Team-based interval running drills without the ball have been a staple of football conditioning over the years. Speak with any professional player or manager about tough preseasons in their career, and they’ll be able to relive in anguish a gut-busting run that they used to do as a team. An every-line-and-back suicide run, laps around the pitch, runs up the stands of the stadium, flag runs, hill runs, shuttle runs… a plethora of running drills performed without the ball, not linked to the tactical or technical side of the game. A pure running drill focused on physical conditioning and pushing a player to their physical and mental limits.
These sessions appear to be engrained within the psyche of those who did them like a period of trauma in their life. They will be able to recount in detail – as if it was yesterday – the distances they ran, the times expected of them, how they dealt with the demands and how they fared against their teammates.
These runs are rooted deep in the history of football training in this country, and are the very essence of what fitness training was all about.
Over time, an array of weird and wonderful running drills performed within the confines of a football pitch have been created, along with set times that a professional football team should complete them in.
Dean Smith recounts his time as a player and a few of the team running sessions he was exposed to: “When I was a player at Walsall in the early 90’s, Kenny Hibbit would run us every Tuesday without fail. ‘Terror Tuesday,’ it was called. Kenny would make you run and he used to say, ‘You’ve got to earn your day off.’” One of his favourites was a box-to-box style run. Now, this particular run was originally from Gerry Francis, and Kenny picked it up when he was [Gerry’s] assistant at Bristol Rovers. Gerry went on to manage [Queen’s Park Rangers] and Tottenham, and I know for a fact he took that run with him to Spurs.
When I was a playing at Leyton Orient under Martin Ling, we used to do a shuttle run: 5 yards and back, 10 yards back, 15 back, 20 back. We did it five times, and each one had to be under 30 seconds. If you didn’t make the time, we would have to do it again. These were regularly on Tuesdays at the end of training. This run was with Lingy, but he used to do it as a player at Brighton with Micky Adams, and picked it up from there.”
A lot of the team fitness runs in football training have come into existence through this very process. Running drills passed down through the generations as players become managers become deeply rooted in the history of football training. Over time, managers, coaches, fitness and medical staff would develop a repertoire of runs and fitness drills they picked up along the way, and would use these drills and times as measures of whether a player was fit enough for the demands of a game.
If it worked for me, it’ll work for you
The start of interval training as a practice is attributed to track & field athletes, with signs of their use going back as early as the start of the 1900’s. These concepts made their way into team sports training via coaches and staff who became well-versed in them as physical education teachers, or having performed them themselves in other sports. These running drills might also be a hangover from when fitness coaches in clubs were generally physical training instructors recruited from the army to lead fitness sessions and get players “military fit.” They would devise assault course-style drills that would push players physically and mentally. Either way, interval-based training and running drills became entwined with football training, and the cycle continued over the years.
Ex-Stoke and QPR defender Geoff Cameron recounts his experiences as a player in the United States National Team under Jürgen Klinsmann:
“When Jürgen won the World Cup as a player in 1990, one thing he did were these empty stomach runs in the morning. He’d set off at 8-9am before he had eaten anything and ran for 20-25 minutes. And he would do this most mornings. So when he was managing us during our lead up to the World Cup, he would make us do them. The fitness guys at the time were advising against this, but this is what he did as a player when he won the World Cup, and so he wanted us to keep it going.
“This run was meant to be a steady jog. Twenty minutes nice and easy, like a leisure run, nothing crazy. But each morning, the pace started to increase. We were divided into groups of 10 and would run with a coach. When you had Jurgen leading your group, you knew you were screwed. Jurgen can run for days. He’s a fit guy, and you’d be flying for 20 minutes straight. But we all believed in the process. That’s the important thing.
“We felt if we did it, and it helped take us a little further in the World Cup, then let’s do it.”
Originally, a coach would apply a successful training regime from his own experiences and what worked for him. There was usually a particular run that helped him gauge the physical or mental state of the team and made it relatable for him as a coach. Coaches then want to impart that methodology to the next generation. If the group is successful and the players believe in the process, the cycle continues.
