The game of football requires a player to be all-around athletic. Players need a combination of speed, strength, agility and power to be successful on the field. Without a weight room and equipment, training can be challenging.

Luckily, athletes can utilize bodyweight exercises to help stay in great shape in the offseason.

According to Jace Derwin, lead sports performance specialist at Volt Athletics, body weight exercises are an excellent way to involve all the muscles in your body. There are five that he particularly likes:

Box jumps and hops (single-leg, double-leg, landing)

Derwin suggested box jumps as an exercise to help develop explosive ability. It also simultaneously teaches safe movement mechanics in different landing positions, which can help prevent injury risk.

“Jumping onto a box and placing conscious effort into the position of the knees, hips, and ankles will help to instill sound mechanics that can transfer to the field,” he said.

Hops on one or both legs can help to develop the ability of the lower limbs to handle the stress of repeated explosive efforts in the game of football.

Push-up and pull-up variations

Derwin believes push-ups and pull-ups are a great way to work the upper body.

“Push-ups and pull-ups are staples for upper-body development,
 he said.

An added bonus, according to Derwin, is that both exercises have many different variants and can be made easier or more challenging depending on the athlete.

Squats, lunges and step-ups

For the lower body, Derwin believes squats are indispensable.

“The bodyweight squat is a foundational movement that can help identify limiting mobility factors that can be improved with direct and focused work,” he said.

Derwin also said that lunges and step-ups assist with strength and balance to ensure a strong base and explosive abilities.

Plank and plank variations

Derwin pointed to planks as a key exercise for the core—and a better option than crunches.

“Core stability is necessary and vital to preventing injury risk,” he said. “Athletes frequently tend to mistake core strength as simply isolating the abdominals and performing crunches. Instead, athletes would benefit from improving the endurance and control of the entire trunk musculature through postural bracing in the plank position.”

Planks are also very versatile in ways to make them more difficult. Lifting an arm or a leg or elevating your feet are ways to make planks challenge your body even more.

Hill sprints

Sometimes, athletes need to take it outside.

Derwin pointed to hill sprints as a key exercise in an athlete's exercise arsenal.

“The hill offers a natural resistance that demands more forceful running mechanics, helping to teach athletes to run hard with quick turnover. The incline of the hill places the athlete’s body position in a natural forward lean and prevents over striding, a vital biomechanical necessity to effective acceleration off the line,” he said.

Derwin also said uphill running minimizes impact, decreasing the risk of shin splints.

These body weight exercises will not only keep you in football shape, but will help you prevent injury, increase flexibility and become stronger.

For examples of body weight exercises and variations, click here.