Best_fullback's Training Blog 2.0

[best_fullback]

Welcome to best_fullback's training blog 2.0!

Hello and welcome to my training blog 2.0! Those unfamiliar with my old blog back from 2009, charting my course to try and become a fly-half after years of being labelled as the cursed 'utility back', can access it here. This is my training blog in which I will chronicle my training routine to hopefully help people here on TRF! So here is my general goal:

The Aim: After now finishing university and having not played Rugby Union for nearly 2 years (did have one season playing League), I am absolutely itching to get back into playing again. The general aim is still the same from the previous blog: to play as a fly-half. However, since completing the last blog the transitional issues are no longer as important as they were. Because of this, I intend to focus on fitness and weight training to get me back up to the level of fitness I was at before I finished playing, as well as doing more in-depth analysis of the fly-half game including general kicking, goal kicking and all other facets of play.

Whats in it for you: I will be writing frequent entries to the blog to gain insight into my training, I will hope you can offer constructive feedback also. I will be posting the up the gym routines I am doing, training sessions and drills, reviews of drills and equipment, my nutrition as well as detailed results over the course of the training. Hopefully this will help in decisions for training and choices you make in pre-season leading up to the coming season.

Here are my vital stats:
Age: 21
Weight: 150.8lb (10.8st/68.4kg)
Height: 5'9'' (175cm)

Unlike the last blog I will now be including a contents section below with links to every entry I make, so you now won't have to scroll through page after page to find a relevant entry. I hope anyone reading finds the blog helpful and informative, and please feel free to leave any comments or questions!

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Contents
Entry 1: Getting back into the swing...

[TRF_Olyy]

Wehey!

*thread stickied*

[lucky number 7]

Wehey!

*sticky*

That's disgusting ....

[TRF_Olyy]

That's disgusting ....

I already said I was excited


But I, of course, meant that I'd stuck this thread to the top of the forum

[Amobokoboko]

Cool, good luck with your mission. Curious to see your work out, maybe we can use some of the valuable info.

[best_fullback]

As I walked out onto my local pitch to practice, it was like stepping back two years in an instant. The grass with dandelions poking through, clearly wearing the pre-season ‘I-haven’t-been-cut-in-weeks’ shagginess, epitomised by the turfs of long grass spouting from the bases of the posts; the sound of children playing in the nearby school; Border Collies running on the neighbouring cricket wicket and pairs of Hercules streaking through the sky from RAF Lynham. This is what I love about coming and training – being alone, in a peaceful surrounding so I can focus.

That was until I kicked my first ball. My god was I rusty!

To make things clear: I never intended my first kicking session to be anything more than just feeling my way back into kicking slowly, without any structured routine. As many who may have read my previous blog may remember, I started out there in a similar way. I began kicking without posts on a grass running track, simply aiming to land the ball in the same lane I was kicking from regardless of the distance I got on the kick. Once accuracy is established, then you can work on your distance. So as far as I was concerned, as long as I was kicking the ball in the general direction I wanted it to go, then this session would be a success.

I want to focus on talking about the specific elements of goal kicking in more depth in this blog, and really pin-point fundamental technique points, breaking down the whole process in a similar way that you may find when going to a golf lesson. In that respect, swinging a golf club and taking a kick at goal are not mutually exclusive. They both require you to perform the individual processes correctly but you have a massive amount of control over the outcome. If you can repeatedly condition yourself to hit a golf ball in the same way, then you will know that when you get onto the course you will be able to hit it in exactly the same way with the same outcome (give or take the elements!). Those mini-articles will be appearing soon, so keep an eye out for them!

In the meantime, to wet your appetites, here is an incredibly good video from Total Rugby with Dave Alred helping an amateur player improve his goal kicking:

The video gives some great discussion on some of the most basic problems a lot of self-taught goal kickers encounter. Well worth a watch for any budding goal kickers out there.

Getting back to the first session, it went pretty well. I started by doing some extra long stretching since I haven’t been kicking in at least a year, or played competitive sport in a while. I then went on by doing simple end-over-end punts up and down the length of the pitch with my three balls, simply focusing on getting the ball to strike out of the sweet spot of my foot and follow through the ball nicely. I didn’t focus on hitting the ball too hard, but simply have a smooth action that felt relaxed. I also find by not trying to hit the ball too hard you really recognise if you are hitting the ball off the wrong part of your foot, something you don’t necessarily notice if you are hitting the ball as hard as you can, because the ball simply goes nowhere. I also hit a few spiral kicks, but the less said about them, the better.

