
Db Shrugs/Curls- 3x10-15 on each

Conditioning
100m sprints x15

My roommate and I trained in the ROTC gym, and it was pretty cool. It’s small as hell, but it’s got everything we need to train in, plus it’s the summer so we were the only ones in there. As long as I don’t get caught it might be nice to train there primarily.

As far as the actual training, the lifting was good, my reps didn’t drop off hardly even on the 3rd set. Hopefully this means my muscular endurance is improving. The conditioning was harder today then monday. I puked up after the 10th sprint, and I felt like death after the last one. My guess is that since my legs were pretty damn sore from yesterday’s leg workout, so I had to work harder to run the same speed. Oh well, still got the work done.

34 days til the first practice!

[quote]jtownlax wrote:
I’ll be following. You’ve been a very helpful member of the forums for a while now.
[/quote]

This. And I will be following as well.

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[quote]Chris87 wrote:
On another note, I’m weighing in at 211 now. That’s down from 220 at the beginning of the summer. This is just because I cleaned up my diet a bit, not eating as much junk. Still some junk, just not as much.
[/quote]

Could you please elaborate on your diet? What exactly did you eat yesterday?

As you know Im a semi-pro soccer player, so I do lots of running around like you. I have been playing around with a modified version of IF/lean-gains style of diet. Although due to multiple training sessions a week(field and gym), I am finding it hard to find the right equation. Your thoughts?

Bird.

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[quote]theBird wrote:

[quote]Chris87 wrote:
On another note, I’m weighing in at 211 now. That’s down from 220 at the beginning of the summer. This is just because I cleaned up my diet a bit, not eating as much junk. Still some junk, just not as much.
[/quote]

Could you please elaborate on your diet? What exactly did you eat yesterday?

As you know Im a semi-pro soccer player, so I do lots of running around like you. I have been playing around with a modified version of IF/lean-gains style of diet. Although due to multiple training sessions a week(field and gym), I am finding it hard to find the right equation. Your thoughts?

Bird.

tweet[/quote]

I’m not the type to count calories or follow a specific “diet”, I just try to eat healthy and stay away from the junk.

This summer, my typical diet has been:

Breakfast- 4 scrambled eggs with cheese and salsa, cup of coffee with a bit of sugar and milk, 1 or 2 pieces of toast with peanut butter and jelly

Lunch- Ham and turkey sandwich with veggies, probably a piece of fruit, either some gatorade (G2, the low calorie version) or milk to drink

Dinner- This varies the most by far. Could be tacos, chili, some kind of chicken dish, or I’ll go to subway or something

I also make sure to get in a protein shake every day. Usually just a cup of milk and 2 scoops of protein powder. Sometimes I add some peanut butter or have a piece of fruit as well.

Thanks for following

Monday- Max Upper and Conditioning

Lifting
Floor Press- worked up to 195x5 (starting point for PR’s)
Db Incline- 40’s x 16,16
Db Rows/Rear Laterals- 3x10-15 on each
Weighted Spread Eagle Situps- 3x10

Conditioning
Weighted Sled Drags- 50m x15

Today was my first time trying out floor presses for a max effort movement, and I had set a goal of 185x5, and as I worked up I knew I could get more. After racking the 195, my training partner told me I could’ve gotten 200 or 205 and I agree. Today was just to get a starting point though so I didn’t do another set.

Conditioning was brutal again. We used 10 more pounds on the sled, and also dragged it 10m further than last time. It was really tough to finish it all, but I feel like my conditioning is getting much better. My recovery between drags was pretty quick.

Tuesday- Extra Stuff

Pushups- 25,12,15
Chins- 8,8,6
Situps- 18,16,12

Swam for about 15 mins

Tuesday is usually when I go to rugby practice, but I hurt my big toe monday being stupid and it hurts to walk on, so I didn’t want to go push it. My training partner uses this day to practice for his PT stuff, so I went with him and did what he normally does. He went for a 2 mile run but I just swam instead.

Thursday- Max Effort Lower and Conditioning

Lifting
Hurdle Jumps- 4x3
Olympic Squats- up to 235x5 PR
Kettlebell Swings- 3x10
Ab Circuit- 2 sets through

Conditioning
Sprint the straights, jog half the curve, walk half the curve x10 total

Got a nice 10 pound PR on the Olympic Squats today, and it was lighter than I thought it would be. The work up sets all felt heavier than they should have, but when I got to 235 it wasn’t too bad.

