7 Upper Body Exercises for Footballers

7 Upper Body Exercises for Footballers:

(If you want to improve your confidence on the pitch, make sure you read the full article)

 

“But Ric I mainly use my legs and my core to run, so why would I need to train my upper body..”

“I don’t want to get too big or too bulky to be able to run and be fast on the field.”

My Response to these athletes is as simple as this:

“Training your upper body will not make you too big or too bulky. The only thing that will make you too big or too bulky is training like a ‘gym bro’ or a bodybuilder and eating past the point of fullness on a consistent basis.”

If you are working with a well-educated coach who has some experience in the game, they will put you on a well regimented program that will be directly transferrable to you performing better on the field.

The truth of the matter is that your body is a kinetic chain and it functions as a whole, as one solid unit.

Your body doesn’t function body part by body part. It is called a chain for a reason.

When one part of the body moves, the entire body works to help it move as fluidly and efficiently as possible.

If you just have strong legs and a strong core, but you never train your upper body, you won’t be able to fully reach your genetic potential.

Before I recommend and coach you through exercises, I want to give you my Top 6 Tips for Training Your Upper Body as a Footballer:

1. The whole body is one unit. You are only as STRONG as your weakest link.

2. If you look better, you will feel better; which will lead to more confidence on the pitch. If you have more confidence, you will play better!

3. Upper Body Training and looking good are important, but should never be of more importance than being good on the ball.

4. You are in the gym to improve your performance when GAME DAY comes.

5. Train for FUNCTION, not AESTHETICS. Aesthetics come as a secondary reward of training right, eating right, and recovering right.

6. YOU ARE A FOOTBALLER, NOT A BODYBUILDER.

Try out these 7 Upper Body Exercises to Strengthen Your Upper Body as Well as Your Core:

With Detailed Instructions on How to Execute Them

 Exercise 1: Spiderman Pushup:

-Common pushup position

-Control the downward movement of your body with your arms

-As you go deeper into the pushup, take your right foot off the ground, and bring your right knee as far forward as possible, trying to touch the elbow.

-Engage your core and obliques throughout the movement, back up and repeat on the other side.

Exercise 2: One Arm Row on Stability Ball with One Leg Elevated

-Grab a stability ball and a kettlebell.

-Put your right hand on the stability ball, and lift that same leg.

-Bend your left knee slightly.

-Pick up the kettlebell with your left arm.

-Keep the core tight the entire time to remain stable!

-Pull with your elbow up and back towards your pocket.

Exercise 3: Pushup Pike on Stability Ball

-Get into Pushup position with your feet on a Stability ball.

Engage that core and make sure to keep your back flat at all times.

-Do a full range Pushup; keeping back flat and whole body stable; using your obliques and lower pelvic floor muscles.

-Immediately; pull the ball in with your toes; using you entire core, and let your butt raise up, (“piking”) your butt into the air.

 

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Exercise 4: Isometric Shoulder Complex

-Grab a LIGHT set of Dumbbells.

-Set a timer for 10 seconds on, 10 seconds off. But you actually don’t take off.

-You are working the entire time in 30 second intervals for each movement.

-Generally for my athletes, I use this as a finisher for 3-5 rounds (1:30-3 Minutes of work).

-Base standing position:

-Drive Feet into the ground, to activate glutes.

-Suck that core into the spine.

Position 1: Begin with the dumbbells out in front of you. Hold your arms as STRAIGHT as possible.

Activate the whole arm. Hold for 10 seconds.

Position 2: Dumbbells to the side. Hold arms as straight as possible. Activate the back muscles. Hold for 10 seconds.

Position 3: Press up over head. As fast as you can for 10 seconds.

Exercise 5: Barbell Inverted Row:

-Get under a bar (squat bar on a secure rack or a bar on a smith machine)

-Hands slightly wider than shoulder width.

-Feet about shoulder width apart.

-As with every exercise:

-Keep your back in a neutral position; glutes and quads right and feet Dorsi-Flexed.

-Chest in line with Bar, and pull yourself to the bar using your lats and mid back!

Exercise 6: One Hand Rear Delt Raise with One Hand on Bosu Ball:

-Grab a Bosu Ball and a light dumbbell to start, and get into Pushup position.

-Put one hand onto the center on the Bosu Ball, and get locked in.

-With the other hand, grab the dumbbell.

-Keep the balls of the feet driving into the ground, to lock the glutes and core in.

-Press the hand into the Bosu Ball as hard as you can to gain that stability in the core.

-Grab the dumbbell, and bend the elbow slightly.

-Raise the dumbbell, in a fluid motion.

Exercise 7: Kettlebell Row:

-Feet shoulder-width apart, toes pointed forward.

-Slight bend in the knees and get your butt back.

-Keep your back neutral the whole time, by getting the butt back, squeezing the glutes, and keeping your erector (low back) muscles, and hamstrings contracted the whole time, as well as tucking the core in as usual.

-When in position, grab the kettlebells in a position where the handle is parallel to your legs, and PULL with your elbows keeping your elbows tight into your body. Think of pulling with the elbows. This will engage the lower lats.

Reps & Sets:

“But Ric, how many reps and sets of each exercise?!”

This is one of the most common questions that I get when suggesting exercises on any social media platform.

And my answer is the same and boring all the time, “it really depends…”

Why do I always have the same answer?

Because it really does depend on your goals, your lifting experience, where you are in the season, and sometimes even on what position you play..

As I always say, the most important thing is to perfect the technique of every single exercise you do before you look to increase reps and load yourself with a lot of volume.

Reps & Sets: As a general rule of thumb (especially for these exercises), start with 2-4 sets of 12-15 reps. As you get better and your technique gets sharper, you can definitely add more volume!

Yes, the Upper Body is important but nowhere near as important as your technique and ability on the ball.

Are you struggling with that?!

There’s so much information out there! I understand, you may not know what to do…

Trust me, I’ve been there.

I got a simple answer for you.

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Here is the Full Video where I walk you through every exercise on 7 Upper Body Exercises for Footballers:

If you want to explore more exercises for your upper body for football, check out this video:

I hope these explanations helped you and I hope you will do a good job of integrating these into your gym routine!

I am grateful to have a large audience who speaks Spanish, so I went ahead and translated the entire article into Spanish to help you feel more comfortable. I hope it helps: