How To Train For Speed

Here you are and you find yourself wishing to out run your competitors and you have no idea how to go about doing it. Believe it or not, speed is something that can be developed.  Developing speed to play soccer well is much different than developing speed for track or cross country running.

Why is this the case?  It is, because you must develop various types of speed, not neccesarily the type speed you would use in a race.

There are three types of speed which you must develop:

Thought Speed
You must think fast on your feet to adapt to changing circumstances and make your feet and body react at a blistering pace.  

You need to be running and thinking at the same time. How to feign a move, how to create space between you and an opponent, where to position yourself, who to pass the ball to, whether you should shoot, pass or dribble the ball. The number of decisions that must be made until the game ends are astronomical.

Thinking speed can be developed with a good soccer trainer and by playing lots of soccer. At some point in your play, these decisions will become automatic and can be done with little thought given to them at all.

Acceleration Speed
Acceleration speed is crucial to play good youth soccer. You need to be able to turn on the speed very quickly if your competitors are closing in on you. This sudden change in your speed catches your competitors off their guard and can confuse or leave them flat footed in your wake.  Even more so if you have a change in direction along with the speed.

You can develop acceleration speed, by developing in your entire lower body, from the legs to the abs. Weight training with squats, lunges, stiff legged dead lift and calf raises are very good places to start.  Developing these muscle also allow you to jump higher when going for a header.

Quick Starts - Quick Turns  High Interval Intensity training and    speed running up slopes will also   help you to develop powerful  acceleration speed as well as building  up your endurance and power.

Turning Speed
To turn yourselves quickly and you feign quickly you have to possess strong core muscles.

To develop effective core muscles try crunches and side crunches. Do them slowly and with deliberation, compessing them hard with every contraction.

If you develop the muscle groups mentioned above you will have a head start on being a great asset to your team.  Of course if you mix speed conditioning with developing your ball skills and "game sense," you will be a great player!

If you want to know more about this subject however, you can start at this web page about speed and agility.