Sled pulling is excellent for rugby and will definitely help your strength and conditioning. The Prowler is an excellent sled allowing you to push and pull as well as attach ropes. Have a look at Joe De Franco's videos showing sled work.
Looking at a fixed position is a good thing to do and should have been mentioned in the video. It gives you a point of reference to ensure each rep is consistent. You need to look at a point that allows you to keep your neck in the correct alignment and to maintain your lumbar curve. This will vary from person to person and you need to experiment but the key thing wherever you look is to keep your head and neck in the correct neutral alignment.
As long as your knees track out over your toes and your back stays straight this should be fine as everyone has very different proportions so will need to adopt different stances. Shoulder width is a good general guide really.
Posterior chain seems to be everyones buzz phrase at the moment but the anterior chain is as important. Most rugby players I see also don't have strong enough quads particularly VMO so squatting this way along with Deadlifts and Powercleans for the posterior chain will produce an all round strong and powerful player.
Probably a combination of both but mainly balance. Practice squatting about 2 inches away from a wall. Facing the wall descend slowly and where you feel you will fall over if you go any further hold that position for 5-10 seconds then slowly descend a few inches again and repeat this until you reach the bottom position. Practice as often as possible each day and you should improve quite quickly. You will really feel this in any tight/weak muscles!
@EffYouAmerica another thing which is good for strength training, something i have been doing recently, is doing literally 2-4 reps, but high weight, good form etc, the form is the most important thing. Doing this on bench press, within 10 weeks of regular training i increased by one max rep from 70kg to 100kg, it definately works :D good luck man
No I am not saying you are wrong or that high bar squats are just for quads just that high bar squats are more useful in general for rugby players as they activate enough of the anterior & posterior chain for our purposes when done with deadlifts & power cleans & are easier on the shoulders than low bar - a key consideration for rugby. VMO is vastus medialis oblique - the teardrop shaped muscle of the quad on the inside aspect of the knee. Nutrition advice is very important & on our to do list!
@wizardlyfriend the only concern for low bar is that it tends to be harder on the shoulders which already take a battering in the game. I wouldn't worry too much about bio-mechanical carry over from high bar vs low bar because weightlifting is a general type training for rugby players and you can strengthen the legs in a general manner as long as it is balanced (squats, deadlifts, clean pulls) and then the rugby training (scrummaging, tackling etc) forms the specificity
Rippetoe generally suggests a mark ~2 metres in front of the lifter, thus a slight downward look. This tends to get more posterior chain recruitment and also helps keep weight back off the toes. Some great stuff in his book 'strong enough', especially about full depth squats vs half/quarter etc and where he writes that anyone who says 'full squats damage knees has no right to an opinion!' Rip doesn't pull punches or suffer fools :)
Yes it will be painful for sometimes 2 weeks when you first start but as your flexibility and posture improves from doing squats you will find this reduces dramatically. Take care not to go too heavy too quick and make sure to allow your body to adapt.
There are a lot of factors to take into account here. Improving strength and power requires very good recovery which is often difficult to achieve in season due to team training and games. How you go about this will depend on what your weight training status is (novice or intermediate), how much rugby you are playing and at what level which all affect your recovery. Be careful trying to improve your strength in season as it is very easy to overtrain which inevitably leads to injury.
Knee anatomy and correct squat technique dictate that if you reverse direction from a half squat where the ligaments are at their weakest with a load heavier than you can handle because you are limiting your range then you will end up injured. Full squats as described allow the weight to be reversed from the strongest position with the hamstrings, quads and adductors anchoring the joint. Look at any anatomy book to see this and as referenced below Kinematics of Human Motion, Zatsiorsky (1998)
This has been posted before. His feet are facing forward, hip width apart with toes angled slightly out and knees tracking over the line of the toes as they should be.
@hurock2 I'm not from the UK, so i don't play rugby, but i did squats for gridiron, it really depends on your max. Last year before season i maxed about 315 so i did 225 5-10 times, 275 3-5 times, and 315 1-3 times. This may not work for you, but make sure you stretch, and start off light and get heavier..
There are lots of bodyweight exercises you can do at home but if you have just had surgery you need a rehab programme from a sports injury therapist. I would think it would need to have been very minor surgery if you are planning playing D1 in a month.
@AshtonZac The advice you already had: that diet and recovery are important and that with building muscle increases metabolism and helps losing weight is good, but if you get yourself a skipping rope and use that regularly you'll be doing one of the most effective exercises imaginable for getting light on your feet and burning off calories. You'll start off hitting yourself in the head and tangling your feet, but before long you'll be skipping like a real man! ;)
great tutorials. but please explain the "hip drive". Ive never heard of that before when i squat. Im pretty sure i do it, but i just want to make sure in doin it right.
Google "Prilepins table" this will tell you optimal volumes for % training. You will see you have a very high volume here for 80% 1RM (assuming these are 80% from your first post) which is why you are struggling. He recommends 15 total reps (e.g. 3 sets of 5 reps) for 80 to 85% and you are doing c.32, roughly double that. Be careful though as your true max percentages can vary from workout to workout depending on fatigue etc. which will vary where you sit on these volumes.
In addition there may well be a place for half squats as I said when you have mastered technique and conditioned the muscles, tendons and ligaments to allow a full squat that is twice your bodyweight. This is much the same as high impact plyometrics which are great at building explosive ability but should not be performed until you have sufficient strength to protect your joints when they are having to absorb more than 15 times bodyweight in ground reaction forces.
Again it depends on your individual situation and goals. Most people simply are not strong enough and gain most benefit from 3 sets of 5 reps at the same weight increasing the weight by 2.5kg to 5 kg per workout. Unless you can squat over 1.5 times your bodyweight you need strength.
