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1000 Ways to Train for Lacrosse

As lacrosse players, we love to stay in great shape and train ourselves in new ways that push our limits and help us stay competitive. In an effort to give you the upper hand, we’re working to supply you with a list of 1,000 training methods that will assist you in your quest to be the next Lacrosse All Star. Whether your goal is the Tewaaraton winner or Summer League MVP, add these workouts to your repertoire and prepare the best.

1000 Ways to Train: 51-60

Training for lacrosse is a little different than training for most sports as you can’t rely SOLELY on your strength or ONLY on your speed. To be an elite lacrosse player, it’s vital that you train hard in several areas: strength, power, speed, agility, and endurance.

The best players in the game move constantly while on the field, running from one point to another as each play progresses. Lacrosse is a very peculiar sport in that way because it requires players to have extreme levels of endurance and the strength to muscle through a check or body up on an opponent.

Simply put, you need to be able to run fast, run all day AND be a beast.

And so 1000 Ways To Train For Lacrosse continues…

51. Close-grip Press

This one is really good for defenders and anyone else looking to really target their chest and shoulders. Grab your stick and hold it like you were going to play defense on someone, this exercise is very similar to that position (minus the grip). You can use a normal bench press barbell, a curl bar, or even dumbbells. The key is to really keep your hands no further than shoulder width apart while you are pressing. This will definitely give you a leg up when you are trying to drive your attacker away from the goal.

Close Grip Bench Press

52. Single-Arm Rows aka Chainsaw Pulls

Always a great addition to your upper body days. Single-arm rows really help target your whole lat, upper back and the trap muscles. There are several different ways to do these, you can use a weight bench (as pictured), the dumbbell rack (if you want to get in everyone’s way), by sitting backwards on an incline bench.

It is important not to cheat when doing these. It is easy to just use your whole body and hips to swing the weight up, but it is most effective to use a slow, controlled movement and really put emphasis on the targeted areas while keeping your core tight and your neck neutral.

Single-Arm Rows

53. Sledgehammer Workout

When I was up at Idaho, I always saw the football players coming outside with a sledgehammer to hit the big tractor tires for an extended period of time, it looked like a lot of fun. After college the famous Flava Fletch turned me on to the sledgehammer workouts as a great alternative exercise to keep your body guessing. Sledgehammer workouts are a great way to develop your core strength, as well as enhance your grip and strengthen your forearms.

Here is a great “How-to” on the Sledgehammer Workouts.

54. Hang Cleans

Power cleans, check, deadlifts, check, that only leaves one thing – hang cleans. If you are a lacrosse player and aren’t doing hang cleans, you need to figure it out. There are extensive resources on hang cleans that you can use to learn proper technique, so I will only say one thing – it is all about form. As I’ve mentioned before, I learned this the hard way, but now having learned proper form, I love them. Until you get the proper form done, make sure you stick with lighter weight. You only hurt yourself if you throw on a bunch of weight so you look like a tough guy.

55. Jump Squats

One thing every lacrosse players knows, is that explosion is huge. Doing workouts that really help with your explosion are what give you that extra step off the line and that extra burst through a split dodge. Jump squats really work to develop y0ur strength and speed along with all that explosion I keep talking about.

Check out this article on the benefits and application of Jump Squats.

56. Pistol Squats

With all the Crossfit junkies today, there are all sorts of crazy workouts that require A LOT of overall strength and stability to complete, this is one of them. The Pistol Squat definitely has a high degree of difficulty. When I first started doing them, I held a weight in front of my body to help my balance as I lowered myself down. As you get more comfortable with it, decrease the weight until you don’t need any at all or add some onto your back to raise the difficulty.

Pistol Squats

57. Full Sit-ups with Twist

Works your abs, works your obliques, you are good to go. Take it away little man!

Full Sit-up with Twist

58. V-up

V-ups, Pike crunches, toe-touches, whatever you call these, they are a fantastic exercise for a killer ab workout. As always, proper form > speed. Have a nice controlled motion to really strain those abs.

59. Double Leg Ski-Hops

Double Leg Ski-Hops are great for working on lateral movement… or for preparing for ski season. Start with one foot inside and one foot outside the hole, then jump to the next square like in the picture below.
Double Leg Ski Hops

60. Front/Back Hops – Skip a hole

Keep working on the foot speed! You won’t be as quick as Kyle Harrison if you aren’t training yourself properly. Start facing one side of the ladder. Jump in and out of the ladder as quickly as possible while moving to the other end. Really aim to get as close to either side of the ladder as you can.

Front/Back Hops - Skip a Hole

Until next time, only 940 to go!

1,000 is a big number. Please share your favorite lifts and exercises in the comments section (or email us at info@lacrosseallstars.com) so we can add them to our list and reach the big 1-0-0-0!

An important note about trainingYou should always consider your own goals and decide what you want to accomplish during training. Most importantly though, always learn how to properly do an exercise before you start doing it. As very few of us are experts in Sports Science or Medicine, we always recommend doing your own research and finding credible trainers to teach you how to train. Train smart, train safe, train hard, lax on.