By John McMahon THE business end of the Gaelic club season is reaching the pinnacle with county finals fast approaching. For those clubs that have exited the championship and their seasons have now ended, what should their focus be? The off-season brings a welcome rest from the demands of a long competitive season in GAA. […]
GAELIC games has a gruellingly long season, which includes league, championship campaigns and trial games. The body is beaten up and players are in a constant state of recovery. The in-season therefore becomes the dominant training period of the year. It is therefore imperative that players have a proper strength program in place if they want to improve/maintain […]
A brief introduction…… Let’s think back to our younger days playing Gaelic games. I often recall having a warmup to start the session (which usually consisted of a couple of laps around the pitch) followed by stretches. We would then perform a few drills for the main body of the session, with a match at […]
The Why & How…… IT’S that time of the year in the club players calendar the league is well over halfway through and the championship count down has begun. Depending on your teams’ priorities? Are you pushing for league promotion or battling relegation? These scenarios will determine your focus. However, some coaches and players at […]
By John McMahon WITHOUT doubt, the most popular topic area I have during Strength & Conditioning workshops I deliver to clubs is – What is the best way to condition our players? A few articles back I discussed how to structure your training week and monitor and manage your training loads with your teams. This […]
THE goal of training in general should be to do as much as possible, as often as possible and keep improving. Unfortunately, the reality of training is not so simple. While training does trigger positive adaptations and benefits performance in the long-term, this comes at the price of the breakdown of the body and impaired […]
HAVING spent years as a strength & conditioning coach/consultant working with Gaelic players, coaches and organisations, the most common problem area I have observed and encountered is the transition from the pre-season phase to the in-season phase (competitive games). The key questions have been how many times a week should we train? What session fits best […]
