Improving personal components of skill-related fitness will allow you to perform better in almost all situations and especially in the game of soccer. There are several options here, and many different paths that you can take to improve those components, as well. With kids U.S. soccer consider that drawing conclusions about your current skill level will help you set goals for improvement.

For example, increasing your agility will make you a better player in a number of sports including the game of soccer. To increase your agility, you can do several things. The shuttle-run exercise is a great way to achieve these results – faster pivots and quicker turns during this exercise will allow you to increase your agility, and perform better in other areas.

The same principle applies to all personal skill-related areas of fitness: muscular endurance, muscular strength, spatial awareness, agility and coordination.

It is not enough to simply improve your personal skill-related areas. You must apply them, and understand how to integrate them into other activities. For instance, you might choose to take up dance, which relies on and can improve your agility and coordination. Increasing your agility and balance will help you smoothly transition from one step to another throughout the entire routine and help when you play a game of soccer.

Another example can be drawn from soccer. Greater muscular endurance and coordination will help you kick the ball down the field, avoid defenders and position yourself to score or pass to a teammate who is positioned to score.

Using Skill-Related and Health-Related Fitness to Improve Selected Activities

Like the example in the previous section, you can use your skill and health-related fitness to improve your performance in other activities. For instance, you can improve your standing long jump performance by increasing your muscular strength, as well as power.

Greater coordination and agility will help you improve kicking, while more power and muscular strength will help you sprint faster up and down the field. Greater muscular endurance will help you perform better in long-distance running on the field from one goal to the other. Each activity both benefits and is benefitted by improvement in these areas.

With kids U.S. soccer consider that different components of skill-related fitness will also apply outside of your high school career. You need to cultivate each of these components to ensure that you are able to perform well in both recreation and within the bounds of a career.

For example, greater muscular strength, endurance and speed will make you better able to run up stairs, a requirement for those choosing to become firefighters. Greater balance, coordination and muscle strength will translate into greater ability and confidence in recreational activities like rock climbing.

With kids U.S. soccer consider that nutrition planning is an essential component of both body composition and physical performance. The right nutritional plan is vital for all people, but it is especially important for those who expect to attain high levels of performance.

For example, the choice to become a vegetarian can allow you to adhere to personal principles and ethics, but it can also put you at a disadvantage in terms of physical performance. Vegetarian athletes require additional sources of protein to help grow and strengthen muscle tissue.

For vegetarians, protein can be found in numerous places that are not derived from animals. For instance, beans are excellent sources of protein, as are nuts. However, they can also be high in fat, which should be avoided. Protein supplements (non-animal derived) can be found at most health food stores. These have low fat content, high protein content and can be mixed into beverages or foods very easily.