In-Season Training Mistakes for GAA Players

GAZ GAELIC GUIDE

In-Season Training Mistakes for GAA Players

And what your training week should actually look like

Right, I'm going to be straight with you here. I've been playing GAA for years, I'm a qualified PT, a Certified Nutritionist, and I've been posting GAA content since 2019 — and even I've made most of the mistakes I'm about to talk about. So this isn't me preaching from some high horse, this is me telling you what I've learned the hard way so you don't have to.

In-season training for GAA players is genuinely one of the most misunderstood areas in the game at club level. You've got lads going absolutely mental in the gym during the week, turning up to training on Thursday legs like lead, and wondering why their performance is going backwards. Or you've got the opposite — lads doing nothing in the gym because they think they'll be too tired and then wondering why they feel slow and weak in August when the championship comes around.

The reality is most club players are either doing too much, doing the wrong stuff, or doing it at the wrong time. Let's get into it.

Mistake #1: Training Too Hard in the Gym During Match Week

This is the big one. And I think it comes from a good place — lads want to improve, they're motivated, they're in the gym Tuesday and Wednesday and Friday and they feel great about themselves. But here's the problem.

Your team training sessions ARE your conditioning. That's not a throwaway comment — at club level, two pitch sessions a week plus a game is a significant load on your body. Your nervous system, your legs, your joints — they're taking a hammering. If you're stacking heavy squats and leg press on top of that, you're not adding to your performance, you're taking from it.

The goal in-season isn't to get fitter. The goal is to maintain what you built in the off-season and stay fresh enough to perform on match day.

I learned this myself during the 2024 season. I was still training like it was January — high volume, heavy loads, multiple sessions a week — and I was turning up to matches feeling flat. Not injured, just flat. No pop. The legs were there physically but the sharpness was gone. That explosive first yard that I rely on as a full forward? Gone.

When I pulled back the gym work and actually started treating it as maintenance rather than development, I felt the difference within two weeks. Game speed came back. I felt fresh. It sounds obvious in hindsight but when you're in the middle of it, it's hard to admit that less is more.

Mistake #2: Skipping the Gym Completely

The flip side of Mistake #1. Some lads read 'don't overdo it' and take it as 'don't bother at all.' That's not it either.

Here's what actually happens when you stop gym training completely in-season: you lose muscle mass, your strength drops off, and by the time championship comes around in July or August, your body isn't in the same shape it was in March. You feel weaker in contact, you're more susceptible to soft tissue injuries, and that physical edge you had early in the year is gone.

The research backs this up too — it doesn't take much to maintain strength adaptations. Two sessions a week, moderate volume, keeping the intensity honest. That's it. You're not trying to set PBs in-season. You're just trying to hold onto what you built.

Two gym sessions a week is the sweet spot for most club players during the season. One is survivable. Zero is a mistake.

Mistake #3: Treating Warm-Up Sets Like Working Sets

This one specifically annoys me because it's so easy to fix and so common. Lads come into the gym, load up the bar straight away and go after it, then wonder why they feel battered the next day.

Your warm-up sets exist to prepare your joints, your nervous system, and your muscles for the actual work. They shouldn't be close to failure. A warm-up set at 60% of your working weight for 5 reps is NOT a working set. The moment you start treating every set in the session as maximum effort, your total volume and fatigue skyrocket — and in-season, that's the last thing you want.

Keep your working sets honest — pick a weight you can execute well, do your 3 sets, and get out. In-season is not the time to be grinding out 5-rep max attempts.

Mistake #4: Hammering Legs the Day Before Training

Sounds obvious. Happens all the time.

If your team trains Thursday and Saturday, you shouldn't be doing a heavy lower body session on Wednesday. Simple as that. Heavy squats, deadlifts, leg press — they cause muscle damage that takes 48-72 hours to recover from. If you're doing them Wednesday evening and training Thursday night, you are actively sabotaging your performance.

If you want to do lower body work, do it Monday or Tuesday — give yourself as much distance as possible from your pitch sessions. And even then, keep the volume sensible.

Mistake #5: Ignoring Recovery Completely

Sleep, nutrition, and managing your overall load during the season isn't boring stuff you can skip — it's where the results actually happen. Your body doesn't get better during training, it gets better during recovery. That's not a motivational quote, that's literally the physiology.

