Football Pre-Season guide
The 1st step in designing a Pre-Season is to determine the length of this period. Typically, the Pre-Season period ranges from 3-8 weeks. Then the length of each phase of the Pre-season is adjusted while considering the athletes level and team needs.
Stage 1: Gradually introduce athletes back to training. Develop game specific capacity.
Stage 2: Gradually increase intensity. Develop the ability to perform repeated high intensity actions.
Stage 3: Further increase in intensity while providing adequate recovery. Improve actions’ quality.
Stage 4: Expose athletes to typical in season micro-cycle while using a progressive overload approach. Work on team and individual needs.
After establishing the objective of each phase, the next step is to organise the weekly structure of training. When organising the weekly structure during pre-season it is important to have in mind the friendly-games schedule and the need for recovery/underload sessions. Typically, 2-4 football conditioning sessions occur during the week. Underload session can be used to aid recovery and prepare athletes for the next phase of pre-season. At the early stages of pre-season were players have game exposure for 45-60 minutes only they may not require 2 days to fully recover, therefore athletes may be able to perform an extensive moderate type session instead of recovery. It is essential to monitor training readiness before making these kind of decisions as although the game exposure might be low, the fitness and capacity level of athletes might also be low at that point.
Below is an example of a generic 6-wee pre season plan:
Do note that this is a plan example and it cannot be applied to any scenario and does not guarantee success. It’s just a visual representation of how progressive overload can be applied in a period of 6 weeks during pre-season using training blocks.
Things to have in mind when designing a pre-season plan:
📆 Duration of each stage can vary from 1 to 3 weeks and is adjusted based on competition schedule athletes’ level and team needs.
📈 Remember, players are coming from holidays so take it easy at the beginning.
📊 Determining a suitable starting point of training workload along with appropriate application of progressive overload are key to a successful pre-season.
🛌 Never underestimate the importance of recovery during the pre-season period.
🗝 Quality > Quantity