Top 3 ways to condition Linemen- not what you think!!

***Top Three Alert***

Offensive Line Conditioning

Conditioning Offensive Line and Defensive athletes is harder than you may think. Naïve people think that you can condition and OL athlete just like a skill position, but they couldn’t be more wrong. Skill positions run a very long distance on most plays without must strain. OL and DL athletes run short distances with a lot of strain. We as strength coaches must know this information and use it to execute the training program! Here are our 3 favourite ways to Condition OL and DL athletes.

Tire Flipping

This is a great way to get Big Football Athletes CNS going. Twenty seconds of tire flipping is a perfect amount of time to get them firing on all cylinders! This is a great way to develop strength and conditioning in the lower back which is very important for hand down athletes. One note for this is when they flip the tire they need to sprint around it so they are working at 100% the whole rep.

Banded Runs

This is easily one of my favourite ways to condition big boys. I like to keep the distance short, 10 to 15 yards maximum. Put a resistance band around their waste and make them work. 60-70 percent resistance is the perfect amount. Tell the athletes to start out of their stance and the fly. With OL what I like to do is start on a “Zone Track” then make them run after the fact.

Jumping

I can’t even begin to tell you how important this is. The name of the game in the trenches is all about who can apply more force through the ground to move laterally and vertically, with strength. Jumping teaches us this perfectly. You can train it numerous amounts of ways, box jumps, bounding really anything where you are getting lift! This really teaches them the importance of bend in their legs and where power comes from along with the conditioning.

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