I wore a Whoop for a while and the data was actually eye-opening. Nights where I wasn't sleeping well, my recovery scores were in the bin — and those were exactly the days I felt flat in training. It's not rocket science but it's easy to ignore when you're busy with work and life. At least be aware of it.

• Aim for 7-9 hours of sleep — especially the night before a game

• Protein: you need enough to maintain muscle. 1.6-2g per kg of bodyweight minimum

• Eat enough. In-season is not the time for aggressive fat loss dieting — you need fuel

• Hydration: boring, but it matters. Even mild dehydration affects speed and reaction time

I went through a 14-week fat loss and body recomposition phase with my coach Dylan Nolan after the 2025 season — post-season, when I could afford to be in a calorie deficit and dial things back. I lost around 6kg and hit a personal best GPS speed of 9 metres per second. But I timed it right. Doing that kind of deficit during the season would have been a disaster.

Mistake #6: No Structure — Just 'Doing Bits'

Last one and it's probably the most common. Most club players don't have a plan. They just turn up to the gym and do whatever feels good that day. Chest on Monday because it's Monday. Some bicep curls because why not. Maybe some cardio if they feel guilty. Then they wonder why they're not seeing any improvement.

Having even a basic structure — knowing what you're doing before you walk in the door, having a rough plan for the week, being consistent with it — puts you ahead of 90% of club players. It doesn't have to be complicated. It just has to be intentional.

Structure beats motivation every single time. Motivation comes and goes. A plan keeps you going when motivation has done a lap.

What an Ideal Training Week Looks Like

Okay, so we've talked about what not to do. Here's a realistic template for an average club GAA player with two pitch sessions a week and a match on the weekend. This isn't for inter-county lads with full-time S&C coaches — this is for the working adult trying to balance a job, a life, and performing well for their club.

Assumptions: Team trains Tuesday and Friday. Match on Sunday. You have access to a gym 2-3 times a week.

The Key Principles Behind This Week

• Upper body gym work earlier in the week — furthest from match day

• Lower body gym work mid-week — enough distance from Friday training

• Wednesday is recovery, not an opportunity to sneak in another session

• Saturday is match prep or full rest — no heavy training

• Sunday is sacred — completely off

If you only have time for one gym session a week, make it a full body session on Monday or Tuesday. Keep it to 45-60 minutes, 3 working sets per exercise, sensible weight, and get out.

What Those Gym Sessions Should Look Like

Upper Body Session (Monday) — 45-50 minutes

• Bench Press: 3 x 8-10 @ 70% of max

• Bent Over Row or Cable Row: 3 x 10

• Dumbbell Shoulder Press: 3 x 10

• Lat Pulldown: 3 x 10-12

• Face Pulls or Band Pull-Aparts: 2 x 15 (shoulder health — do not skip this if you've ever had a shoulder issue)

• Optional: Bicep curl, tricep pushdown — 2 sets each if time allows

Lower Body Session (Thursday) — 45-50 minutes

• Goblet Squat or Barbell Squat: 3 x 8 @ moderate weight

• Romanian Deadlift: 3 x 10

• Bulgarian Split Squat or Reverse Lunge: 3 x 8 each leg

• Nordic Hamstring Curl or Hamstring Curl Machine: 3 x 8 (hamstring injury prevention — massive for GAA)

• Calf raises: 3 x 15

No maximal efforts. No grinding out reps to failure. Clean, controlled, in and out.

Final Thoughts

Look, I'm not going to pretend this is groundbreaking stuff. A lot of it is common sense. But common sense isn't always common practice, especially when you're a motivated player who wants to improve and you're seeing all these gym videos online telling you to go harder.

The lads who perform consistently well across a full season are rarely the lads who trained the most — they're the lads who trained smartest. They showed up to matches fresh, they maintained their strength, and they didn't let their gym ambition get in the way of their pitch performance.

That's the job in-season. Get to match day in the best shape you can be. Everything else is noise.

Train to perform. Not to impress anyone in the gym.

If you want a structured in-season gym plan built specifically for GAA club players, I'm currently developing one — and it'll be the only one on the market that's actually designed around the GAA season calendar, not just a generic gym programme with a GAA logo slapped on it. Keep an eye on @gaz_gaelic_guide on Instagram and @gazgaelicguide on TikTok.

Gaz Gaelic Guide  |  @gaz_gaelic_guide  |  gazgaelicguide.com