How To Train And Play Sports

Quite often, we start seeing the benefits in our strength, health and fitness from putting in the HARD WORK in the gym. We see those results and link it directly to the gym training, but it’s really important to remember to keep applying your strength and fitness to other areas and not just connecting it entirely to the gym grind. 

Why you need sport outside the gym

Training in the gym is and should be controlled and predictable. You know the plan, the variables, the structure. You’ve probably tracked your progress and feel dialled into what works for you. That’s all great, but sport throws in a different kind of stimulus. It’s reactive, chaotic, and unpredictable. 

The physical benefits of sport

When you play a sport—whether it’s football, tennis, basketball, martial arts, or even a casual weekend game, you’re putting your body into different movement patterns, speeds, angles, and decisions that you just don’t get from a barbell or an erg. It challenges your coordination, awareness, timing, and endurance in a way gym training can’t replicate independently.

And the best part? You use your fitness without thinking about using it. You’re sprinting, reacting, cutting, changing direction, adapting on the fly - and your body can handle it because you’ve been putting in the work in the gym. You move better, recover faster, and stay injury-free longer. That’s the real-world value of being strong and fit.

The mental edge

There’s also the mental side. Playing a sport reminds you why you started training in the first place. It’s fun. Competitive. Social. You get to switch your brain off from tracking metrics and just play. That refreshes you more than another structured session ever could.

​​Playing sports does something powerful on a neurological level. You’re constantly making decisions, reacting to movement, adapting to unpredictable situations, and your brain is firing just as much as your body. That kind of stimulus creates sharpness. It improves coordination, timing, and pattern recognition in ways structured training can’t fully replicate. And maybe more importantly, it forces presence. When you’re in the middle of a game, you’re not thinking about work stress, your to-do list, or anything else - you’re just in it. That mental switch off, paired with the high-speed learning of new skills and movement patterns, is one of the most underrated forms of physical and psychological development.

How training and sport work together

Now, this doesn’t mean training should take a backseat. It just means you don’t have to choose one or the other. In fact, they feed into each other. Keep training hard, but give yourself the space to apply that work in a real-world environment. Your gym numbers might not always go up every week if you’re also playing a sport - but your overall performance, athleticism, and enjoyment will.

So if you’ve stopped playing the sport you love because you’re focused on lifting more or chasing the next PR, it might be time to bring it back in. Use the gym to build and bulletproof your body. Use sports to express your fitness. 

Your training doesn’t end when you leave the gym. It just finds new ways to SHOW UP.

How do you fit sport into a 5-day training program?.

Let’s say you’re following a structured 5-day program. You’re training with intent, ticking off strength work, conditioning, accessory work, etc. Adding sport on top can feel like it will either mess with recovery or take away from gym progress. But it doesn’t have to.

The key is knowing where to slot it in and being honest about the intensity it brings.

If your sport is low-impact or technical, like table tennis, slower-paced pickleball, pad work, or light football drills, you can treat it as an active recovery day. It’s a movement, skill, and a mental reset all in one. Ideal for your rest days or lighter sessions.

If you’re playing something more full-on like a match, a hard 5-a-side session, or sparring, then treat that as one of your training days. Don’t force a double session or try to squeeze your program around it. Replace a high-intensity gym piece with the sport session and let that be your daily intensity. You’ll still hit the energy systems, challenge your movement, and stay athletic — it just won’t be in the shape of EMOMs and AMRAPs. 

That gives you balance, keeps recovery in check, and allows training and sport to push each other forward rather than compete.

The best way to balance both

The worst thing you can do is cram everything in and end up under-recovered or half-committed. Instead, treat sport as part of your program, not something separate to work around. If the goal is to be a better athlete, more capable, and more resilient, this approach covers all the bases.