An Introduction

Hi there to everyone, those who know me and those who don’t. This is my first blog post of what I would hope will be many. The purpose of the blog is to try and help ordinary Gaelic Footballers and Hurlers (and others) to learn more about physical conditioning. I will be particularly focusing on practical ways of getting strong, flexible and faster without spending a fortune and without spending hours traipsing through the Internet looking for advice and/or programs and even longer time in the gym or out on the roads. Many of the websites out there, while impressive and full of info, are actually too full and intimidating for an ordinary bloke or lady to read through and understand. What happens is many dip in and out of programs without actually knowing what they are doing, what their goal was or is and just jumping from one to another risking poor performance or worse injury. There are certain things a Footballer can take from MMA or Powerlifting Weight Training or from a Sprinters Track Program, but seeing as Gaelic Football is such a diversely challenging sport physically we probably need to take bits and pieces from them all, while keeping our own basic fundamentals very much to the fore front of our minds.

As I say in my bio I don’t espouse myself to be an expert, I am someone with certain qualifications, massive passion and tremendous drive to be a better coach, a better physical trainer and to be a healthier and fitter person myself. I don’t work with elite athletes day in day out, and to be honest I may not be as much use to you guys if i did as most of the people I am hoping to reach are amateur Gaelic Footballers, Hurlers, Boxers, Soccer & Rugby Players. But i have seen up close how pro's train and how some of it is so easily transfer without a lot of bother. Maybe some day I will work with elite athletes, but for now I’m just trying to learn from them and their coaches and transfer that knowledge as best I can to you guys while using my own extensive experience with working with Amateur sportspeople in Ireland, but also in USA & Australia. I want to help with programs and program design that will fit into peoples lives, not the other way around. Some of the training promoted on some sites would have guys doing absolutely ridiculous training far too often. You have to train hard, but also train smart and specifically.

I really want to encourage discussion and questioning. I may not have all the answers, but I’ll try and get to the bottom of any issues we may struggle with.

It must be realized that any Strength & Conditioning Coach needs to spend time with the Athletes and I won’t be giving out any programs to people individually without meeting them and going through the normal testing procedures. I live in Australia right now so for the guys in Ireland ye’ll have to wait. But that doesn’t mean you can’t learn from this site, and challenge people who tell you silly things like “weights slow you down”, “all you need is a football for football training” or make statements like “he’d be better off out kicking the ball around than be in a gym”. There is so much crap associated with the attitude to S&C in GAA its hard to believe it still exists, but it does against all published Sports Science. I would hope this site could also help coaches or prospective coaches and help them learn a bit more, but also help plan their seasons and sessions. I will also be looking in time at technical Football work as well as the psychological side to the game.

One final thing, I am constantly testing Sports Science and Exercise myself, there isn’t an exercise or a program you’ll see go up here that I haven’t done and evaluated myself and/or with any athletes I work with. As I say I have studied my chosen subjects and I continue to study, I also read extensively both through book and online and try to keep the good stuff and dump the bull shit!

I really want to encourage discussion and provide information. For too long I kept my mouth shut in relation to training and everything that goes with it. Ask the simple obvious questions, they need to be asked. I remember asking an old coach (debatable name for him) “Why are we running 6 sets of full belt (lets say 85-90% MHR) 6 Min runs around in a circle when the average passage of play in football is less than one minute and Football is a multi sprint sport?”. The answer “Because we have to be fitter than everyone else” (we clearly didn’t have enough skill was the view I suppose). No science there, no football there either. It wasn’t that the reason wasn’t good enough, it was a decent reason to train hard, but there was a better way, and I knew it. Now I would still have people run medium-long distance to improve aerobic conditioning and some of these runs would be longer than 6 minutes, but they would be at a lower pace and probably only 2-3 sessions a month. These were runs we did almost every night we trained!!! You can see where I’m going with it.

I wasn’t impressed with the answer, but got on with it, and sure enough got injured. I had put my head down and worked hard and it backfired, i want others to avoid this situation. Ask questions, and ask for reasons. I don’t mind changing my mind if someone can give me a good enough reason to do so.

Talk again soon.