GCSE PE Personal Fitness Programme.

GCSE Physical Education (Sport & Coaching)

GCSE PE Personal Fitness Programme

Circuit Training

Circuit training is a method of training. A circuit usually has around 8 to 15 stations, where at each station a different exercise is carried out for a certain amount of time. Circuit training can improve muscular endurance, cardiovascular endurance, aerobic fitness, muscular strength, speed and agility.

A circuit-training program may also be designed for a certain sport. Circuits for this purpose will include exercises to improve all the muscles and skills associated with the sport. (Example: A circuit training program for basketball should include skills: jumping, catching or throwing)

My circuit-training program is for football. The 10 stations are specifically suited to what is needed to play football. The Circuit is specified for an outfield player as there are no goalkeeping skills involved in this circuit.

My circuit will be performed over a 6 week period with one session in a week, consisting of an hour each session.

My circuit aims to improve the following skills: muscular endurance, muscular strength, speed, agility, cardiovascular endurance, and ball skills. These skills are all essential for an outfield football player.

For example:

· Muscular Endurance - To keep the muscles contracting for the full length of the match without them becoming tired or weak.

· Muscular Strength - the force your muscles exert when they contract. This is an important part of football as it is a contact sport and it is also very physical, players need to be able to guard the ball and hold other players off when they are challenging for the ball. Muscular strength is also useful when taking a throw-in, good muscular strength in the abdominal muscles is required to throw the ball higher and further to reach a player that is a long distance away from the touch-line.

· Speed - the ability to perform a movement in a short period of time. This is essential in football, for example to be able to sprint after a through ball or tackle an opponent who is through on goal.

· Agility - the ability to change direction quickly and control movements of the whole body. This is needed to be able to change direction quickly while dribbling or to collect a loose ball.

· Cardiovascular Endurance - the ability of the heart, lungs and circulation to deliver oxygen and remove waste during exercise. This is essential for the player to keep a constant pace all the way through the match. This is hard to perform in a circuit, so it would be better to improve this by running long distances or cycling.

· Ball Skills - the skills in football are all open skills. This means that the movement will change in a different environment. A skill is a particular action or set of actions. These are essential for football as they cover everything from a simple pass to more complicated skills such as dribbling the ball in different directions. These are all motor skills as they are skills involving movement.

Overload

To improve the fitness of a part of the body, you need to overload it. That means you need to make it work harder than usual. Over time, it adapts to meet the increased demand by getting fitter

You can overload your body in three ways:

· By increasing the frequency of exercise - how often you do it.

For example start by exercising twice a week, then move up to three or four times a week.

· By increasing the Intensity of the exercise - how hard you work.

For example run faster or lift heavier weights.

· ...

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Overload

To improve the fitness of a part of the body, you need to overload it. That means you need to make it work harder than usual. Over time, it adapts to meet the increased demand by getting fitter

You can overload your body in three ways:

· By increasing the frequency of exercise - how often you do it.

For example start by exercising twice a week, then move up to three or four times a week.

· By increasing the Intensity of the exercise - how hard you work.

For example run faster or lift heavier weights.

· By increasing the Time you spend on the exercise. If you are very unfit you might start off jogging just for 5 minutes a session, and work your way up week by week to 30 minutes a session.

Progression

Your body takes time to adapt to the increased demands on it. So you should build up your exercise level gradually. But once it reaches a certain level when it can comfortably deal with the level of exercise, it will not improve anymore. This is called plateauing. To prevent this from happening the exercises must be made progressively harder to ensure that the body continues to improve.

Equipment

· Cones

· 3 Hoops

· Footballs

· 1 Measuring Tape

The Circuit

The order in which the exercises are to be performed:

Warm up >> Stretches >> The Circuit >> Warm Down

Warm up & Stretching - The warm up is very important, as the exercises you will be doing are very demanding. The warm up will increase the blood flow and heart rate, warm up the muscles, warms and loosens joints. This will prevent any injuries to the muscles or joints.

