Ultimate Fitness

Here's something I think about a lot, but haven't really acted on in the past 9-12 months... Fitness. Well, fitness specific to Ultimate.

Everytime I get into any conversation about fitness with an Ultimate player in these parts, they like to talk about their 5-mile runs and all this pish-posh endurance exercise. It's all well and good, but we aren't exactly trying to play a game at 60-70% max speed are we?

Here's what I feel about Ultimate-specific fitness: It involves explosive movements that rely on the ability to recover quickly so as to repeat these explosive movements as many times as possible in an hour and a half.

Sprinting to a disc, blowing past an opponent for a 'd', and getting vertical for a disc are not endurance-related movements. Work your sprints with increasing lowered recovery time, manage your plyometric exercises so you are working at maximum effort for every rep, and workout for the sport you play. If you can't run 5 miles it doesn't mean you can't be a good Ultimate player. I'd take the guy that can play every other point 100% over the marathoner that can survive a full game at 65% any day.

I suppose this fitness blurb ties in a bit to the situation you play in. If you are someone who the team needs on the field for 75-80% of the points then it's going to be hard to stay "explosive" through the season, but if you've got a deep team and you can sub in and out freely, there is no reason for you to workout at that 60-75% level. Practice to where you want to play.

The only way to play at 100% is to practice at 100%. Next step: stop talking and start doing....