Different positions should have different programs no question. It all depends on the individual requirements. Strength training requires reps in the 1RM to 5RM range no matter who you are. Higher reps and volume work will actually add size not necessarily strength. As a back you need to train cleans and snatches to convert strength from Squats and Deadlifts into Power and work on sprints and agility to carry that Power over to the field.
good video, I have been doing squats for quite awhile now and have adopted a wider stance with feet more than shoulder width apart...i feel more comfortable like this and can get a deeper squat, not a bad thiing tho?
If you are a beginner your focus should be on good technique first as bad habits at this stage will be hard to remove as you progress. The simple novice progression is to start with the bar for 5 reps and as long as your technique is good add around 5kg to the bar each set until your speed slows. Stop there and use that weight for your next session for 3 sets of 5 reps and provided you complete all sets and reps with good technique add another 5kg each session.
@AshtonZac once you are comfortable with the technique 3 sets of 5 will be fine for you. Increase the weight 2.5 to 5kg each time you train and if you are off season train 3 times a week. In season probably only twice a week. Concentrate on building strength and the muscle and fat loss will come with a good diet and recovery.
really good form. Iv been doing squats for a few months now but i cant get that deep without falling backwards. Is that a lack of flexibility or poor balance?
If you're working your back more than your glutes you'd need to check your form. It means you are bent over too far in a kind of "good morning" position.
Just 1 more thing. What benefits would Sled Pulling give?? I've heard that its unreal at developing overall fitness AND building lower body muscle. cheers
You should spend about 3 hours in a gym, doing various weight lifting techniques, especially power cleans. Running short but extremely sprints will improve your muscularity and strength over-all.
Surely weight programmes vary between scrum-halfs and props. Would backs be looking to do higher reps for strenght rather than size and how do i put on weight wothout losing agility and speed?
about the head position..i always found that when i squat and deadlift looking up at a fixed position prevents me from rounding my back - is this a serious form issue do you think ? good video series btw
Seeking advice.... I'm a 18 year old flanker, but used to play prop. I can squat quite heavy i think around 180 kg for 5 reps. Should i be doing that much or should i be lowering it and making the reps higher. And would doing excercises like hamstring curls and quad extensions going to slow me down, i try and fill up my leg work out sessions with other machines, is that a bad idea?
You should stand up to full natural extension of the knees, there is no reason not to. The knee is designed to bear weight in the locked out position and move through a full range of motion. Please tell me how this will ruin your knees and what it will damage. Not locking is a common instruction for people using a leg press as when performed too fast there is a danger of hyperextension but this is a squat not a machine exercise so the same rules do not apply.
is there anything that people can do at home who dont have complex weight machines? i just had knee surgery a month ago and need to get back to D.1 form in a month
so is that you telling me that I am wrong? or just saying that you would have players perform squats for quads primarily then other exercises for the posterior chain? Whereas I go for blanket sitmulation with squats and then specify elsewhere. and what is VMO? just thought, maybe advice on nutrition for rugby players would be good too. A lot of people fail in the gym or make hindered progress because they don't get enough calories/protein.
I've started squats and have just finished my first week of them. I cant help but notice how painful the barbell is while on my traps(not sure if it is the traps, but where the bar is rested) Is this normal and will it stop?????
the reps determine what you are trainging roughly 2-4 is power 5-6 is strength and anything above 8 is building muscle assuming you going to fatigue your better off with free weights than machines, as machines dont give you strength in a usable movement if your after mass go with machines, if you want to be useful stick with squats
No half squats are more damaging to knees for so many reasons there is not enough space here to list them all. You may have heard half squats are more sport specific because they mimic the range of motion when running but this ignores the fact that 90% of players have weak hips which require full squats to build strong hamstrings, glutes and quads. If you can full squat twice your bodyweight then there may be a place in your program for half squats but most people here will not be at that stage.
rugby world, this is slightly wrong. The squat you showed was a quad dominant movement, us rugby players need more posterior chain emphasis. To get this we sit back into the squat, get right down until out hamstrings press firmly against our calves and lower our body inbetween our thighs. Doing these things allows the hamstrings and glutes to involve themselves more than in the squat you showed, and as you know these muscles are very important for power and pace.
Anyone who thinks squats are bad for the knees do not have adequate flexibility in their posterior chain i.e. glutes and hamstrings. I have had knee pain when squatting and lunging, and it has always been due to laziness on my part with stretching.
You cannot say half squats are better as that study doesn't compare half squats and full squats it solely looked at half squats in 17 elite soccer players and said there was a correlation between them and vertical jump and sprint performance. They do allow you to lift more weight but as most people cannot squat properly this is not a good thing especially when your ligaments are at their weakest in half squats and you have put even more load on - Zatsiorsky, Kinematics of Human Motion (1998).
The athletes here that actually believe that partial squatting leads to optimal muscle development for the purposes of sport are ignorant. Squatting properly (i.e. below parallel, whether you do it high or low bar) develops the glutes and hamstrings, as well as explosiveness in the hips, in a way that no other barbell exercise can. Why an athlete would not what these areas to be as strong as possible is asinine. Back to school, kiddies.
nah he is doing it right 4 rugby,too deep and he will be wasting time using muscles he'd never use in a game,half or quater squats are all you need,w/heavy weight of course
He is going too deep, bahahaha... what just because you dont often enter that specific range of motion while playing rugby there is no need to get a full range of motion? thats the dumbest thing I have ever heard. As far as power and explosiveness goes, olympic lifters are as good as it gets and they perform full squats. You have to go deep enough to fully engage the posterior chain, those muscles will not be strengthened properly otherwise.
