Soccer, or football as the rest of the world calls it, is far more than just the most popular sport on the planet – it’s a religion and the World Cup is their biggest, most sacred holiday. In today’s post we pay homage to the World Cup by offering up a few soccer inspired workout tips because, aside from being a way of life for most people, soccer also offers a fantastic, total body workout.

To be a World Cup level superstar, your workout routine needs to focus on four key things;

1. Endurance
   The average length of a soccer match is usually over 90 minutes, pair that with a large field, rare substitutions and a swiftly moving ball and you’re putting on a lot of miles. A soccer player runs an average of 7 miles throughout the course of every match – that’s more than what basketball and tennis players run. Even the sport’s referees have to be in peak cardio shape, they’re required to pass a fitness test! That much running with intermittent bursts of sprint speed leads to significant lactic acid build up. A build up of lactic acid beyond our body’s threshold results in fatigue. Pro soccer athletes counter this by training with a longer duration at a lower intensity and working up from there.
2. Explosive Speed
   Soccer requires intermittent, explosive bursts of speed and power on the fly. One of the best ways to build explosive speed to help propel you down the field like a rocket to goal winning victory – plyometrics. Here’s one to get you started:

   Jump Running
   
   It’s like running in ‘slow motion’ landing on alternate feet. The goal of this exercise is to try to achieve as much height and distance with each stride as possible. For every strike of your left foot and right foot, count one repetition.

3. Powerful Legs
   You play soccer with your legs, having those bad boys and girls in tip-top shape is pretty important. When training your legs, you should keep two goals in mind – prevent injury and increase explosiveness. To protect the integrity of your ankles, knees and hips, you’ll want to strengthen the stabilizing muscles around those joints. Great ways to do this is with one-leg exercises (such as a one leg squat) on the ground or on stability pads.  For explosive power, good old fashion Olympic lifts such as hang cleans and push presses are perfect for developing hip, hamstring and glute strength.
4. Core Strength
   You might not think it, but core strength is one of the most important muscle groups for any soccer player. The image below should help back this claim.
   
   You could do some serious laundry on those abs! In soccer, the hip/core complex is the base of power for your goal scoring kicks.

For more World Cup worthy training tips and getting a killer soccer pro body to show off at the beach, take advantage of your free personal training consult! One of our qualified personal trainers will help assess your starting point and build you a custom plan to achieve your training gooooooooooals!

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