Article title: Effect of preseason concurrent muscular strength and high-intensity interval training in professional soccer players.
Authors: P. Wong, A. Chaouachi, K. Chamari, A. Dellal and U. Wisloff.
Source: Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research 24, 653-600
Background:
Football is full of explosive activities such as jumping, kicking, tackling, turning, sprinting and changing pace. Maximal muscular strength is highly related with the performance of the above actions. The two ways of increasing muscular strength are: muscular hypertrophy and neural adaptation. Increases in hypertrophy will result in greater body mass which is not ideal for the player, on the other hand neural adaptation enhances muscular strength by recruiting more muscle fibers with minimal body mass increase. Also since in football the players run 8 to 12 km in 90 minutes on average, traditionally prolonged continuous exercise has been used to improve aerobic endurance. Since research has showed that during a match carbohydrate oxidization was 1.2 times higher and fat was 3 times lower when compared to continuous exercise intermittent training (HIIT) protocols have been developed to cope with game specific energy requirements.
Aim: To examine the effect of 8 weeks of preseason concurrent muscular strength and high-intensity running interval training on professional soccer players’ explosive performances and aerobic endurance.
Methods:
Muscular strength training:
High-Pull
Jump Squat
Bench Press
Back Half Squat
Chin-up
6RM x 4 sets with 3 minutes rest
Plyometric Sit Up throwing a 3kg medicine ball 15reps x 3sets
High Intensity Interval Training:
15 seconds work period over a predetermined distance using MAS. After a 15 seconds passive rest they ran the opposite direction for 15 seconds. This was repeated for 16 times.
The sessions of both protocols were performed twice a week. Most importantly was that no differences were observed in body mass or body mass index.
Results:
After 8 weeks:1RM Back Half Squat mean increased from 123kg to 148kg (+25kg p≤ 0.05)
1RM Bench Press mean increased from 65.3kg to 70.4kg (+5.1kg p≤ 0.05)
Vertical Jump Increase (+2.5cm p≤ 0.05)
10m Sprint (-0.11 seconds p≤ 0.05)
30m Sprint (-0.12 seconds p ≤0.05)
YYIRT (YoYo Intermittent Recovery Test) (+298m p≤0.05)
MAS (Maximal Aerobic Speed) (+0.5km•h-1 p≤0.05)
These results are reflecting the improvement when compared to the same tests results done before the intervention. Also a higher percentage of improvement in the same results were shown when compared to a control group.
Practical implications for the coach: During the preseason period, strength and conditioning specialists can concurrently use muscular strength training and high-intensity interval running to enhance professional soccer players’ explosive performances and intermittent and continuous aerobic endurance. Specifically to minimize the interference effect of the aforementioned concurrent training modes, high load and less repetition (6RM for 4 sets, 3minutes rest between sets) are recommended in muscular strength training to stress the neural adaptation and to avoid muscle hypertrophy for football players. Furthermore high-intensity interval running for 15:15 seconds (120% of maximal aerobic speed and passive recovery) could be used to effectively improve aerobic endurance. High-intensity interval running is a time efficient training method that enhances aerobic capacity as compared to traditional continuous aerobic endurance training.
This article selected by Sports Performance – N.M for its importance and impact it can have on an entire football squad. Please follow the page on Facebook for further updates.
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