In-Season Strength Training for Team Sport Athletes

In-season strength training keeps the speed, power and strength you built in the off-season. It also keeps you on the field. Players who stop lifting once games start often feel slower by midseason, just when the games matter most.

The good news is that maintenance takes far less work than building. This guide covers how often to lift, how much to do, and where to place sessions around matches in soccer, basketball, rugby, hockey and other team sports.

Why you should keep lifting during the season

Your off-season gains are not permanent. Without a stimulus, strength and sprint speed start to drift down within weeks.

A study of professional soccer players tested this directly. After a 10-week preseason block, one group lifted once per week in season and the other lifted once every two weeks. The weekly group kept their gains in strength, 40-metre sprint and jump height over the first 12 weeks. The every-other-week group lost leg strength and sprint speed (Rønnestad et al., 2011).

Lifting in season also protects you. A meta-analysis of 25 trials with 26,610 participants found that strength training reduced sports injuries to less than one third of the control rate (Lauersen et al., 2014).

There is a performance payoff late in the year too. Teams play their biggest games at the end of the season. If you keep lifting, you arrive at the playoffs with the same strength you had in week one, while opponents who stopped have lost some of theirs.

The minimum dose that keeps your gains

The key variable is intensity, not volume. You can cut sets and sessions sharply, as long as the weight on the bar stays heavy.

A review by the US Army Research Institute of Environmental Medicine looked at the minimum dose needed to maintain fitness. In younger adults, strength and muscle size held for up to 32 weeks with as little as one session per week and one set per exercise, when relative load stayed the same. Endurance held when volume dropped by 33-66%, as long as intensity stayed high (Spiering et al., 2021).

"Our primary conclusion is that exercise intensity seems to be the key variable for maintaining physical performance over time, despite relatively large reductions in exercise frequency and volume."

Spiering, Mujika, Sharp and Foulis, Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research (2021), PubMed 33629972

For a team sport athlete, that translates into simple rules:

• Frequency: 1-2 sessions per week. One is the floor; two is better in long seasons.
• Volume: About half of your off-season sets. Two or three working sets per main lift.
• Intensity: Keep loads at 80-90% of 1RM for 3-5 reps, or RPE 7-8.
• Duration: 30-45 minutes, including the warm-up.

What to include in an in-season session

Keep the menu short. Each session should cover one lower-body strength lift, one power movement, one upper-body push or pull, and one injury-prevention exercise.

Core lifts

• Trap bar deadlift or back squat. Heavy lower-body strength. 2-3 sets of 3-5 reps.
• Bench press, push press or chin-up. Upper-body strength for contact and contests. 2-3 sets of 4-6 reps.
• Rear-foot elevated split squat. Single-leg strength. 2 sets of 5-6 per leg.

Power work

• Jump squat, box jump or medicine ball throw. 3 sets of 3-5 reps with full recovery. Keep reps crisp and stop before speed drops.

Injury prevention

• Nordic hamstring curl. A meta-analysis of 8,459 athletes found that programs including this exercise cut hamstring injuries by up to 51% (van Dyk et al., 2019). Do 2 sets of 3-5 reps.
• Copenhagen plank. Groin strength for cutting sports. 2 sets of 20-30 seconds per side.

Where to place sessions around games

Timing matters more in season than in any other phase. The goal is to lift when you have recovered from the last game and still have time to recover before the next one.

One game per week

1. Game day (MD). Play.
2. MD+1. Recovery: mobility, light bike, soft tissue work.
3. MD+2. Main strength session: heavy lower body, upper body and Nordics.
4. MD+3. Team practice.
5. MD-3. Short power session: jumps, throws, one heavy set of the main lift.
6. MD-2 and MD-1. Practice only. No heavy legs in the 48 hours before kickoff.

Two games per week

Lift once, on the day after the recovery day. Cut it to 20-30 minutes: one lower-body lift, one upper-body lift, and Nordics. Skip the power session. The games already supply plenty of sprinting and jumping.

Bench players and limited minutes

Players who see few minutes can keep closer to off-season volume. Add a second full session on MD+1, since the game itself was not a heavy load for you.

Common mistakes to avoid

• Dropping the weight instead of the sets. Light loads fail to maintain strength. Keep the bar heavy and cut volume.
• Stopping for weeks at a time. Lifting every other week was not enough in the soccer study. Hold the weekly floor.
• Training to failure. Leave 2-3 reps in reserve so you leave the gym fresh for practice.
• Adding new exercises midseason. Unfamiliar lifts cause soreness. Use movements you trained in the off-season.

Build it in the free builder

You can build your in-season plan in a few minutes with the free program builder. Enter:

• Your sport and your position.
• Your phase: in-season.
• Your game days and practice days for a typical week.
• The number of gym sessions you can fit: one or two.

The builder places each session around your games and sets the loads and reps. For a ready-made option, browse the starter programs and choose the in-season plan for your sport.