The Ref Stop

Matchday -1

Samuel

Member
Level 5 Referee
Hi all, I was at a FA CORE camp last month and we covered MD-1's but I cannot for the life of me remember everything we covered like the exercises and conditioning. If anyone who was there can remember them it would be a great help.
 
The Ref Stop
Hi all, I was at a FA CORE camp last month and we covered MD-1's but I cannot for the life of me remember everything we covered like the exercises and conditioning. If anyone who was there can remember them it would be a great help.
Hi @Samuel . I was at a county FA event a few weeks ago, and we covered this in brief detail. I wonder if the two images attached will be of any help to you?
 

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Regardless of who crafts these training plans and fitness training guides, they are ALWAYS misguided
Invariably, they significantly over emphasize high intensity workouts (probably to meet people's incorrect expectations). I don't recall seeing one that appreciates the importance of low intensity sessions, recovery and rest/sleep
It doesn't matter what you're training for, low intensity exercise should account for the majority of any plan
This is even more important once you're past your peak years, especially as refereeing accounts for more high intensity exercise than we should otherwise ordinarily do. I've reached my desired fitness level. At the age of 50, I'll no longer do ANY high intensity sessions aside from games for the foreseeable future. Some weight training, gentle swimming, very slow running and lots of recovery work to fill in the gaps
I have however incorporated some very high intensity (over recent months) to get to where I need to be
I'm not the fittest bloke in the neighbourhood. That accolade goes to @RefereeX .... I have always been interested in the subject however. My vice is Ale
 
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There's also the issue that one size doesn't fit all, what works for a 20 year old almost certainly won't work for someone in their 40s (although granted CORE is probably geared more at the former). If they'd told me to do high intensity exercise on match day -1 they'd have been getting a lot of Friday phone calls telling them they needed to replace me as I'd pinged something.

There are also challenges around these not being full time referees. If I'd popped out of meetings to go and fetch a Greek yoghurt I'm not sure my performance reviews would have ended well, not even sure sitting there eating a packet of seeds would have landed that well 😂
 
There's also the issue that one size doesn't fit all, what works for a 20 year old almost certainly won't work for someone in their 40s
Yeah I have found that when speaking with other referees in recent weeks about their preparation that everyone needs to focus on different areas due to age or injury requirements. Fortunately for me, I am still very early in my career as an official so I have a little while before I need to worry about dropping the high intensity.

However, there are a few bits I have incorporated after speaking to my more 'experienced' mates.
 
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