Just a blog for my training and season for the 2007 Super League. Everything up to this point is on my blog on my profile. Feel free to hit me with anything.
This is 2/28…i’m currently carrying a small tear in my hamstring and the usual bumps and bruises. How the hell can you get hurt after two matches? I might sit this week to make sure its healed, season runs til June, can’t be getting injured this early.
what your weight/ hiegh what position do you play?
what is your proposed training looking like?
what are you maxes on bench/ squat/ dead cheers
2/28 DE/RE Upper
Typically this would be a ME Upper day, but since my hammy is wrecked, I swapped my ME Upper to Monday.
Various Rot Cuff work
DE Bench 8x3x135 (40%, havent done DE in ages so stayed nice and light)
Palms In DB Bench 50x15x4
DB Row 55x15x4
Bradford Press 75x15x4
Saxon Bend 85x8 95x8 100x8
Hanging Leg Raise x8 x8 x8
Here’s my specs:
6’0
220lbs (100kgs)
Hooker
Bench: 305 (havent tested in ages, may be lower)
Box Squat: 405
Clean: 285
Ideal training week looks like this:
M ME Lower
T Team Training & AM speed/agility
W ME Upper & AM Fitness session
T Team Training
F DE/RE Upper/Lower, Strongman or active recovery
S Match
S Recovery
DE/RE and/or Strongman on Friday moves to Thursday AM on match weeks. I’m a big believer in making training adjustments based on how I’m feeling, so I may change workouts depending on how I feel…
You’re hurt only two games into the season because your training is too intense for an in season Rugby League player.
I’m a full back here in Australia, 6"1 90 kg and my training is as follows:
S - Game
M - Full body weights - more rep based.
T - Team training
W - Full body weights - more explosive focus
T - Team training
F - Foot work/agility
S - Active Recovery - dynamic mobility work
I think your morning sessions and the weight lifting/strongman work the day prior to the game is what is causing you to get injured.
I also try to avoid maxing out during the season because it takes such a toll on your body.
James.
Nah bro, I tweaked the hammy because we played a 6pm match a few weeks ago in Boulder, Colorado in February! It was about 30 degrees F at kickoff and around 20 post match!
I used this split last season too with no issues so i’m chalking it up to a freak occurence. The ME work typically follows a 5-3-1-deload so its not as if i’m handling 1RM loads weekly.
For me, posting a template is kinda tough because I change quite a bit of it depending on how i’m feeling…the Friday work goes out the window in season except for timed sets/recovery, mainly because matches are Saturday…although with a Sunday match this week, i’m getting a quick easy one in tomorrow…
I know what you’re saying about the volume but since its still preseason i’m ok with the volume now and backing it down over the next 2-3 weeks…
3/2 recovery workout
AM:
ART, ice and stim for my hamstring
PM: Recovery workout
Band Traction
Mini Band Pull Aparts 3x20
Pushups Against Bands 3x20
Single Leg Squat 3x20
Just hitting some sore spots…and the hammy is about 90% so i’m good to go for Sunday. Just hoping we get some warmth around here Sunday…
im in my second mesocycle since en do fmy rugby season
1st was basically a lot of unilateral work so lunges, single arm presses, single arm clean/ snatche, single arm rows to iron out the muscle imbalances from the season. only for a month it was.
no on a 4 day split with 3 cv sessions
so mon: pm- cv tues: pm- MEUB wed pm- MELB thurs: pm- intervals fri: off saturday: am- steady cv pm- DEUB sunday pm- DELB
with change to 1 80min a week, 1 power endurance/ strongman session a week, 1 speed/ fartlek session, 1 MEUB, 1 MELB session. this is preseason. it is gradually changed into this. i.e. change a of the steady cv in an interbal session, the DELB will become strongman/ power endurance workout. amongst other changes… into my preson.
in season this year was
mon: lunchtime- MELB pm- team training
tues: foward run thru
wed: yoga/ physio dislocated shoulder
thurs lunchtime MEUB pm- team training
friday- off
saturday- game
sunday- full body workout actually help to iron out kinks from the game. then alternate shower, massage
I still include an hr or so of yoga in my recovery work the day after matches (plus I’ve always had ridiculously tight hamstrings and calves/Achilles). But fuck does it hurt after engaging 20-30 scrums the day before! My recovery toolbox consists of contrast showers, ice baths, epsom salt baths (life saver when you first get home from the match) foam roller and massage.
Its also helpful that i’m a grad student so I can have a nap after training. Also lets me throw in a random AM fitness session or something if i’m free and feeling up to it. IMHO, the issue with surviving a season isn’t the volume of training you undertake but the amount of time you devote to recovery works. Although I still probably do far too little of both training and recovering.
