Football and soccer seasons are rapidly approaching and soon we’ll be coaching, assisting or watching our sons and daughters take to the football and soccer fields.
As we find ourselves in the middle of summer I often find it’s a great time to revisit, address, and provide some advice for some of the mistakes I’ve witness on youth fields during the past season. More times than not these mistakes are simply due to being unaware of the many updated and innovative methods that are now available to coaches at all levels. Unfortunately many of the methods that we grew up with and experienced are outdated and are often not appropriate for today’s athletes.
One element of practices and pre-game warm-ups that I often observe is the static stretching routines many novice (and sometimes experienced) coaches require their players to execute. Static stretching at the beginning of any activity can actually lead to more injuries than preventing them, and does nothing to warm the body up. It is much more appropriate to conduct an active warm-up that gets the blood flowing to all the large muscle groups and joints (shoulders, arms, upper back, mid section, hip flexors, thighs, calves, ankles, etc.). This prepares these vital body parts to be able to fire when called upon during the course of practice or competition.
Static stretching is only appropriate at the end or during an activity after the body has had a chance to actually warm-up by moving and allowing the blood to circulate. At this point the muscles, ligaments and joints are prepared to be stretched out, assisting in recovery rather than starting up.
HOW TO MOST EFFECTIVELY CONDUCT WARM-UPS
In order to begin a practice or prepare for a game, warming up is important. At the same time you don’t want to start with a low key, low energy activity that does nothing to motivate and get your team fired up and prepared. Typically warm-ups are presented in a low-key almost nonchalant fashion due to static stretching and a lack of importance placed on this portion of practice. When in fact, this may be the most important part of practice or preparation for a game.
I like to get the group moving immediately with high-energy activities that motivate the team while warming up the entire body. Preparing, choreographing, and setting up this station prior to the team’s arrival will help accomplish this goal. The following provides a sample warm-up segment for a team practice for just about any sport.
Active Warm-up – 10 Minutes Mark – off an area with cones (10yard x 10 yards)
Keys to segment: keep every athlete moving (jogging) the entire 10 minutes while incorporating free range of motion (shoulders/back/hips/thighs/ham strings)
Equipment: Tennis ball for each athlete, cones to outline 10 x 10 yard area
Elements of Warm-up:
- Jog counter clock wise around area for one lap (maintaining a good distance between each athlete)
- Ask athletes to toss tennis balls with right hand in the air above their head while keeping right arm fully extended for one full lap – then repeat for one lap with left hand – followed by tossing the ball from hand to hand with both arms fully extended above head.
- Ask athletes to backpedal while repeating above sequence of ball tosses for each lap of three total.
- Have athletes jog clockwise while rotating ball around waist for two laps, followed by rotating ball through legs in a figure 8 rotation (should keep moving without stopping) for one full lap. Repeat backpedaling with same sequence of ball rotations around back and figure 8’s through legs
- Ask athletes to roll ball with left hand about 3 feet in front of them & pick up immediately with right hand followed by picking up with left – rotating rolls and hands for one lap
6.Close the gap between athletes and ask the front jogger to roll the ball to his/her right followed by the last athlete in line retrieving the ball before it stops and running to the front of the line, repeat till everyone has retrieved a ball three times on both sides.
Follow this portion of the warm-up with small-sided (3 on 3) ultimate Frisbee games on multiple 20 x 15 yard areas, for a total of 5 minutes.
Equipment: One Football &/or Frisbee, four cones to mark off field – four additional cones to mark off
end zones
Execution: The objective is to score by catching a Football/Frisbee in a designated end zone, there are no designated positions. The Football/Frisbee can move in any direction around the field, and play is continuous. Change of possession occurs when the Football/Frisbee is thrown out of bounds, is dropped by the offense, is deflected by a defender to the ground, or after a score. When a change of possession occurs, the defense immediately goes on offense and begins play at the spot where the Football/Frisbee was dropped, thrown out of bounds, or scored in the end zone. Players may take two steps after receiving the Football/Frisbee and can transfer it only by throwing it to a teammate. The objective is to keep everyone moving, so divide your group into an even amount of teams and allow them all to play at the same time on different playing areas.
What have you accomplished?
- Every athlete is fully engaged all major muscle groups (preparing their mental as well as physical skills), and broken a sweat.
- Every athlete feels energized and excited to continue on with practice.
- A complete team activity that promotes working and preparing together is a great way to start any practice or competition.
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