I will speak generally, as the off-season may be broken down into different phases.
Generally, for off-season football, I would not have someone run 4 days a week. I would be more apt to employ various conditioning drills on certain days and running/sprints on others. 2-3 days a week for actal running.
Also, I donât like the idea of ME upper and lower on the same day, especially when you are sprinting on the same day. This, in my opinion is too much CNS strain.
For off-season football, I like 4 days a week strength training with 3 days sprint/agility/conditioning. I recommend a WSB based, or Tier program. I wil illustrate a WSB template. Something as follows
Day 1
DE/mod intensity Upper
Day 2
AM sprint or conditioning
PM ME/high intensity lower
Day 3
OFF/or sled active recovery/flexibility training
Day 4
AM sprint or conditioning
PM ME/high intensity Upper
Day 5
Off/sled active recovery/flexibility training
Day 6
AM sprint or conditioning
PM DE/mod intensity lower
Day 7
Off/ or sled active recovery/flexibility training
So what I have listed here is a 4 day program with three auxilliary days. If nothing else I highly recommend flexibility training on the off days.
the game of football is based upon repeated bouts of explosive effort. Thus, I believe the sprint and conditioning training must serve to develop position specific starts, accelerations, deccelerations, change of direction, and so on, all within the frame work of very short durations.
As we know, a 100m sprinter is not best served by performing any type of repetitions which exceed a few hundred meters, at MOST. So we may view the actual race as being about 30% of the longest repetition used on certain training days.
I use the same guidelines for football. The average play is 6-10 seconds, regardless of position, therefore, I do not see the efficacy in employing any type of drill which exceeds 20-30 seconds per repetition, at the MOST.
Football is explosive strength/anaerobic endurance, force absorption/stabilization/production, I donât care what position you play.
So, my view is to use the principles of Charlies system, but not the actual template itself.
This is much like my view of WSB method. I am a die hard believer in the system, however, I would not employ the WSB method, at least not in itâs strict sense, for sport training in which it does not apply to so well (eg, sprinters, MMA, wrestling, boxing, etc)
I do feel that the WSB template applies VERY well to football players, especially in the off-season. As always, adjustments must be made to accomodate the specific motor requirements of the sport in question.
The key, in my opinion, is to take the fundamental components of any training system, and then logically and systematically construct a program which most optimally suits the motor requirements of the sport.
We must remember that CFTS is for short sprinters, WSB is for powerlifters, and so on. And the primary target quality of each system is speed and strength, respectively. So we may than take this into perspective and construct programs which are specific to the demands of other sports in which strength (in all of its manifestations along the F:V curve) and speed (in all of itâs components starts/acceleration/max speed/SE) are fundamental motor requirements.