Start by lightly jogging for approximately 4-5 minutes as a pulse raiser. This will get the oxygen pumping round my body and prepare it for exercise. Then move on to some dynamic stretching. For example: rotating hips and arms. Then stretch all the major muscles used for football, each stretch should be held for a period of 8 - 10 seconds.

The muscles required to be stretched during a warm up for football:

1. Hamstrings

2. Quadriceps

3. Gastrocnemiuis

4. Triceps

5. Deltoids

6. Trapezium

Station:One

On this station, using space in the middle on the start line, you start by sprinting to the first cone then sprint back to the line then sprint to the second cone, sprint back to the line then sprint to the third cone, back to the line, sprint to the forth cone and sprint back to the line to finish the exercise. Record the time taken to complete the exercise.

This exercise will improve your speed, agility and muscular endurance of the quadriceps and hamstrings.

Station:Two

This station is a sit up exercise using a mat. Perform as many sit-ups as you can in one minute. These will improve muscular endurance in the abdominal muscles; this comes in handy when a throw-in needs to be thrown over a long distance. This is explosive strength because it is done in one explosive movement.

Station:3

This exercise concentrates on a player's chipping ability and accuracy; the hoops should be placed 3m, 6m, and 9m from a line. Place a ball behind the line and chip it so it lands in the first hoop, then chip a ball so it lands in the second hoop. Then chip it so it lands in the third hoop. You score 3 points for the 3m hoop, 6 points for the 6m hoop and 9 points for the 9m hoop. Calculate a total after 1minute of this exercise.

Station:Four

This is a shooting exercise. Create a goal by placing cones 5m apart, then line up three balls 10m away from the cones and one three cones behind the balls (see the diagram). An assistant may be needed to return balls on the line after they have been hit. This will improve shooting accuracy & muscular strength.

Record the amount of shots that were scored, on target or missed. E.g. 4/2/1 is 4 Scored/2 On Target/1 Missed

Station:Five

Use this time (1 minute) to rest and relax. Some light stretching can be done to remove the lactic acid that has built up in your muscles during the first four exercises.

Station: Six

The exercise on this station are burpees, burpees are squat thrusts and star jumps mixed together. Do squat thrusts then stand up and do a star jump and then another squat thrust then stand up and do another star jump. Record the amount of burpees done in one minute. This will improve your agility, cardiovascular endurance and muscular endurance and strength of the quadriceps and hamstrings.

Station:Seven

Place six cones in a line 1m apart then dribble a ball in and out of them and dribble in a line back to the start, repeat this for 1 minute. This will improve ball skills, speed and agility. Record the amount of laps completed in 1minute.

Station:Eight

The exercise on this station is kick-ups. Do as many as you can in one minute. If the ball is dropped or touches the floor, the exercise must be restarted. This will improve ball control, and muscular endurance.

Station:Nine

Set up a line of 7 cones 1m apart.

From the designated line, attempt to pass the ball, from left to right, through each of the 6 spaces between the cones. Use both feet in this exercise: e.g. Use your right foot first for the first pass then your left foot for the next. If the exercise is completed successfully, restart the exercise using your left foot first instead of your right. You have one minute to pass the ball through each space of cones one after the other without missing a space. If a space is missed you have to restart the exercise. Extra balls or an assistant may be needed to return the ball to the line after each attempt. This exercise will improve the ability to pass the ball accurately and ball control.

Station:10

Press-ups – Do as many press-ups you can in one minute. Press-ups can improve muscular endurance & strength with are both essential aspects of playing football.

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Once the circuit is finished a cool down will take place, it involves performing a light continuous exercise where the heart rate remains elevated. The purpose of the cool-down is to keep metabolic activity high, and capillaries dilated, so that oxygen can be flushed through the muscle tissue, removing and oxidising any lactic acid that remains. This will prevent blood pooling in the veins which can cause dizziness if exercise is stopped abruptly.

The cool downs can also prevent delayed muscle soreness which can be developed after heavy and unaccustomed exercise.

