Who's faster?

[flaming]

Professional rugby players or football(soccer) players?

Considering most of football is sprinting no further than 50yds why arent the players looking bigger these days.

Even the tennis players seam to have started training to increase there strength.

[Ad McG]

Football is a more aerobic sport. Although there are obvious sprint intervals during the game, most of the time is often spent walking or jogging. Players need decent aerobic fitness to cover 10km+ per game, especially midfielders. Rugby players tend to need a lot more power as it is more of a contact sport. While a bigger football player will have an advantage in strength, the skill lies more in applying strength in football rather than just being big - see Rooney or Drogba. Neither are particularly massive but both are often stronger than opposing defenders. Rugby needs more brute force and size to bring opponents down and to power through defending players. Football players do require a good amount of strength but it is better to keep the weight down a bit. Personally I would like to see many players with an additional 10-30lbs to benefit their game without losses in aerobic capacity. Football players definitely need a lot more skill and real game training rather than strength training as the best players are always the most skilled, regardless of strength. In rugby it takes more power and speed to pass an opponent, in football it takes more a combination of skill and speed rather than brute strength. They do train to increase strength but IMO their training is way behind some other sports in this department, even though they do have to keep the volume down.

[flaming]

Football is a more aerobic sport. Although there are obvious sprint intervals during the game, most of the time is often spent walking or jogging. Players need decent aerobic fitness to cover 10km+ per game, especially midfielders. Rugby players tend to need a lot more power as it is more of a contact sport. While a bigger football player will have an advantage in strength, the skill lies more in applying strength in football rather than just being big - see Rooney or Drogba. Neither are particularly massive but both are often stronger than opposing defenders. Rugby needs more brute force and size to bring opponents down and to power through defending players. Football players do require a good amount of strength but it is better to keep the weight down a bit. Personally I would like to see many players with an additional 10-30lbs to benefit their game without losses in aerobic capacity. Football players definitely need a lot more skill and real game training rather than strength training as the best players are always the most skilled, regardless of strength. In rugby it takes more power and speed to pass an opponent, in football it takes more a combination of skill and speed rather than brute strength. They do train to increase strength but IMO their training is way behind some other sports in this department, even though they do have to keep the volume down.

Yeh forwards exspecially could do with adding strength training.

Do you think of your posture when your playing?

I usually just think of keeping my neck back chest up and pushing my belly out a bit. I used notice by the end of a game my chin would be realy far forward, but single leg deadlifts have helped alot with that.

[Ad McG]

I always try and keep good posture when I'm moving around so it's become pretty automatic now. Shoulders back, head up and you can't go wrong :)