Rugby: Cone Crawling Contact Conditioning

*AUDIO DESCRIPTION ON*

Players sit back to back, arms interlocked and knees bent. The coach says left or right. The players must battle to pull their partner to the floor on the said side.

Have 3 or more pad holders, this depends on how many rucking units you wish to have and how many players you have at training - but work hard to keep every player busy and active.

The 3 pad holder should be about 5 meters back from the rucking units, and they should be holding the pads safely.

Players should work in groups of 2, and there will be 1 scrum half. Only one ball is needed as the scrum half will move the ball from unit to unit.

Get the players moving quickly, and tell the players the following....

1. One player carries the ball into contact and presents the ball.
2. The other player provides covers and time for the scrum half to move the ball to the next unit.

The scrum half should move the ball from unit to unit, and the units/pads should reposition themselves for the next line of attacks. Keep the action going, and don't forget to change the players on the pads.

From the start position, run out to the centre set of cones.

Quickly move sideways to the left set of cones and then move quickly sideways to the right set of cones.

Return sideways to the center set of cones and then run quickly backwards to the start position.

This is a great warm-up for defensive and evasion sessions, or it might even be a warm-up that helps you reinforce coaching points made during a previous session. The best bit is that it's fun and relevant to all ages. If you're coaching tag rugby, change the warm-up exercise from contact to tags.

One team runs clockwise round the inside of the circle with the other team running anti-clockwise around the outside of the circle. The circle in this case is marked out using blue cones, but you can use whatever colour you like.

When the coach shouts 'Jailbreak' the players inside the inner circle try to 'escape' to outside the 10m x 10m square (yellow cones). The size of the square and distance from the circle is a suggestion, play with it a little and let us know your variations!

The inside team scores a point for each 'jailbreaker' - swap over. If you have an odd number of players give the defenders the extra man.