As a football player, to effectively play, it requires strength, endurance, catching, throwing and, of course, speed.
There’s obviously a lot of running involved in football, after all, there are moments when a player is going to throw the ball really far, what do you do there?
Run of course. Run as fast as possible to be able to reach and catch the ball.
But to reach that kind of speed, you’ll need to specifically train on your footwork, so, here are some tips on which you can improve your speed and run faster than Forrest Gump:
- Have a balanced exercise routine. It’s important to have a specific exercise routine so you can focus on your footwork. You should focus on exercises that help you work on speed training drills, dynamic explosive strength and maximum effort gym work. For this, you have to do it every week, but you must also constantly change the exercises, sets and reps as your body can adapt quite fast. After you feel that your body has adapted to the amount of sets of the exercise, increase the reps so that you continue to challenge your body and continue like that onwards.
- Work your lower-body muscles. If you want to get faster, the most vital muscles that you have to work on are the glutes, lower back, obliques, hamstrings and abs. If you constantly exercise those muscles, you will increase your strength, which will also help you increase your speed when running.
- Arm action. Obviously, you run with your feet and legs, but many people ignore the importance of the arms when sprinting. If you move your arms fast, so will your legs. Technically however, when running, the shoulders should be what you move while your hands and elbows are in a locked position. The arms should move in a semicircular way while bringing the hands from cheek to cheek to the rear of the hip.
- Proper technique. Make sure you sprint correctly in order to be more efficient at it, and an excellent way to do it, is to learn the proper technique. Things such as drills, warm-up exercises and scrimmages and everything else that you do, you should always do them correctly and learn the actual technique in doing so.
- Train fast. High-speed drills, that’s the way to go here. Obviously, if you want to get faster, then do some speed training, which includes explosive drills and short sprints. Running miles isn’t exactly speed training, focus on doing acceleration drills, weight lifting and short sprints.
- Do jump training. Doing plyometrics, or jump training, is also important as it trains your muscles to “fire” rapidly. Another thing it helps your body to do is to absorb elastic energy and release it. Overall, jumping can enhance your speed.
- Focus on all levels of speed. For this, you need a complete speed training program, which includes exercises focused on agility, coordination, speed, reaction and strength. You must train all of these aspects regularly, for that, you can do short sprints, weight lifting, as well as balance and reaction drills.
Train like that, and you’ll become a fast football player. But remember, know your limits, don’t over train either as you’ll just damage your body. You still need to train hard, must wear football uniforms but also give your body chance to recover.