The fact this process continues implies these runs were part of successful environments in the first place. John Terry explains how pitch length runs were a mainstay of the training environment at Chelsea FC under Antonio Conte:
‘’Under Conte when we won the league, we regularly did aerobic runs. Intervals of full length in 20 seconds, 75 yards in 10 seconds, and 50 yards in 10 seconds. We’d go through the whole set of runs once a week. The lads that were playing would do a little bit less than the ones that weren’t, but we would all do them.
Tweet ThisUnder Conte when we won the league, we regularly did aerobic runs. Intervals of full length in 20 seconds, 75 yards in 10 seconds, and 50 yards in 10 seconds. We’d go through the whole set of runs once a week
@JohnTerry26 via @SharkeyStories
“During that early period, we were getting results and doing well, so the runs got accepted, even though the lads didn’t particularly enjoy them.
“I feel that if you don’t have those results as a coach or manager, and you’re running a lot, it gives players an opportunity to say ‘we’re running too much.’ However, if you get results, you’re top of the league and you’re winning, players don’t really have anywhere to go. Its accepted by the group and you carry on doing them.”
‘‘With man management, it’s having a manager with the ideas that really get into the group. At the end of the day, you can be a good manager or a bad manager, but the most important thing is having that message and getting the people right behind you. The biggest example is Klopp. If Klopp goes to any player from that Liverpool team and says, ‘Listen, just go against that wall and break your head 10 times,’ they would do it. It doesn’t matter about the message, but just follow. And being followed is the most important thing for a manager and what will make you successful.” Pepe Reina
‘’For me you have identify what a player needs to work on, individualise the conditioning, that’s the kind of detail you must take with conditioning runs. The group runs have their place, but it’s important to individualize the physical work depending on the player. If you take a player aside and show them that you’ve taken an interest in what they are doing, how they’re feeling, and show how you are going to improve them as an individual, I think that puts them in a good place.” John Terry
“From my experiences the game has changed a lot over time. I think there has been an increase in the quality of fitness needed in a team. For me the more you work individually with a player, the more payback you have. It is now capitally important that you screen players singularly, and then work on their strengths and weaknesses. If an individual player needs more running than others, then so be it, but it depends on the player and what they need. Same with the gym work and the prevention of injury. We all have weaknesses and areas we must improve. So the more specific you make the work, the more profit you will have.” Pepe Reina
Interval training runs into exercise science and tactical periodisation
Advancements in sport science and technology have led to us knowing more about the physical demands of the game and the physical profiling of players in more detail than ever before. The conditioning and athletic development programmes accordingly have become more individualised and tailored to each player’s specific needs.
Group running sessions where players run round a pitch several times or run to every line and back are retreating into the history books.
Paul Laursen and Martin Buchheit’s training bible, Science and Application of High-Intensity Interval Training, is a key example of the detail and understanding we now have of interval training’s physiological and developmental effects. Pivotal work over the last decade by the likes of Dan Baker, Shane Malone and Jack Ade continue to show how team sports can apply increasingly specific interval training to great effect.
In the modern game, the long interval running drills that were once common are generally now reserved for preseason. In-season running is primarily short interval runs, repeated sprint intervals or sprint exposure, with greater emphasis on making the movements more game-related.
Similarly, conventional football periodisation now demands complete tactical reasoning in everything we do on the training field. The adoption of tactical and dynamic periodisation is increasing; and, with this model, all training drill components must align from tactical, technical, physical and psychological perspectives. This starts with a defined game model and set of principles that provide an encapsulation of how a team plays. Each drill in training must fit with this tactical framework.
By devising various rules, and environmental and coaching constraints in session and drill design, coaches can overload the quality they want to improve. If the aim is to increase high-speed running volume, coaches can increase the dimensions or duration of play in order to simultaneously target the tactical, technical and psychological objectives. If there is a need to hit maximum velocity in training, coaches devise game-like situations that hit those speeds while replicating the specific positional demands the player will experience in the game, including reaching maximum velocity with the ball.