For conditioning, we did the same “sprint the straights, walk the curves” but jogged until halfway through the curve, because last time we did this walking the whole curve felt like too long of a recovery. Well this kicked my ass pretty hard. For the last 3 I had to stop after the jog and recover for a while before I could walk the rest of the curve. So my goal the next time we do this is to get through all 10 reps without stopping at all.

Friday- Rep Upper and Conditioning

Lifting
Db Bench (palms in)- 55’s x15,13,15
Lat Pulls/Db Cleans- 3x10-15 on each
Db Shoulder Press- 3x10-15
Db Shrugs/Plate Extensions- 3x15 on each

Conditioning
400m “sprints” x2
Sprint/Walk alternating for 2 laps

Another good training session today. The Db benching felt strong and I was happy that my reps didn’t drop off either. Started out conditioning with the plan of running 4-6 400m sprints, but that didn’t happen basically because neither my training partner or I could really sprint the whole thing, or even close to that. It basically became a jog/slow run, so I finished up with sprinting half the straighaway, walking the rest, sprinting half the curve, walking the rest, etc. for 2 more laps and called it a day.

Good log, hope the ‘A’ team beckons

If your goal is to make the A team, I wouldn’t be so worried about your numbers in the gym.
Especially if your playing flanker, I’d be focusing on skills training. Your obviously pretty focused and dedicated if you can keep up this training log, and flanker is a very technical position - essentially should be the first man to the ruck, so working on breakdown skills and running lines off set phases could take your game to the next level.

Another thing to brush up on would be the rules, the flankers role generally has to flirt the line of legality, just look at richie mccaw, if not the worlds best but often criticized for infringement.

I’m from nz and used to play flanker myself so I’ve basically had that stuff brainwashed into me.

[quote]Chris87 wrote:
Conditioning
Sprint the straights, jog half the curve, walk half the curve x10 total
[/quote]

Only here to offer conditioning tips, don’t mean to impose. We used to do this 100m run 50 jog 50 walk in our sprint group and progression was slow. Of all the tempo we did, 3 x 4 x 100m back to back runs with 30 secs between reps and 2.5 mins between sets was the most effective short distance, building up to 3 x 5 x 100m and trying to hit the same target time each rep (unless it’s windy). If you’re doing longer distance for conditioning I had huge progress in my breathing but my calves would get so tight doing it. I found using a stopwatch and trying to pace it evenly and hit 20 secs per 100m, so 1:20 per lap, worked well. If you can build up to 6 x 400m in 1:20 with 3-4 mins rest then take it out to 5 x 500m in 1:40, or 5-6 x 400m in 1:16. Hope that’s of use.

[quote]RampantBadger wrote:
Good log, hope the ‘A’ team beckons[/quote]

Thank you, I appreciate it

[quote]el_Toro wrote:
If your goal is to make the A team, I wouldn’t be so worried about your numbers in the gym.
Especially if your playing flanker, I’d be focusing on skills training. Your obviously pretty focused and dedicated if you can keep up this training log, and flanker is a very technical position - essentially should be the first man to the ruck, so working on breakdown skills and running lines off set phases could take your game to the next level.

Another thing to brush up on would be the rules, the flankers role generally has to flirt the line of legality, just look at richie mccaw, if not the worlds best but often criticized for infringement.

I’m from nz and used to play flanker myself so I’ve basically had that stuff brainwashed into me.[/quote]

I agree with you, I try not to focus too much on the lifting, but as long as it’s going up over time I’m happy. I really try to focus on conditioning (thus the switch to WS4SB so only 1 lower body day per week) because that has been my most weakness since I started playing.

I wish I had more opportunities to work on my actual skills outside of the season, I’ve been trying to go to practices this summer, but they were either 7’s practices or practices with the men’s team here, and they aren’t really that skillful (the keep it very basic)

I’ve been trying to find stuff on youtube to help me learn better, but I can’t really find much instructive stuff other than for pure beginners. Do you have any stuff you could recommend or sites that offer that kind of stuff?

