Foss is Boss: 6 Week Preseason Workout Plan

Training

January 9th, 2015

For most of us we are 6 weeks from the start of the spring season.  If you haven’t started to prepare don’t stress.  I am going to give you a fool-proof 6-week plan to get in the best shape possible.  If you have been regularly training I hope this will give you some new ideas to add to your program.

Start each lifting session with a proper warm up.  First, complete a half mile warm up on the track or on the treadmill.  This should be at a comfortable speed with the goal of increasing core body temperature and heart rate. Then get some soft tissue work using a foam roller, medicine ball, or lacrosse ball.  This will increase range of motion by lengthening tight muscles and decrease soreness in high stressed areas.  If you’re not sure what is tight you can never go wrong with the calves, hamstrings, glutes, IT band, and pecs/anterior shoulder.  Next, do a movement prep warm up using 5-6 bodyweight exercises such as squats, lunge variations, deadlifts, etc.  The ideal is you are increasing mobility while warming up your body for the movements you are going to do during the strength training.  Lastly, do some bodyweight core work such as planks, side planks, hip bridges, superman, v-sits, etc.  There are a million variations of these exercises and athletes should progress the difficulty rather than time.  Shoot for 3 exercises for 2 sets of 45 seconds with 15 second of rest in between.  In total, the entire warm up should take you no more than 30 minutes.

Strength Training will be done on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday with Wednesday being a complete rest day.  The first part of the training will focus on bilateral compound movements.  The compound movements will consists of Squats on Monday and Deadlifts on Thursday for lower body.  Bench press would be done on Tuesday and Pull Ups on Friday for upper body.  Week #1 and #2 you would do 3 sets of 12, 10, and 8 reps.  Week #3 and #4 you would do 4 sets of 6 reps.  Weeks #5 and #6 you would do 5 sets of 3 reps.  As the volume of reps decrease, the load should increase.  These compound movements will be superset with plyometric movements such as squat jumps, broad jumps, MB press, MB slams.  The plyometrics exercises should be done for 3 sets of 5 reps with max effort.  The second part of the training will focus on unilateral auxiliary movements.  These auxiliary movements aid in strengthening the smaller synergistic muscles that assists in the compound movements.  Examples of these movements would be single leg dead lifts, lunges, DB rows, and DB bench press.  These exercises should be done for 3 sets of 10 reps per side.  The entire strength training portion should take you 45 minutes.

Following the strength training, athletes would do speed training on Monday/Thursday following their lower body day.  The speed training should consist of agility for 10 minutes, sprint work for 10 minutes, and conditioning for 10 minutes.  Agility drills can be done using dot mats, ladders, and hurdles.  Sprints would be done doing linear work on Monday and lateral work on Thursday for a total of 400 yards.  For example, 10 x 40 yard sprints or 4 x 100 yards sprints for linear sprints.  For lateral work you could do the 10 x 20/20 yards (40 yards) or 10 x 50/50 yards (100 yards). Conditioning should be done for a total of 1 ½ miles whether that is sprint/jogs, straight running, shuttle runs, etc.

Lacrosse skills would be done on Tuesday/Friday following their upper body day.  Wall ball or partner passing (100 left handed/100 right handed) for 10 minutes.  The next 20 minutes would be position specific drills such as dodging & shooting for offense, angles and slides for defense, and outlets and live shots for goalies.

The last 15 minutes would be spent doing a cool down static stretch and soft tissue work on any tight areas.  Make sure you take this time to really stretch to decrease soreness and injury.  Finish your work with 16 oz. of chocolate milk, a peanut butter & jelly sandwich, or a protein shake within 30-45 minutes.

I hope this helps everyone get a good game plan together and have a successful and injury-free spring season!