Tactical periodisation has numerous benefits, including efficiency and maximising the time athletes spend on their feet. Advocates argue it may be the only way to prepare a player to have the physical capacity to carry out the game model or execute the tactical objectives under pressure, because it is a true representation of the match environment.
Running drills without the ball, especially as a team, therefore, are becoming less common.
One of tactical periodisation’s most famous exponents is Jose Mourinho. John Terry experienced the impact of this methodology first hand. He saw how it threw out the typical preseason running and initiated a change in culture.
“During the first meeting he said to the group, ‘First day of preseason, you won’t need your trainers. You just need your boots.’ We were thinking ‘Boots on day one? Footballs at your feet on the first session?’ This was new to us, and during that preseason we never did a run without the football.
“Everything was game-related. Psychologically, it gave everyone a boost. We were all expecting to be ran because that’s what you do in preseason, but it never came. Also, because we had the ball at our feet, mentally we weren’t thinking ‘this is tough.’
“After a while, lads would think ‘this is just disguised running.’ But then something new would be thought of by the coaches, a fresher way to get the work into us. It didn’t feel like it, but we were actually working harder then we ever had in a preseason.”
So where does this change leave the catalogue of running drills that played such a significant part in the development of players and managers over the years? Are they confined to the history books, or are we missing the point of what they were achieving?
In some circles, the new breed of tactical periodisation aficionados frown upon running without the ball. Coaches will ask, What can a run do physiologically that can’t be achieved in game-related practice?
It’s impossible not to argue that an individualised approach to athletic development is the way forward in today’s game. How can you guarantee group runs will push everyone equally? Does everyone in the group need to develop aerobic capacity or repeated sprint ability, or could they spend that time focusing on another physical quality that would be more beneficial for their personal development? Fewer and fewer teams are now implementing group running drills in their training cycle beyond a handful of runs in preseason and top-ups after games.
Teams may lose more than a tradition by discarding interval running
Staff within organisations can be guilty of focusing solely on their own skill sets and believing their area of expertise is the answer to a problem. But this becomes an issue: if your only tool is a hammer, then every problem looks like a nail. If there is a problem in the performance, the coaching department will feel it is a tactical issue; the sport scientist will believe the answer is down to loading; the S&C coach will look to what they are doing in the gym; the medical team thinks availability and injury; a nutritionist re-evaluates fuelling; a psychologist, the mental state of the group.
We all have our expertise, and we all feel passionately how that influences the performance of the game.
Tactical periodisation looks to combine multiple areas and, by doing so, be the solution to this problem. But before that can happen, we have to probe the original reasoning behind these runs. Is it tactical, physical or mental? What are the coaches and managers who implement them actually looking for? How does the player feel having done them? How does the team dynamic respond?
Fundamentally, there is a reason why they were there and have persisted for decades.
Once you ask this question, you begin to understand. This issue is one of opinion, and it’s important coaches and fitness staff make up their own mind on what practice is best for the team. Here are a few of the answers I have received. Hopefully, they give some insight into the managers’ and players’ perspectives.
Interval running without the ball, from those who have done it
Mile Jedinak (Former Crystal Palace, Aston Villa and Australian international midfielder)
There’s a place for those type of runs to build that little bit of resilience within yourself. To push yourself through that pain barrier. Yeah, you can do all these conditioning runs with the ball, I understand that, but sometimes there’s nothing better than testing your own capacity without it.
Running in a group environment also certainly has it’s place. It brings that togetherness. You push each other along the way. Even though the runs are difficult, they can have that component where they bring the group together and you’re pushing each other along.
I find these runs have an important place early on in preseason. They give you a very early impression of how someone will be. They serve a purpose on that journey. As you get closer to the season, it’s more about the game input. The games become the barometer of what you measure yourself on as a player and how you feel during the games. It’s important you have a combination, though. If you don’t have the conditioning runs at the start, you won’t get to the levels you want to be playing at in the games. It’s that simple.
For me, there’s a psychological perspective to these runs during preseason. They show you who’s up for the challenge. Who’s up for the fight. The season is not going to be easy.