In the off-season, I like spending a few hrs on my mtn bike or road bike as my steady state work, but it gets mostly chopped out once preseason starts. I can get a bigger bang and more specific training in a smaller frame of time with some 330m shuttles or 400m runs, or even running Red Rocks Amphitheatre (LOTS of steps and its at around 7000ft)
i know what you are syaing about intervals but to be fair i like to start them pre-preseason. then have a interval fart-lek after my speed work and the strongman/ power endurance sessions i do are brutal i.e.
2 squats 90% ss 1min of farmers
2 jerks 90% ss 1min of famers
2 deads 90% ss 1min of farmers
rest 1 min
repeat
then same main exercises but with lunges, then yoke, tyres, sled pulls if you get me up to 40mins. the supersetted exercise ae changed for variety so are the main effort execises. follow basically a main lgexrise squat, front squat gm’s. then jerk, push press, bench then clean/ dead or snatch.
you should try it, it is horrid.
other things. i do for PE are load 4 50kg sandbags on the 22 or half way then run from under posts to pick them up to a sled one by one then do full length pitch sled drag. unload and repeat. also rather brutal. for increased brutallity increase weight of sand bags.
what strongman/ power endurance things do you get upto
Been doing mainly truck pushes, keg tosses and some tire flipping. Another goodie we were doing is carrying 155lb barbells zercher style from goal line to 22 and back. The tire flipping was in groups of fours (3 flips per turn) and racing down the length of a pitch …its not much of a “race” by the time you get through three pitch lengths or so!
And with the intervals, they’re good all year round really. Its just that, for me, I like the long aerobic work to build a base for the intervals to improve. I probably do some kind of intervals once a week off season just to remember what it feels like and keep that lactic acid flowin.
3/4 Match
W 54-6
Not a sparkling performance by any stretch of the imagination but it’ll do. If I had to grade out, probably give myself about a C or a C+. Made all my tackles, but screwed up calls on two lineout throws amd probably made 30m or so ball in hand. Scrummaging was slopping and needs work though, bad channels off my strike. Got sloppy in the 2nd half, tough not to when you’re up 36-3 at the break. Being as it was the first real hit out with all our forwards and backs, we’ll take it. Two weeks to season opener. Hamstring came through like a charm but fuck is it gonna hurt tomorrow. Luckily im not that fast in the first place.
3/5 Recovery Workout
Band Traction
4x8 Light Band Hip Abduction
4x8 Light Band Hip Adduction
4x12 Rotator Cuff
4x25 Single Arm DB Press
4x25 Lat Pulldown
4x25 Single Leg Press
One thing I forgot to mention: The new scrummaging cadence takes some of the impact off of your neck and traps; my neck isn’t nearly as f’d up as it usually is the day after…one nice thing is you can really load up and time the “engage” call, because refs are supposed to keep timing consistent; I’m willing to trade a free kick or two for gaming the call…
great to see some fellow ruggers on this site…
sledge…how old are you? what team do you play for? how does the US superleague compare to the Canadian superleague?
personally i play either 6, 7, or 8.
i played for the University of Western Ontario - starting 8, and for the Brampton Beavers men’s 1st team - starting 7.
im going to be trying out for the Toronto Extreme which is a superleague team this summer…
you playing union, you have this stupid touch before you can engage
i couldnt sort my timing out all season… thought it was a joke but hey it is porbably safer…
3/6 Team Training
45 min film session
Fitness work
-40m sprint 5x5 5s between reps, 90s between sets.
-ballhandling games for fitness, 1min on, 30s rest
Scrummaging
Short Lineout work
5on3 attack/defense drill
Fighting two tweaked hamstrings and a serious flu…not a good start to this f’n season!!
Regarding the US SL vs Canadian SL: In the US SL, you dont have a club and then a SL team here. Your club IS the SL team. Pros and cons there as with everything.
I’m a hooker, 26, 6’0, 100kg.
I’m growing to like the new engage calls. Once you figure out how to time the candence, it’s actually pretty good and safer. And its definitely less of a beating for my neck and shoulders.
[quote]big49ersfan wrote:
you playing union, you have this stupid touch before you can engage
i couldnt sort my timing out all season… thought it was a joke but hey it is porbably safer…[/quote]
All season? The new rule has only been in two months?
my seaon is over cant play uni rugby this term due to lesson restrictions and my ‘club’ team are in an american football tyle league of pre and post season and we never made the post season. so to me it is all season
ah, its nice to see another fitness and rugby obsessed hooker on T-Nation.
Why is it always us Hookers ??
I’m 5’8 and 95kg.
Struggling to get back into the swing of things since I displaced my pelvis deadlifting back in December. It turned out I hand some ligament damage from a game prior to the session.