Wonder why your team is tired on game day? Look no further than the structure of your practice schedule.

Sun - film + tough lift
Mon - tough
Tues - tough
Wed - tough
Thurs - walk through
Fri - game day
Sat - off

Where does recovery and adaptation take place to be fresh Friday?

Tough workouts

- should be heaviest off/pre/early season, 3-4x/wk

- mid season volume, intensity, “tough” early in the week. 2-3x/wk

- late season, tough is 1-2x/wk TOPS

- post season maintenance, fine tune, PEAK

** game day = tough training day, recover accordingly

Takeaway: if tough is something that MUST be done, it is better to knock it out while your season isn’t on the line and before chronic overtraining hinders the athlete. Continuing to push these types of grueling workouts in season is likely contributing to your tired athletes.

So before you question their commitment & drive on game day, before you scream at them for their lack of intensity, look at your program. It’s no coincidence 95% of the team looks gassed every game day. They don’t give it everything all week and choose to lack energy Friday.

It’s not to blame coaches, more saying that you have the power to gameday energy by modifying work loads throughout the season. Overtraining / underrecovering are both things that can potentially plague any program. Recognizing it is the first step to fixing it.