I’ve played in teams where you knew it was going to be a difficult season. But you knew at the back of the preseason, after all the work you’ve done together, you know you’re going to be alright because the lads around you are willing to fight. You’ve pulled each other along, and it’s going to work. Basically, you learn who you can take along with you for the ride, and who you’re going to have to carry.
I remember when I played in Turkey. At the start of preseason we had to do 1 km runs in small groups of four. We were grouped on ability. You set off together, sticking at a pace. You’ve got four of you running together, which is great. It helps you, but you still have to push. But sometimes you may be working and other players drop well off behind you, and you start to ask yourself “Why is he so slow? Is he gonna get up to fitness by the start of the season? Have I come back into preseason too fit?”
That’s why you have to be a judge of yourself. It will always be about myself. How am I feeling? Have I run a good time?
Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink (current Burton Albion manager and former Leeds United, Chelsea and Middlesbrough striker)
As a player, the toughest managers I had for training were [Gianluca] Vialli and [Claudio] Ranieri at Chelsea. We did a lot of 1000m and 500m runs during preseason. The Italians did a lot of these type of runs with minimal rest. A lot of endurance work. I hated those runs and I would make it known, because I wasn’t an endurance runner – I was a sprinter. But I knew I needed better endurance to be a better player, so I would do it. But I hated it.
Vialli had a fitness coach, Antonio Pintus, who went on to be fitness coach at Real Madrid and was Zinade Zidane’s fitness coach. He was magnificent. During preseason he would get us doing the 1000m runs. I would have to do the run in under four minutes, then have three minutes rest before going again. We would sometimes do this seven times. Under Ranieri, we would do the 150m arc run. We’d also have to do an endurance pitch run, where the recovery become reduced. We had to do that one a fair bit. But they worked.
As a manager, when at Burton for the first time we did a lot of running and were successful. I think it gave us a psychological edge. With that running you got this feeling they were going into games stronger physically and mentally than the opposition. They knew in games that when the going got tough they could get over that hill and sustain that work rate. We were not technically the best in the league, but that group of players were special. We had a mentally really strong group, and that’s why we could do that type of training and were successful.
I don’t think you get those types of groups very often. If players can’t do that type of training then you have to change, and you have to do a lot of training in disguise. When you get a player physically and mentally stronger, it allows their quality to shine through as a player. But players don’t always realize that.
John McGinn (current Aston Villa and Scotland international midfielder)
The runs that got me the fittest were at [HIbernians] under Neil Lennon. It was four laps of the pitch, which had to be done in four minutes. We would repeat it four times and each one had to be in time. He would shout: “If you don’t make the four laps, you don’t play in the team,” and that lifted the tempo. It was good fitness, but I hate that kind of running.
To help push me along, I would pick someone and stay on the boy’s heel the whole way round, and that made it more comfortable.
We would do that a lot in preseason. Then sometimes in the season, on a Tuesday afternoon, he would surprise us with the 4 x 4 minute run. The more and more you do it, you realise that you felt fitter going into games. All because you’ve done little top-ups of running here and there. At that point, under Neil Lennon, our team was as fit as I’ve probably ever seen a team.
Also, under Neil Lennon, if the training wasn’t good enough he would run us. Most of it would be made up on the spot, such as run over that hill and back in 45 seconds, or box-to-box runs. Everyone hates running, so if training wasn’t up to the highest standard, he would use the runs to try and motivate us to lift up our standards. But it worked.
Tom Heaton (former Burnley, Aston Villa and current Manchester United goalkeeper)
At Burnley under Sean Dyche, he had this killer day during preseason where the balls would go away, sport science would go out the window, and we’d have 2 – 2 ½ hours of running in groups. It was called the “Gaffer’s Day.” Anyway, this day was a real grind and you wouldn’t know what was coming. It was probably more psychological than anything. But for me, it was a brilliant day and I actually loved doing it. It was real hard work.
Also, in the season, now and again we would also still do these pitch runs at the end of training, which everyone had to do. It was a run around the pitch, and everyone had to get within the set time. If one person didn’t make it in time, we all had to do it again until we all made it. We’d usually do this on the back of two hours of training, so considering everyone was shot at the end, it was a tough run.
