When it comes to preparing elite athletes for high-stakes competition, Aled Walters is a coach who knows exactly what works. Now leading the British & Irish Lions’ physical conditioning for their upcoming six-week tour of Australia, the experienced Welshman is turning to tried-and-tested methods to get his players firing fast.
Among his favourite tools is a deceptively simple – and undeniably tough – running drill borrowed from the New Zealand sevens setup.
Known as the 80-60-40 drill, it’s designed to test fitness, build resilience and quickly expose who’s ready to dig deep. ‘It’s horrendous,’ Walters admits, ‘but it’s repeatable – and a great way to test and improve your fitness.’
In an environment where time is short and standards are sky-high, this kind of session is key to sharpening minds and bodies alike.
The 80-60-40 Drill
- Find a rugby pitch and start under the posts.
- Run as hard as you can to the far 22m line (80m).
- Sprint back to the near 22m line (60m).
- Then run to the far 10m line (40m).
‘Your target is to cover that 180m in 30 seconds or under,’ he says. You’ve then got a minute to walk to the far try line before you go again. ‘It’s 30 seconds of maximal work and a minute of rest – a 1:2 work to rest ratio.’
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Former Munster full-back Felix Jones, who Walters also coached alongside during his short spell with England, holds the record. ‘Felix had one of the best engines I’ve seen,’ he remembers. ‘He looked scrawny enough but man he was mentally tough.’
Walters challenged Jones with the 80-60-40 drill to see how many reps he could manage before tapping out. ‘I thought surely six or seven and he’d be cooked, but he did 11 reps in a row,’ he says, fondly. ‘That’s a nice one for pre-season for outside backs and quicker back rowers. That’s a tasty one for sure.’
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Sam Rider is an experienced health and fitness journalist, author and REPS Level 3 qualified personal trainer. Having covered – and coached in – the industry since 2011, he’s road tested every workout concept, training accessory and diet plan you could dream of, while quizzing titans of the industry and reporting on the physical and mental exploits of Olympic athletes, World Cup winners and CrossFit Games champs. In 2016, in the name of science, he underwent a clean bulking transformation, packing on 10kg of lean mass in 10 weeks, before promptly dropping 10kg in two weeks after tearing his ACL on the football pitch.Sam graduated from the University of Leeds with a degree in History and completed his NCTJ Diploma in Journalism at News Associates in Manchester.