Combining F1, Running and Football/Soccer

[Afiya Zia]

   Hi! I purchased F1 last night and am delighted with the product. However, I am having a bit of trouble figuring out how to fit it into my already active schedule. I am currently training for an international Athletics tournament this August, where I will be running the 1500m and be competing in Long Jump. I I do this every morning. I play football (soccer) at varying intensities with my friends each evening, for about 2-5 hours ( I know!) 

 

   I would like to supplement my long jump work with some plyometric exercises. Should I do some senders work before or after my F1 workout? Should I do some weighted leg work for football? ( I am also playing with our country's football team at this tournament). Should I work out before or after my runnning?

 

   A little bit about myself: I am 5ft6in, around 130 lbs at bf% slightly above 10%. I used to exercise by combining weights and basic calisthenics for about 7 months, before I found this wonderful site 

 

   Any and all help is appreciated

[Blairbob]

 I would probably split doing the F1 and Plyo work at different times in the days.

 

 You can look into proper plyometrics starting with depth jumps, depth jumps with rebounds, and so forth. Single leg sprinting ( sort of a single legged hop/jump horizontally across a distance ) would probably be a good exercise as well besides short sprints.

[Connor Davies]

This is a pretty difficult question to answer, so I'm only going to focus on parts of it.

 

 

Should I do some weighted leg work for football?

General consensus is that bodyweight work alone will not be enough for your legs.  Squats and deadlifts are excellent, olympic lifts are superb if you're an explosive athlete, and have been proven to improve vertical jump height. (I'm not sure about long jump length.)

 

 

Should I work out before or after my runnning?

This depends on what your goals are.  Obviously the running will tire you out quite a bit for your foundation work, but if you're a competing runner you will probably want to focus on it while you are fresh. 

 

As far as including plyometrics in your workouts, they are quite advanced and are prone to do more harm than good if you don't know what you're doing.  I would try to find a good coach who can teach you to implement them properly.  I'm sure there are some very good programs around the place, but it's outside my area of expertise to direct you further.  Maybe someone else on the forum could chime in with their advice.

 

I have to question the inclusion of F1 in your current training.  It's predominantly an upper body workout, and not sports specific to ANY of the events you're competing in.  Since you're currently very active already and can't seem to find a place for it, you could potential shelve it until after your season is over, and then come back to it.

 

I don't mean to discourage anyone from the program, it's one of the best around, but I don't think it will help you very much with your goals.

[Afiya Zia]

This is a pretty difficult question to answer, so I'm only going to focus on parts of it.

 

 

General consensus is that bodyweight work alone will not be enough for your legs.  Squats and deadlifts are excellent, olympic lifts are superb if you're an explosive athlete, and have been proven to improve vertical jump height. (I'm not sure about long jump length.)

 

 

This depends on what your goals are.  Obviously the running will tire you out quite a bit for your foundation work, but if you're a competing runner you will probably want to focus on it while you are fresh. 

 

As far as including plyometrics in your workouts, they are quite advanced and are prone to do more harm than good if you don't know what you're doing.  I would try to find a good coach who can teach you to implement them properly.  I'm sure there are some very good programs around the place, but it's outside my area of expertise to direct you further.  Maybe someone else on the forum could chime in with their advice.

 

I have to question the inclusion of F1 in your current training.  It's predominantly an upper body workout, and not sports specific to ANY of the events you're competing in.  Since you're currently very active already and can't seem to find a place for it, you could potential shelve it until after your season is over, and then come back to it.

 

I don't mean to discourage anyone from the program, it's one of the best around, but I don't think it will help you very much with your goals.

Thank you for your advice. I don't think that it would be optimal for me to learn the Olympic Lifts currently, as I feel they would be better implemented earlier in the season (so that after the technique and execution were sound, strength gains could be made at this time.) I have a fair bit of experience with plyometric exercises from football practices, so I know how to scale them reasonably well. 

 

As far as F1 helping my goals goes, I understand that it may not be optimal. However, after summer's over, I will be engrossed in school work building up to the CIEs (Cambridge International Examinations) , and I have no clue how often I will be able to run, play or work out. I just felt that sumer would be the best time to make as much progress in F1 as possible, so I decided to go for it.

 

As of now, I will do some plyometric work twice to thrice a week (however the actual nature of football and long jump are reasonably plyometric, so I will adjust volume according to how I handle it). If I feel symptoms of overuse, or that F1 is impeding my progress in my other athletic endeavours, I will postpone my F1 work until after the tournament.

[Blairbob]

Bipocni, the OP is playing soccer not American Football. I honestly have no clue what soccers players do for S&C besides what I remember seeing them at practices in HighSchool. 

 

 

 

You can probably still manage to do any plyo work after your F1 work. When I was doing GST, I either lifted or sprinted/plyos afterwards and it was pretty doable. Other way around is tough. You could also finish your F1, carb up a bit and rest and do your running.

 

If you play soccer that much I don't see why you need to do more running unless it training for Long Jump which would mostly be sprints and plyos.

[Afiya Zia]

 

 

Bipocni, the OP is playing soccer not American Football. I honestly have no clue what soccers players do for S&C besides what I remember seeing them at practices in HighSchool.

Yep, soccer. Most of the workouts footballers do are centered around squats, deadlifts, plyos, calf raises, pull ups and benching. It's only recently that "core" work has been introduced into the sport, and it's all the rage. 

 

 

You can probably still manage to do any plyo work after your F1 work. When I was doing GST, I either lifted or sprinted/plyos afterwards and it was pretty doable. Other way around is tough. You could also finish your F1, carb up a bit and rest and do your running.

 

Yeah, I think I'll do this. I generally have a one-hour window between my F1 and when I go for training, so I'll get something to eat before. Weighted leg work I'll do probably around thrice a week, and plyos after a couple of my F1 sessions. 

 

 

If you play soccer that much I don't see why you need to do more running unless it training for Long Jump which would mostly be sprints and plyos.

 

The running is mostly fine-tuning and high-level conditioning. However, football (should I just call it soccer?  ) has given me a fantastic stamina base. For an Atheltics Meet in Karachi, I finshed 2nd in the 800m with a time of 2:41, despite being injured and having gone to the meet from a soccer practice. So the running does not tire me out tremendously.

[FREDERIC DUPONT]

How old are you?

[Afiya Zia]

I'm 14

[Blairbob]

14! Geez.

 

Yeah, soccer will build up a lot of aerobic endurance and some anaerobic endurance. I want to say in HS some of our XC/Distance runners were soccer players in fall. They were alright 400 runners (generally around 60s) with good 800 times despite focusing more on the 1 and 2 mile distance events.

 

"It's only recently that "core" work has been introduced into the sport, and it's all the rage."

 

Huh, hmm. If someone has a good squat and DL there generally is a decent core strength. I still think most "core strength" is assistance work not primary work. For a soccer player, upper body push/pull work is probably less important than lower body and core strength development.

[Afiya Zia]

Well, depending on which country the player is from (talking professional now), their workouts will focus on different things. For example, the English Premier League is extremely physical and quick, so whole-body strength and athleticism is important. Most players in the Prem are on whole-body workouts, because they need it for staying on their feet. The focus is leg strength and explosiveness, as well as the core, but upper body exercises also feature in their workouts.

[Karri Kytömaa]

I would add F1 with very low volume, just doing it once a week split over 2 or 3 days. Take it mainly as mobility work and learning the right movement patterns, not real strength training. After month or two, see how you feel and go on adding more volume. With gymnastic training, slow and steady wins the race. (And most importantly avoids injuries!)