Jack Grealish (current Manchester City and England international midfielder)
I have been brought up doing these types of runs in the academy. The manager at the time used to love interval runs, such as the one across the box. He’d make us perform them between games in training. But I thought it was quality. I feel that’s the reason why the young lads that come through the Aston Villa academy were so fit, because they’d work with him and he’d just run you.
Other runs that stand out to me are the “Premier League Runs” and the “Horsehoe Pyramid.” They are probably some of the toughest runs I’ve ever had to do. We would do them during preseason under Dean Smith and Steve Bruce. But I think they’re good because they push you as a player. You don’t want to come into training and perform runs that are easy. If it’s not pushing you, it’s not making you fitter.
I want to be pushed. I want to get as fit as possible. Don’t get me wrong: you’ll moan and give the manager and fitness coach stick. But, once you’ve finished them, you’re buzzing with yourself. Especially if you get within the times. You think, job done.
Running without the ball has been an important part of my training and preparation. I know sometimes it’s not football-related, but you’ve still got to run in matches without the ball. I do agree that most of training needs to be done with the ball, but when working on your fitness, runs are needed and are helpful. Especially during preseason or when coming back from injury.
With preseason runs, I’d be wanting to beat myself, beat what I ran before. Unless it was one of my mates, and they were having me off saying they were gonna beat me beforehand. Then I’d want to beat them. But for me its about competing with yourself.
Danny Drinkwater (former Leicester City and current Chelsea midfielder)
We didn’t do much running under Ranieri at Leicester [City] when we won the league. When he first came in he didn’t have a full backroom staff team, so he worked with staff left from the previous manager.
Preseason when he came in was tough. Matt Reeves, who was the fitness guy already at the club, had his template of preseason that we followed. But that was blended into Ranieri’s and Andreas Azzalin’s, and so it was a mix of both, but I think it was a perfect balance. It got us fit, we didn’t have many injuries, and obviously we won the league.
Most lads in the squad at the time would say that they were at peak fitness during that season. The only time we would run without the ball was during international breaks. We did a lot of fitness work for 2 – 3 days with limited football, but then have a block of days off. I’d say that was the only time we did specific fitness work without the ball.
Under Conte at Chelsea we did a lot of runs. There wasn’t a single player who didn’t do them. We would actually joke and say it was Chelsea Athletics Club. When [Maurizio] Sarri came in, that actually carried on because he kept the same fitness coach. The fitness coach stayed so it had the same feel.
John Terry (former Chelsea and England international defender and current Assistant Manager at Aston Villa)
I remember during my youth team days, one run we did with the youth team manager, Ted Dowd. We were split into two groups on opposite sides of the pitch on the halfway line. Just poles set up in the corners of the pitch. On his whistle, both groups set off running and there was one rule: we couldn’t stop running until we caught someone in the opposite group. The quick lads would race off and catch someone within two laps, but the rest would carry on running for 10, 15, even 20 laps. When you’re running, all you’re thinking is “Right, I need to catch someone, I need to catch someone.” I think he would end it when we’d ran over 20 laps.
Now, looking back, you realise it wasn’t a physical running test. The coach wanted to see the other side of it. I remember around five lads gave up and dropped out because mentally they knew they couldn’t catch anyone. But that’s what he was looking for. Did you give up after 10 laps or 12 laps, or were you going to keep going. Were you going to be ruthless and go “Right, I’m not getting caught, but I’m not going to catch anyone, but I’m not going to get caught!!”
When you get older you see the other side of it. Once we were driven in the mini-bus, unsure where we were going and after around five miles you’d get, “Right, out you go.” They’d drop you off and go “See you back at the training ground. First one back.” You’d have no money, there were no phones back then, and it was just find your way back to the training ground. Obviously you wouldn’t be able to do that now.
Gary Rowett (current Millwall FC manager)
From a mental aspect, it creates that feeling of “I know I can sprint up and down the pitch six, seven, eight times and cope with it.” Psychologically, the runs build resilience, and you’re building that ability to not feel mentally fatigued.
