Building a cardio base for rugby

Building a cardio base is normally an off-season activity; it’s when you develop a solid level of general fitness so that, when it’s time to start training more intensely, your body is adequately prepared. A good level of cardio fitness will ensure you recover more quickly between sets of strength training and interval training, and more quickly between workouts too.

To develop a cardio base, your training needs to be aerobic in nature, and that means low to moderate intensity exercise, sustained for relatively long periods of time. You can read more about developing cardiovascular fitness in our article – How much cardio do rugby players really need? – then grab one of our supplements or custom stacks before you get to work!

Here are some joint friendly training methods that are perfect for rugby players:

1) Circuit training

Circuit training was invented at Leeds University in England way back in the 1960s. It’s a system of training that was designed to improve cardiovascular fitness and muscular endurance all at the same time – sounds perfect for ruggers, right?!

Simply choose 8-12 preferably compound exercises, and perform them back to back. Rest a moment after completing the final exercise, and then repeat. You can use bodyweight exercises, free-weight exercises, kettlebell exercises, TRX exercises, or a combination of the above. Work for a set number of reps or time per station.

Example circuit:

Do 45 seconds of each exercise, rest 1-2 minutes between laps. Do as many reps as you can per station.

Speed squats

Push-ups

V-sits

Step-ups

Bench dips

Medicine ball slams

Jump rope/jump jacks

TRX rows

Kettlebell swings

Supine back extensions

Avoid placing overlapping or similar exercises back-to-back, as localized muscular fatigue will reduce your work rate, decreasing the cardiovascular benefit of your workout. Instead, use non-competing exercise, e.g. legs/upper body/core.

2) Swimming

Swimming is the ultimate in non-impact exercises, and a very good cardio choice for ruggers. Because your bodyweight is supported by the water, the risk of impact-related injury is zero, nada, zilch!

However, for swimming to be an effective cardio workout, you need to be a half-decent swimmer. To develop your fitness, you need to be able to keep on swimming for a sustained period of time. The best stroke for developing cardio fitness is freestyle, sometimes called front crawl.

If, because of poor technique, you have to stop every lap or so to empty your lungs of water, swimming probably isn’t right for you.

Can’t swim, won’t swim? Try deep water running instead. Think big guys can’t swim? Check out this video of 400 lb. World’s Strongest Man Eddie Hall making it look easy: