Agility drill
Accelerate-Decelerate Runway
Train hard braking, which loads the body more than sprinting and underpins every change of direction.
- Time
- 15 minutes
- Players
- 1 to 4 players
- Intensity
- High
- Equipment
- Cones
- Space
- 20m straight line
- Positions
- All positions
Setup
Three cones on flat grass: a start cone, an acceleration mark at 15m, and a stop line 5m past it.
How to run it
- Sprint flat out from the start to the 15m mark, then stop as fast as you possibly can before the stop line and hold a balanced athletic position for one second.
- Brake late and hard rather than slowing gradually - chop your steps, drop your hips and get your weight behind your front foot with your shin angled back and your chest upright.
- As you get better, move the stop line closer to the 15m mark so you have less room to stop in.
- Do 5 reps with 2-3 minutes rest.
- Stopping puts more force through your body than sprinting does, so do this fresh and keep the volume low.
Coaching cues
- Slam on the brakes
- Drop the hips and chop the steps
- Weight behind your front foot, chest tall
Common mistakes
- Braking early over lots of little steps, so you never actually train hard braking
- Folding forward at the waist, which turns the stop into a stumble and loads the knee badly
Related drills
- Curved Sprint ArcDevelop speed on a curved running line, which is how most attacking lines are actually run.
- Box DrillTrain switching between sprinting, shuffling and backpedalling without standing up in between.
- Mirror DrillTrain genuine reactive agility by making you respond to a real player instead of a set pattern.
- Run to DaylightTrain reading a defender late and cutting decisively into the gap at full speed.
- 5-0-5 TurnDevelop the 180-degree turn off one foot used chasing kicks and retreating to reload.
- 3-Cone L-DrillCombine hard stops, tight turns and a curved weaving run in one sequence.