Sometimes when setting runs up I’ll hear the lads say “Ahh, we’re doing the gaffer’s runs again!?” They don’t like them, but its got to the point where I play on the fact they do not like them. This is how you build that resilience and mindset to work through the physically challenging moments of the game. If you can’t cope with these, how will you cope in the 92nd minute when you’ve made a run and the difference between us winning the game and losing the game depends on how quick you recover and stop the counter-attack? Sometimes I’ll put those scenarios to the players while they’re running.
Sometimes players say “I’m not doing this. It’s not suited to me, my body doesn’t suit these runs.” But basically what they are saying to me is that they don’t like that horrible feeling and they’re unlikely to go to the dark side they’ll need to go to during a game.
Occasionally, a young player will come up from the academy and train with the first team. I remember an academy player at Birmingham came up one day and he smashed the run, blitzed it. Then all of a sudden, on the back of that, you think physically and athletically he’s got something really good, which we can work with. It probably accelerated his entry into the first team training group. It just helps be a part of that decision making process.
Sometimes it goes the other way. You look at players who physically struggle, and they almost make you not want to play them, because it shows that lack of athleticism that you need in the modern game.
There’s a couple of reasons why conditioning without the ball is important to me. The first is that when I’ve felt my best as a player I was at clubs that ran us and you felt amazing. So when the ball work came, it was easy. The second is I’ve always had the same theory: you’ve got a football pitch with 20 outfield players and one ball. Look at any one moment of the game: one person has the ball while 3 – 4 others are there for support, but everyone else is really running to create space without the ball. So you can do conditioning in training with the ball, but you don’t get the same physical parameters, so just do the run.
It’s not something I do all the time, because it can demotivate players and you won’t become a better football team. But it’s certainly important. It’s about creating a balance.
You see that some teams try to do everything with the ball, but I feel it can be taken too literally. They do everything with the ball, and it might look really good, but if you’re not getting the physical side out of it, what’s the point?
It’s important not to imitate other coaches as well. Sometimes you have be who you are, and do what you feel is the right thing to do.
Geoff Cameron (former Stoke City, Queens Park Rangers and current FC Cincinnati defender)
Mark Hughes was big on “football fitness,” and we didn’t really run much. The fitness aspect was guided more by the fitness coach, Damian Roden. Damian is one of the best I’ve worked with. He has a system and it works. We’d rarely do fitness without the ball. It was all part of a process, and the runs and football would progressively get harder and harder, but everything had a purpose. For me, football based on football is the best way to get fit.
But then [Tony] Pulis is a good manager because he’ll make the guys want to fight to win. During preseason and even during the season, you would run and run and run. It wears you down mentally. It was really, really tough. But it brought the team together. Everybody was in the same position, everyone was struggling, because it was hard as sh*t. But with Pulis, he would break us down mentally and then build us up. Then, if you started hitting physical targets in a game, the next week was made easy. Even if you wanted to do more in training he’d be like “Relax, go inside, have a cup of tea and get your rest. Save yourself for tomorrow.” All because you hit your numbers in the game. It was weird, but when Saturday came, BOOM, you’d run through a brick wall, and run through everything on that Saturday. He had that side of making guys work their ass off. This is the system that you follow, and you don’t venture off from that system.
Football training’s future has room for its past
The beauty of this game is that it is up to the manager or coach to decide what they feel will work best for the players they work with. There is no denying the landscape of football training is changing, but we can learn from the experiences and runs that were such a staple of training over the last 100 years.
Today’s coaches and practitioners should appreciate and understand how players and managers felt those sessions benefited their careers, how it improved performance and what is taken from them.
It will be up to the practitioners and coaches to decide the fate of all the weird and wonderful interval pitch runs, and whether they remain a staple of physical programming. Or whether they will be confined to the history books and conditioning is completely individualized and made football specific.
So far throughout my career I have documented over 100 various pitch based running drills with set distances and times which at some point were demanded of players in the professional game. It would be a travesty if they were lost and if you experienced drills in your career that you would like to be documented within this catalog, please reach out and I will share with the community. You never know – it may be more than just conditioning they are developing.