The final part of the cool down period should involve a series of stretching exercises, which facilitate and improve flexibility as the muscles are very warm at this stage.

The muscles that were stretched in the warm up should also be stretched in the warm down. The stretches should be held longer then they were in the warm up to further prevent stiffness and soreness.

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This table below displays results for the first session of the Fitness Programme.

* Scored/On Target/Missed

In six weeks time these results should improve, below is a results table set over six weeks.

Evaluation

In general my fitness program was successful, it tested each area of fitness that I wanted it to.

Station 1: Shuttle runs. This station was fairy successful. I felt myself gain speed over the six weeks and I ran six circuits on the final week compared to two in the first! The exercise has also improved my agility and the endurance of my quadriceps and hamstrings.

Station 2: Sit-up exercise. This station was very tiring, but after each session I felt my abdominal muscles becoming stronger. I steadily improved over the six week period and I performed 39 sit-ups on the final week compared to 33 in the first. I felt I improved the strength and endurance of my abdominal muscles.

Station 3: Chipping balls into hoops. I found this exercise fairy difficult to begin with. But a few sessions I appeared to of gained in accuracy. I could chip the ball into each of the three hoops quite easily and could pick out the 9m hoop with ease helping me to gain a huge total on the final week of 78 compared to the first week where I only managed 33. I definitely improved in accuracy over the six week period.

Station 4: Shooting. This station tested my shooting and accuracy ability. This was one of the easier stations as shooting isn't a very strenuous work out, although I did improve over the six weeks. Week five and six were very successful. In week five I scored 10 goals without missing a single shot and in week six I scored nine and hit the post. I certainly improved in my shooting accuracy.

Station 5: Rest

Station 6: Burpees, this I found was the most difficult as it was very tiring and I had already done 4 other stations. I only improved slightly over the six week period. I couldn’t quite perform 20 in a minute. I managed 18 on week five which was my best score. Doing this exercise I have definitely improved my agility, cardiovascular endurance, muscular endurance and strength of the quadriceps and hamstrings.

Station 7: Dribbling. This was a fairly easy exercise I have improved on my speed and ball control, I noticed this in week five when I wasn't as tired as I was the weeks before.

Station 8: Kick-ups, I am fairly good at kick-ups already but by the end of the program I was able to keep the ball under control at a lower height than what I started with. I managed 56 on the final week compared to the 27 I only got on week one.

Station 9: Passing, this station tested my right and left foot, my accuracy and my speed, my left foot has improved a lot by doing this exercise. I now feel a lot more confident on the ball with my left foot than I did before which will be very helpful when playing in games of football.

Station 10: Press-ups, I found this very tiring with it being the last exercise. During the first couple of weeks, I found this final exercise very tiring, but after 3 or 4 weeks I felt I had gained in muscular endurance I found the exercise not quite as tough as weeks before.

During week four my results decrease, the reason for this is I had a cold that week and was unable to perform to my full potential, as my results show.

I felt I performed very well during weeks 5 and 6 even though I stalled on week 4 with a cold. It didn’t seam to disrupt my fitness level and stop me improving though if I had not had a cold I may have gained even better results during weeks 5 and 6.

I found the circuit to be very intense and tiring, but very effective as my circuit tested all the areas I wanted it to. I was very tired though after completing each week of the program, my muscles were aching and my heart and breathing rate had increased drastically. If I were to perform the circuit program again I would start by having a larger recovery time between each station. I felt too out of breath to do the next stations at some points In the circuit. I would also make the exercise time slightly less at the beginning of the program so I could get use to doing the exercises gradually.

Although I had improved during the six-week period I had only improved slightly, so if I were repeating this program I would make it at least 12 weeks so improvements could be seen more easily. Once the circuit becomes too easy I would have to make it harder to affect plateauing. If the circuit is not made harder the body will stop improving in the areas of muscular endurance and anaerobic respiration. The body must also train to prevent reversibility. This is when the affects of training decrease and the benefits are lost.