Building an “Aerobic Base”
A worthwhile investment for field sport Athletes
“It will make you slow”
“It’s a waste of time for team sport Athletes”
“They’re GAA Athletes, not marathoners, they don't need to run slow”
Aerobic base training gets a lot of stick from GAA Coaches and S&C’s. It’s viewed as a waste of valuable training time, with limited benefit for the GAA Athlete. An unnecessary source of fatigue. Well, I disagree. I think spending the time and effort on building your aerobic base during the Off-Season is a worthwhile investment. So hear me out…
Let me start by explaining the role of your aerobic energy system. It can be useful to think of it as your engine, and the size of your engine in this case determines how long you can sustain effort at a given intensity. So a well developed aerobic base will help you to keep working at a high intensity for the full duration of a game. As well as that, an aerobic system that is firing on all cylinders will increase your recovery rate from high intensity efforts within a game. This allows you to get through a higher overall volume of work which can really set you apart on the pitch. To give you a brief understanding of how aerobic training does this, it increases the rate of lactate clearance (through increasing mitochondrial numbers and the level of intramuscular lactate specific transporters). Lactate is the result of anaerobic (high intensity) metabolism and contributes to fatigue and decreased muscle function, speedy removal therefore hastens acute recovery. Skill goes out the window once fatigue sets in, so even the most talented player can have dreadful performances if their aerobic system is not up to par.
Having a well developed aerobic base is obviously going to significantly improve your onfield output, but if we zoom out we can begin to see that the plethora of gains provided by aerobic base training extends far beyond onfield output. An efficient aerobic system will increase your resistance to fatigue. This gains significance when we realise the massive impact that fatigue can have on acute injury risk, with the majority of injuries occurring in the second half of games when fatigue has set in. The one thing that is going to hinder your development as an Athlete more than anything else is sustaining an injury so the ability of aerobic training to increase your fatigue resistance can’t be overlooked. This increased fatigue resistance will also mean shorter recovery times between sessions during the In-Season, enabling you to get through a higher volume of high quality training.
If none of these performance benefits have impressed you, how does an increased mood throughout the day, improved cognitive function and a longer lifespan sound? Yes, aerobic training is also class for our general health!
How to develop the aerobic system?
So firstly, the goal of aerobic base training is obviously to work and develop the aerobic energy system. In order to do this we must train below our aerobic threshold (which is generally around 75-80% of your max Heart Rate). For the Athletes I work with in The Performance Academy I generally prescribe a subjective intensity of about 70% for aerobic work (Athletes tend to push a bit harder than prescribed so this gives us a bit of wiggle room). Your aerobic system requires a large volume of this relatively low intensity work to see gains. This is far from the sexy side of Athlete training. Long (potentially boring) running which can either be via short or long intervals, or continuous running. No, this does not mean endless laps of the pitch. GAA is an intermittent sport by its nature so the majority of conditioning should be via intermittent interval runs, however I do find continuous runs can be great for bringing already well developed Athletes up a level. It’s important to include a caveat here, however, that we are not training these Athletes like marathon runners. The frequency of these continuous runs are kept low to mitigate negative impact on speed and power adaptations.
Zone 2, aerobic base building doesn’t have to be all doom and gloom however. While running will likely have the greatest carry-over to your GAA performance, you can be creative with your Zone 2 work. Go for a cycle with friends, go for a handy jog with your father, or if you do opt for a solo pitch session then pop in a podcast or a bit of music to keep you company. This type of training can and should be made as enjoyable as possible!
A sample starting point for a club level GAA Athlete could be a short interval session as follows:
75m @60-70% pace, 15 seconds rest x10
3 total sets
2 minutes Active Recovery between sets
If this session is too easy, you can increase the distance of each rep of the number of reps performed, and vice versa if the session is a bit too difficult for you.
If you have any further questions about your conditioning for GAA feel free to reach out via Instagram DM (@theperformancephysio).