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Extreme Football Conditioning for Linemen

1. Prowler Drives

Prowler drives are a lineman’s best f riend. These aren’t long, slow pushes. These are f ast, intense,short bursts of 5–10 yards. Set up the Prowler, get your hips low, and try to get as close as possibleto the actual blocking/driving posit ion that you’d have on the f ield. Now explode f orward f or 5–10 yards. Ideally,this should be perf ormed with a partner so that you can both simply trade of f pushes. But if you’re f lying solo,rest about 10– 20 seconds between pushes and go f or 8–12 drives.

The weight should be medium to heavy. Think of the heaviestguy you’ll f ace and add a f ew pounds on him. This willprobably range f rom 250–400 lbs. Just don’t get caught up intrying to push 600 lbs and move like a pig in slop.

2. Multiple hill sprints

There’s nothing f ancy here. Just line up at the bottom of a hilland sprint. Hill sprints are great because they’re hard, saf ebecause you can never reach f ull speed or over stride, andeasy on the joints, which is especially important f or the bigmen

Trudging up a hill will work the lungs and the legs, so it ’sdef initely a “best bang f or your buck” kind of exercise. The hilldoesn’t have to be crazy high. We aren’t climbing a mountain in Siberia a la Stallone in Rocky IV. We want a nice,steady incline so that it makes the sprints much harder and easier on your knees and ankles. In addition, youdon’t need to spend all day sprinting. A litt le hill sprinting goes a long way.

Start with f ive and work your way up to 10–12, depending on the amount of incline and the length of the hill.These are also great f or dropping excess body f at, so go f ind a hill if you’ve got some f at to lose. It ’s muchmore dignif ied than seeing your big butt plodding around a Zumba class.

3. Metabolic condit ioning

Metabolic conditioning is a f ancy way of saying “posit ion specif ic sprinting.” It was popularized by theUniversity of Nebraska back when anything that came out of Nebraska was gospel. It ’s actually a highlyef f ective and f un way to condition, and it sure beats just running sprints to run them.

The easiest way to envision this is to picture how a wide receiver would do it. He’d line up f or 10 sprints (oneset). Each sprint is actually a pass route. If possible, he’d have someone throw him the f ootball at the end ofeach route to not only condition but also build f ootball skill. He’d do one set, rest 90 seconds, and then comeback f or 3–4 more sets.

But linemen don’t catch passes. Linemen do, however, have very specif ic f oot work patterns, steps, angles,and skills that they can build while still conditioning. We’ll use an of f ensive lineman in our example, but this iseasily adaptable to D- linemen as well.

Set 1

Base step right and sprint 5 yards

Angle step right and sprint 10 yards

Pull lef t and sprint 30 yards (a deep pull as you would on a sweep)

Reach lef t and sprint 15 yards

Pull right and sprint 5 yards (trap step)

Pass slide right and sprint 20 yards

Base lef t and sprint 7 yards

Reach right and sprint 10 yards

Pass slide lef t and sprint 5 yards

Pull right and sprint 30 yards (deep pull)

Sprint, walk back, and sprint again. Pay attention to your steps. Stay low and drive f orward. This is a great wayto kill two boring but necessary processes (conditioning and skill building) in a f un way. If you want, havesomeone throw you the ball af ter each sprint just f or the hell of it. You never know when they’re going to put intackle eligible, so be prepared.

A def ensive lineman would take his steps but change the runs to include the angle to the quarterback,shuf f les/slides, slide sprints, and even a spin move if he wanted to get f ancy. Start with three sets and work upto f ive. Rest about 90 seconds between sets and simply walk back between sprints and start again.

4. Sled and carry medley

This is a f avorite of our linemen. Something about it just screams toughness. It isn’t like anything required ofyou on the f ootball f ield. It ’s a much longer f eat of conditioning, but it builds mental toughness. And if youaren’t mentally tough on the line, you’ll get killed.

You need a sled or a Prowler and something to carry—f armers’ walk bars, sandbags, or heavy dumbbells. Usingthe Prowler is a bit easier. Set a heavy sandbag or set of f armers’ bars about 25 yards f rom you. Now drive theProwler hard and f ast to the line, pick up the f armers’ bars or sandbags and carry it back to the original line.This is basic and it ’s old school, but it works. It ’s as much a mental toughening exercise as it is a physical one.Linemen need to develop an attitude that is part sociopath and part cage f ighter. If you have linemen who aren’twilling to get physical and essentially f ight f or three hours, you have linemen who will get killed.

If you use a sled, it ’s easiest to use a long strap with a handle (Spud towel strap or a triceps rope works best)and either do a back pedal pull or a f orward, 45-degree angle pull. This makes the dismount easier than using aharness. Four to f ive medleys are plenty. You can go f or more as the season draws closer.

When to condition

This seems to be the big question—where and when does conditioning f it into your f ootball strength program?If you do it on your of f days and really go crazy, you’ll be sore and tired f or your weight training sessions.Some have opted f or one total conditioning day, usually on a Saturday. This can work well, depending on therest of your training week.

The best option is of ten to simply add one conditioning drill to the end of your weight training session. Thisworks well deep in the of f -season when you simply want to remain in shape but not go all out on theconditioning. Doing this allows you to remain f airly close to game shape all year long but doesn’t interf ere withyour strength gains. It ’s f ast and ef f icient. Adding some Prowler drives to the end of your lower body daydoesn’t take much ef f ort or t ime and allows you to use your of f days to f ocus on recovery (sleep, nutrit ion,stretching, and f oam rolling).