I then focused on goal kicking for about an hour. As with punting, I simply wanted to come away knowing that I was hitting be ball correctly and in the right general area. I was not fussed about whether it necessarily went through the posts or not. I immediately encountered problems. One of my last posts in the previous blog was to do with the importance of being comfortable making modifications to your technique to increase consistency, if needed. I previously used this kicking tee:

However, upon returning to kick with it I thought the ball was sat incredibly high up. Even when I reduced the telescopic section to its lowest, the ball still seemed to be too high. I persevered, and the kicking seemed very awkward. I wasn’t pacing out my run up, but simply taking as many steps back as felt comfortable and running up, kicking the ball, and trying to transfer my weight through it effectively. The problem was that, as strange as it may sound, the placement of the ball didn’t feel natural and it felt like I was having to make conscious adjustments to compensate for the height the ball was at. Kicks were going high, low, left, right, up, down. You name it, it went there. And I kept kicking the tee.

So I tried a different tact. Having played quite a bit of football since I had given up playing Rugby, I thought I would dig a small indent with my studs and try kicking the ball stood upright straight off the deck. Wow. It was an unbelievable success. Again (sorry if I keep going on about it) but if you read the last blog, you will have read that I used to hate using tees that placed the ball upright such as this:

I think I said it was because I struggled to get height on the ball after contact, but the same was in no way true now. I was striking the ball sweetly, and getting good distance even without kicking the ball 100%. I must have easily slotted 2/3 of the following kicks using this method so I was chuffed. Fortunately my mum arrived at the pitch about 20 minutes after I was getting into the swing of it to pick me up (my car is broken!) and caught me kicking well! She was happy for me in the standard motherly ‘Oooh thats good’ way that accompanies anything positive, though I wasn’t 100% sure she was totally listening.

This means my shopping list now contains:
1 x Flat kicking tee

On that note, does anyone have any comments to make on flat kicking tees that they own? Any good ones I should know about?

I have my eye on this one used by Dan Carter (if he uses it, it must be OK!):

Anyway, for now, that is all I have in regards of my training, but more will be up soon + some articles to do with kicking that I mentioned before. Hope you had fun reading! Please feel free to leave comments or questions and I will get back ASAP.

Cheers guys!

[Dutchrugby]

It's nice to hear that you're first training after more then a year felt good. A few weeks ago I started again after a 1 year break due to study so I know how it feels! It's funny to read you switched from a high tee to a low one. I switched from a low, vertical ball placement to a somewhat higher, diagonal ball placement. One of the things I've learned is that every kicker is unique and is comfortable with a different tee, ball placement and run up. One more thing: you've posted that video before haven't you? It's great because of the simple, but very effective tips & tricks, thanks. Good luck with training, I have subscribed to this thread

[best_fullback]

It's nice to hear that you're first training after more then a year felt good. A few weeks ago I started again after a 1 year break due to study so I know how it feels! It's funny to read you switched from a high tee to a low one. I switched from a low, vertical ball placement to a somewhat higher, diagonal ball placement. One of the things I've learned is that every kicker is unique and is comfortable with a different tee, ball placement and run up. One more thing: you've posted that video before haven't you? It's great because of the simple, but very effective tips & tricks, thanks. Good luck with training, I have subscribed to this thread

Yeah I posted it on another thread to do with goal kicking I think!

Yes the change has surprised me too, but I think it may have something to do with kicking a football off the deck. You never know though, soon I may figure that standing it up isn't working for me, and change back to the 45 degree telescopic tee which I know I had prior success with.

Thank you for subscribing! Hope you find it entertaining/informative/useful!

[Amobokoboko]

Nicely written.
I do however have a little question, hopefully you or the other members could help me out.
I kick much more accurate with my trainers then when wearing boots.

Any advice on that?

Cheers

[best_fullback]

Nicely written.
I do however have a little question, hopefully you or the other members could help me out.
I kick much more accurate with my trainers then when wearing boots.

Any advice on that?

Cheers

Hmm I'm not too sure whether I can give you a good answer to that, but I know what you mean. I have friends who have the same preference.

I similarly like to play football in bare-feet if I am playing on the beach or very short grass because I get a better feel of the ball in my touch that I feel I sometimes lose wearing trainers.

I would ask firstly: what boots do you wear? Also, do you have the large metal rugby studs in them?

If not, I don't really know what to suggest other than just always practice in your boots so that you become accustomed to them. Your accuracy shouldn't just abandon you because you have changed your footwear.

I hope this helps!

[Amobokoboko]

Cheers mate, my trainers are Adidas or Asics and they have a wide top.
My boots are Adidas Predator ( the black and blue ones) with a narrow top. I don't need to kick a lot. Mostly a chop kick. But it's one of the skills I would like to invest in.

[jb12780]

Nice to see the training is off to a good start. As for the flat tees, I am using a Gilbert 320, which I like very much. I also enjoy kicking the football around, so like you, I am used to kicking the ball off the deck. However, I have contemplated getting a telescopic tee, with the mindset that if using a higher tee doesn't yield results, I can always go back to the low tee.