Conditioning w/o Losing Weight?

Hey yall, I am a rugby player, 6 foot and about 185-190 pounds. I am in off season and I just gained about 20 pounds as i was weighing in at 168-170 last year. I play lock, which for those of you who know the sport know I am terribly undersized, but I am one of the best tacklers, I am only trying to bulk for Scrums which weight helps a lot in.

ANYWAYS, I have recently started throwing some running in my program, I lift on Monday Wednesday and Friday using starting strength, I am milking ALL of the newbie strength gains I can get. On Tuesday Thursday and Saturday I am running, anywhere from 1.5 to 3 miles.

I have not noticed any weight loss yet but I really want to stay at 190, as it would really improve my game, can you guys give any suggestions as far as a 3 day a week conditioning program? I need to run for distance at least once a week because in a rugby game you run about 6 miles, but what would you guys suggest.

Im no expert on this.

But if I you I would do one day a week for a timed 4 km run, one day a week for 400m repeats, and one day a week for short sprints under 50m.

And eat more.

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[quote]theBird wrote:
Im no expert on this.

But if I you I would do one day a week for a timed 4 km run, one day a week for 400m repeats, and one day a week for short sprints under 50m.

And eat more.

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Definitely this! In a game, you cover a lot of ground, but you are light jogging, then sprinting, etc. Mixing up your training stimulus would help. Even doing some track work where you light jog for 10 seconds, then sprint for 10, then jog for 20, sprint 20, or any combination would help. But also, like the Bird suggested, Eat. How much food, you ask? ALL of it!

EliteFTS has a really good article by a professional rugby team strength and conditioning coach.

I would second what the bird already told you. Ideally, do the long run on saturdays because pushing yourself over several miles makes your legs pretty sore.