Thanks for your input

[quote]Fezz wrote:

[quote]Chris87 wrote:
Conditioning
Sprint the straights, jog half the curve, walk half the curve x10 total
[/quote]

Only here to offer conditioning tips, don’t mean to impose. We used to do this 100m run 50 jog 50 walk in our sprint group and progression was slow. Of all the tempo we did, 3 x 4 x 100m back to back runs with 30 secs between reps and 2.5 mins between sets was the most effective short distance, building up to 3 x 5 x 100m and trying to hit the same target time each rep (unless it’s windy). If you’re doing longer distance for conditioning I had huge progress in my breathing but my calves would get so tight doing it. I found using a stopwatch and trying to pace it evenly and hit 20 secs per 100m, so 1:20 per lap, worked well. If you can build up to 6 x 400m in 1:20 with 3-4 mins rest then take it out to 5 x 500m in 1:40, or 5-6 x 400m in 1:16. Hope that’s of use.[/quote]

Thank you for your input,

So basically you like splitting it up into reps/sets, with a short rest between reps and a longer rest between sets? Instead of just continuous reps like I’ve been doing?

Also, could you make any suggestions on the whole on my conditioning? I essentially try to make sprint type interval training the meat of my training, and mix in a bit of longer stuff.

Mostly what the program has been lately is:
100m sprints x15 (doing this the most)
50m sled drags x15
Something else a bit longer? 2 mile run or longer intervals? I’m not really sure here

I was also thinking of mixing sprint type stuff with some longer duration stuff at the end, so maybe something like:
100m sprints x10, then run a 1000m shuttle
or
sled drags x10, then run a half mile

Thanks again for your help

Didn’t mean to come across as if your workouts are a waste of time, they are obviously important too.

Unfortunately it’s kind of hard to find stuff on skills and technique, you might be able to find some books on amazon or watch footage and listen to commentary or watch some rugby review shows (there’s plenty from nz/ Australia/ South Africa) which may be uploaded to YouTube. You can also watch some shows on demand via the local New Zealand tv networks.

[quote]el_Toro wrote:
Didn’t mean to come across as if your workouts are a waste of time, they are obviously important too.

Unfortunately it’s kind of hard to find stuff on skills and technique, you might be able to find some books on amazon or watch footage and listen to commentary or watch some rugby review shows (there’s plenty from nz/ Australia/ South Africa) which may be uploaded to YouTube. You can also watch some shows on demand via the local New Zealand tv networks.
[/quote]

Yea, I knew what you meant. I’ve been getting out to 7’s practices and practices with the local men’s team when the weather cooperates in an attempt to get more skill work done. This was the first summer I’ve done that and it seems to be working. I also try to toss and kick the ball around with my roommate/training partner/former teammate once in a while.

I’ll try watching some of those review shows, it sounds like watching that would probably be better than watching full length matches. Any good ones you recommend?

Monday- Max Effort Upper and Conditioning

Lifting
Bench- worked up to 215x5 PR
High Incline Db Press (palms in)- 40’s x18,15
Rack Chins/Rear Laterals- 3x10-15
Weighted Spread Eagle Situps- 3x10

Conditioning
50m sled drags x15

Extremely happy with the PR today, this is a 10 pound improvement over 6 weeks ago. I knew I was being aggressive but that’s been the tone of training all summer. I’ve had my mind on this set for the past few days so it felt great to grind it out.

Conditioning had a pretty quick tempo today, there was a storm rolling in and we wanted to hurry and finish before it got there.

Wednesday- Max Effort Lower and Conditioning

Lifting
Box Squat- worked up to 265x5 (10lb PR)
Box Jumps- 4x3-5, last set was ~40 inches
KB Swings- 3x10
Ab Circuit- 2 sets through

Conditioning
Kicking game, this took about 15 mins
500m Shuttles x2

The Box Squat felt strong today, and I’m confident I’ll be able to get 275x5 next week, which I set as a goal earlier this offseason. For conditioning, my training partner and I played this kicking game that includes a lot of chasing the ball. It was nice to mix it up and do something that wasn’t traditional “conditioning”. After that we decided to run a few shuttles, and they were pretty difficult. Didn’t time them though so I have no idea what we were running.