Rugby fitness demands a high anerobic endurance capacity due to the games stop start and explosive nature.

*Ok stay with me on this one.

The following is a little bit of geeky science but before I take your anaerobic endurance to the next level I thought it was important to give you the chance to understand a little more of the process.*

This is probably the most important part for a rugby player’s fitness.  Your anaerobic capacity is your ability to perform repeatedly at fast and high speed and do it all match long.

When you run fast or sprint you have to re-synthesise energy very quickly and this can only be done in a small number of ways.  You supply this energy quickly via the little amount stored in the muscles (only about 10 seconds worth of effort) and then via two other main sources  – Phosphocreatine (it’s why people take creatine) and fast glycolysis.

Creatine will run out in about 40 seconds and the lactate produced in the fast glycolysis cycle will accumulate very quickly.

The lactate will end up fatiguing the muscle and it’s then that you are unable to maintain that intensity.  However, when you slow down or get some rest the body can quickly get rid of the bad lactate and re-constitute some Phosphocreatine, or at least enough to enable a short return to higher intensity.

It’s why you may have heard the term lactate threshold training.  By causing the body to accumulate lactate you force it to then learn how to deal with it better.  It’s like any training, once you stimulate it enough times it then gets better at it and you can do more before the lactate becomes a problem i.e. you can run faster for a long period of time as you are able to keep the lactate levels low even though you are churning out more lactate.

I’ll be putting some anaerobic programs up here soon so make sure you check back!