Carlton fitness boss reveals training change that helped Patrick Cripps hit new levels of speed and power

Experts predicted Patrick Cripps’ contested playing style would end his career early. Years later he’s hitting new PBs and eyeing off another Brownlow. Carlton’s fitness boss reveals how.

Patrick Cripps of the Blues bursts out of the middle. Picture: Michael Klein

Patrick Cripps recorded the fastest GPS speed of his 199-game career on Saturday night as the beast onballer continues to hit new heights only years after greats of the game questioned whether his contested style was sustainable.

Cripps, 29, has averaged 92 per cent of pre-season for the past six years and is a red-hot chance to secure a second Brownlow Medal in three seasons.

“There’s not too many in the game that get that clean run,” Blues’ high performance boss Andrew Russell told the Herald Sun.

“That’s missing two or three sessions over a pre-season, that’s virtually nothing.

“We’ve played around with his training program a lot. In 2021 he didn’t have a great preparation coming off a shoulder (reconstruction) and he was also really conservative with his approach. He felt like if he was going to stay in the game a long time he needed to be more conservative with his training – and it didn’t work.

“So in 2022 we went completely the opposite way and it set him up. He went home to Perth and trained like a madman. He came back and he was actually a bit overcooked because he trained that hard.

“He would ring me so often, I’ve never had a player ring me so often in the off-season, and say, ‘What about this? What about that? Can I do an extra here?’.”

Patrick Cripps bursts out of the middle. Picture: Michael Klein

Cripps returned and smashed his time-trial record as his long-criticised aerobic power improved enough to allow him to go after speed and power gains.

Leigh Matthews said in 2021: “I can’t believe how badly he’s aged. He just looks like he’s lost his mobility and agility. He’s still probably got his strength, but he just doesn’t move the same as he did two years ago”.

Former Blues coach David Parkin said in 2018 the Blues’ lack of physical support for Cripps would “kill” him.

But Russell said: “That banged-up narrative is completely driven with no knowledge behind that at all”.

“There’s no facts to that. That’s been talked about in the game forever, but there’s nothing to actually back that up,” he said.

“(Cripps) naturally is good at that, his body is conditioned to that – and whatever your body is conditioned to is what it handles.

Andrew Russell says Patrick Cripps can dominate for years to come. Picture: Brett Costello

“He probably would be in the game less if he played forward than around the ball.

“But he prepares for that. You prepare for the demands of game, and if you don’t prepare for the demands of the game that’s when you might get banged up – because you don’t prepare for what the game throws at you.”

Russell said Cripps was “absolutely” at his best entering game No.200 on Saturday and expected him to reach new heights.

“I can’t see any reason why he can’t continue to even get better,” Russel said.

“He’s not carrying any chronic joint injuries. There’s nothing stopping him from staying at this level for a period of time. He’s an absolute sponge and he wants to learn. He’s got this attitude that you can never know enough.”