Weight Training Workouts For A Running Back

To weight train properly for football, you'll need to lift differently at different times of the year. Weight lifting that will help you build muscle can also slow you down on the field if you do it during the season. Create an annual plan to help you improve muscle strength, endurance and speed.

Periodizing Weight Training

Weight training for running backs should follow a periodization plan, which has your workouts more closely resembling the movements you'll use in a game as you get closer to your season. You will begin your periodization schedule using heavier weights, lifted with less intensity, and doing fewer repetitions. As you get closer to your season, you will decrease the weight and increase the intensity and speed of your work. You will use more bodyweight exercises as you get close to your season.

Pre-Season

Months prior to your season, you'll want to build muscle by lifting your maximum weight. You'll do fewer reps and more sets. The Reg Parks 5 X 5 workout program is an excellent workout for building muscle. Lift 60 percent of your maximum five times; for your next set, lift 80 percent of your max five times; finish the final three sets by lifting your max.

Focus on your lower body by performing squats, calf raises, lunges, leg presses and deadlifts. You can also work on core strength with weighted sit-ups, crunches and leg raises. Upper-body exercises would include biceps curls, triceps extensions, chest presses, lat pulldowns and flyes.

Pre-Competitive Season

As you wind down your pre-season work and begin your pre-competitive season work, about month or so before your first game, you'll start training the muscles you have. You'll want to build muscular endurance with lighter weights and more repetitions per set. Perform the exercises you did in your pre-season workouts, but with 50 percent of your maximum weight or less, and for 10 to 15 repetitions.

Circuit training workouts are excellent workouts during this time. Perform a variety of the above exercises during a 30- or 60-minute workout, pausing only one minute between sets to keep intensity high.

You will want to begin training explosive strength in your legs, which is maximal force in one, quick movement. Box squats and deadlifts are examples of explosive strength exercises. For box jumps, stand in front of a box, bench or bleacher and jump onto the box. Repeat three to eight times per set, depending on the height of the box. A one-leg box jump has you standing next to the box with one leg on the box, then pushing yourself up as high as you can with the leg on the box. A paused jump squat has you using 15 to 30 percent of your max on your shoulders, bending down, pausing, then jumping up.

Bodyweight exercises such as push-ups, sit-ups, crunches, pull-ups and chin-ups are good choices for muscular endurance workouts.

During the last few weeks of your of your pre-competitive season, you'll start training high-twitch muscle fibers with reactive, or plyometric, strength exercises, that you will continue to do during your season.

In-Season

During your season, perform plyometric exercises, which are quick, explosive up-and-down movements. Examples of plyometric exercises include giant steps as you bound across a gym or field, high-knee skipping, sprinting and vertical jumps. Depth jumps have you jumping off a box or bleacher, then exploding upward and jumping as high as you can as soon as you touch the ground. Perform 10 to 15 reps per set.

You can continue training muscular endurance during the season, doing the exercises with lighter weights so you train your high-twitch muscle fibers to improve your speed.

Active Rest

After your season, your body will need to recover from the stresses you have placed on it for nine or more months. Cross train with tennis, basketball, swimming, cycling or soccer to stay in shape without straining muscles to the maximum.