Aussie rules is made up of serious contests that can take their toll on players. Therefore, it is essential that every player is at elite performance for the season ahead, as this will help optimise their game whilst avoiding injury. The last thing a player should do is head out onto the pitch for the season’s first opening bounce without optimising their performance themselves for the season ahead!
With this in mind, we are going to list four AFLW performance exercises, as each one will help optimise your team’s ability for what could be a tough 2025 season:
- Speed & agility
The sport of womens footy largely relies on speed and agility to ensure players can move quickly and gain the momentum they need to take the ball into the forward 50. Therefore, the first thing players should be thinking about when it comes to performance is their agility and acceleration.
There are numerous drills that can ensure this level of speed and agility is obtained before the first bounce of the new season, including:
- Sprints
- Hill sprints
- Cone drills
- Ladder runs
Combining both sprints with ladder and cone drills is a great way to work on explosive speed as well as the agility that is essential to outmanoeuvring the opposition!
- Endurance
Aussie rules is a long and gruelling encounter. Players tough it out over 80 minutes of hard knocks, heavy sprints and high-intensity action. Therefore, their bodies must be conditioned to handle what comes at them from the very first bounce of the new season, and these drills will help achieve this:
- High-intensity interval training (HIIT)
- Beep tests
- Burpees
- Lunges
- Circuit training
By combining HIIT, circuit training and beep tests with burpees and lunges your players will work on their aerobic endurance whilst ensuring their muscles are at peak condition to withstand a heavy encounter with the opposition.
- Strength
Speaking of muscle condition, strength training has always been an absolute essential when it comes to ensuring players are at peak physical condition for the season ahead. Footy is a tough sport – we Aussies know it and we don’t shy away from the fact – but this does mean that players have to work on their strength to withstand the hard bumps and tackles that could come from some pretty tough opponents.
These exercises will help achieve this strength level:
- Bicep curls
- Deadlifts
- Lunges
- Pushups
- Squats
Combining a routine of upper and lower-body strength is essential to ensuring your players can win possession through bumps and tackles. What’s more, it also ensures that they are at peak performance when it comes to sprinting, jumping, kicking and other essential strength elements of the great Aussie game!
- Power
Players need that explosive power to not only take off in front of the opposition but to put their foot through the ball in a way that makes it soar towards the middle sticks. Therefore, there are a range of power exercises players can undertake to ensure that they are well-and-truly ahead of the opposition when it comes to this imperative Aussie rules element:
- Ball slams
- Box jumps
- Deadlifts
- Lunges
- Push press
Power plays a key role in out-performing your opposition as footy is a sport that requires plenty of explosive strength. Incorporating these power exercises into training sessions will ensure that your players have the power to outscore the opposition.
These workouts are guaranteed to help your players optimise their performance for the AFLW season ahead!