The Summer Fitness Packet Addiction!

A few years ago I ran into a former club player who was a few months away from starting her freshman year in college at a school that will remain nameless. I asked her how things were going. She told me she had just gotten the team's fitness packet in the mail...

IT WAS 37 PAGES LONG!!!!!

She told me she was overwhelmed and didn't know where to start. It confirmed for me what I already suspected -- huge summer fitness packets are a WASTE OF TIME!

Notice I didn't say summer fitness programs are a waste of time. If you are at one of those fancy D1 schools where the players spend all summer "voluntarily" working out together with the strength coach that's a different story.

But simply emailing a packet to your players is a waste of time. So why do we do it?

I've come to believe it is an addiction that college coaches have. It makes us feel better. I realized I had a problem about 6 years ago when I was sitting at the living room table sorting hundreds of pages of a packet and using a LAMINATOR. My wife looked at me and said "you know your players probably don't even read that packet..."

She was right. I mean let's face it the only people excited about the fitness packet you put together are you and the incoming freshmen. And really freshmen are pretty much excited about everything.

We all know returning players rarely do the fitness packet. Don't believe me? Ask them! How did I find that out? A freshman called me and asked me how to do one of the workouts. She said she had called a bunch of returning players and none of them knew how either...

As with any addiction the first step is admitting you have a program...

The reality is that if it is too complicated your players won't do it.

So over the years with the help of assistant coaches and our strength coach Matt Fraze we have started to simplify our packet to the point where it is actually only about 4 pages. It includes 4 things:

Make Soccer A Priority

Player are encouraged to make soccer a priority. After all we are a soccer team. Not a running team. If they don't have a team they can play on we briefly explain how to structure small sided games so they get the most out of them. We also provide them links to technical workouts like Beastmodesoccer.com and Youtube so they can get plenty of touches. 5,000 touches per week is our goal! We also model all of these concepts all spring.

Running Workouts

A few years ago coach Fraze and I came up with a handful of running workouts that are very easy to follow and require almost no equipment. If during the summer a player contacts us to ask how to do a workout that is a red flag it is time to replace that workout. The reality is that if one player takes the time to call you to ask about the workout, there are at least 10 others that don't understand the workout, didn't call you, and didn't do the workout.

Strength Training

We give the players two strength workouts. Each is one page long. One is for those that have access to a gym. The other is for those that don't. It requires ZERO equipment. It is also great for players to take on vacation with them.

Motivation

Finally we lay out a simply point system. Targets the players can aim for each week. Each type of workout (running, playing in a soccer game, weight training) has a value. The targets are created to encourage certain types of training and take into account effective periodization.

Finally there is one more secret to our summer fitness packet that has resulted in over 90% success!