Your cart is empty.
Built for XV. Not for many.
Preseason has a reputation it has entirely earned. Two or three weeks of running that has nothing to do with rugby, at the end of a summer in which most players did approximately nothing, measured by tests designed to find out exactly how little you did. It does not have to go like that. Here is what the Bronco and the Yo-Yo actually measure, what a realistic score looks like at club and university level, and a six-week ramp that means week one is unpleasant rather than catastrophic.
What the Bronco actually is
The Bronco is a shuttle running test that came out of New Zealand rugby and is now used almost universally, from academies to club sides, because it needs nothing but a pitch, five cones and a stopwatch.
One repetition is a shuttle out and back to 20 metres, then out and back to 40, then out and back to 60. That is 240 metres. You do five of those, continuously, with no rest. Total distance 1,200 metres, and the only instruction is to complete it as fast as you possibly can.
It is horrible by design. The repeated deceleration and turn is what makes it rugby-specific — you are not testing how fast you can run 1,200 metres in a straight line, you are testing how well you tolerate accelerating and stopping repeatedly while progressively more fatigued. That is a reasonable proxy for what a back row does for eighty minutes.
240mOne repetition20m out and back, 40m out and back, 60m out and back.
5RepetitionsContinuous. No rest between reps.
1,200mTotal distancePlus 30 changes of direction, which is the actual point.
0Equipment neededFive cones and a stopwatch. This is why it is everywhere.
What score should you be aiming for?
Here is where most articles start inventing numbers, so let us be careful about what is actually known and what is not.
Bronco times are widely reported for professional players and are genuinely fast — comfortably under five minutes at the top end, with the quickest backs faster still. What is much less well documented is what a good time looks like at Canadian club or university level, because nobody publishes that data systematically.
So treat the bands below as a rough orientation rather than a standard. The number that actually matters is your own time in week one compared with your own time in week six.
| Band | Roughly | What it means |
|---|---|---|
| Elite professional | Under 5:00, quickest backs faster | Full-time training. Not a realistic target if you have a job or a degree. |
| Very strong amateur | Around 5:00 to 5:30 | A fit back or back-rower who trained through the off-season. |
| Solid club standard | Around 5:30 to 6:15 | Where most committed club players land in mid-preseason. |
| Front row and second row | Frequently slower, and that is fine | The test does not weight for body mass. A 120kg prop and a 78kg winger are not doing the same test. |
| First time, after a summer off | Whatever it is | Genuinely does not matter. Record it and beat it in six weeks. |
Professional benchmarks are widely reported in strength and conditioning literature. Amateur bands here are editorial orientation, not measured data.
The Yo-Yo, and why some coaches prefer it
The Yo-Yo Intermittent Recovery Test is the other one you will meet. You run 20-metre shuttles to a bleep that gets progressively faster, but — and this is the whole difference — you get a short active recovery period between each shuttle. It runs until you fail to make the bleep twice.
The Bronco asks how much you can suffer in one continuous effort. The Yo-Yo asks how quickly you recover between efforts so you can do the next one. Rugby, with its stop-start structure of phases and set pieces, arguably looks more like the second than the first, which is why a lot of coaches rate it more highly for forwards.
Practically: the Bronco is more common because it needs no audio equipment. If your club runs a Yo-Yo instead, train the same way. The underlying quality — repeated high-intensity running with incomplete recovery — is the same.
Six weeks to not dying in week one
The mistake is doing nothing for eight weeks and then attempting to fix it in the four days before the first session. The following ramp assumes you are starting from close to zero and have six weeks. If you have three, run blocks one, three and five.
- Weeks 1–2: build a base — Three easy runs a week, 25 to 35 minutes, conversational pace. Boring on purpose. This is the tissue tolerance that stops week five injuring you.
- Week 3: add change of direction — Keep two easy runs. Replace one with shuttles: 6 x 40m out-and-back, walk back recovery. Your calves and ankles need to meet deceleration before they meet a Bronco.
- Week 4: introduce the interval — One easy run, one shuttle session, one interval session: 8 x 1 minute hard, 90 seconds easy. This is the first week that will genuinely hurt.
- Week 5: test yourself — Run a full Bronco, timed, at the start of the week. Record it. Then one easy run and one interval session. Now you know your number before anyone else measures it.
- Week 6: sharpen and back off — One short, fast session early in the week, then reduce volume. Arrive at preseason fresh rather than already fatigued. Do not test again.
None of this is heavy lifting, deliberately. Preseason running and a serious strength block compete for the same recovery, and if you have to choose in the six weeks before a season starts, running wins because the running test is the one you get measured on. The lifting belongs in the off-season block, which is what the 12-week off-season plan is for.
Surviving the first fortnight
The running is the part everyone anticipates. The part that actually injures people is the collision load — going from a summer of nothing to full-contact training inside two weeks, when neither your neck nor your shoulders have loaded anything heavier than a laptop since May.
- Did you train at all over the summer? (Yes: normal ramp / No: tell the coach)
- Do two weeks of neck and shoulder work before your first contact session (Not optional / See the neck guide)
- Cap your first week: full effort on running, moderate on contact volume
- If something hurts sharply rather than aches dully, stop and say so on the day, not on Thursday
Two weeks of basic neck work before your first contact session is the single highest-value thing on this page, and it takes four minutes a session. Building a rugby neck has the progression. Ten minutes of mobility covers the ankles and hips that the shuttle work will otherwise find out.
Preseason does not reward the fittest player. It rewards the one who did something in July, and there are never many of those.
What to expect at your first preseason
- It is mostly running. Two to three weeks of conditioning before the ball appears much at all. This is normal and it does end.
- Everyone is unfit. Including the players who were excellent in May. The summer flattens everyone.
- You will be tested in week one and again later. The first number is not a judgement, it is a baseline.
- The soreness peaks on day two, not day one. Plan around it, and read what the evidence actually says about recovery before you spend money on anything.
- Eat considerably more than usual. Preseason is the highest-output period of the rugby year and under-eating through it is why people stall. What rugby players actually eat covers it.
Common questions
What is a good Bronco time?
Elite professionals are widely reported comfortably under five minutes. For amateur players, anything in the five and a half to six and a quarter minute range is a solid club standard, and forwards will typically be slower because the test does not adjust for body mass. The more useful comparison is your own time now against your own time in six weeks.
How do you run a Bronco test?
Set cones at 0, 20, 40 and 60 metres. One repetition is 20m out and back, 40m out and back, then 60m out and back — 240 metres. Complete five repetitions continuously with no rest, as fast as you can. Total distance is 1,200 metres.
How long before preseason should I start training?
Six weeks is enough to arrive genuinely prepared from a low base. Three weeks will get you through it. Four days will not, and attempting to compress it is how people arrive at preseason already injured.
What is the difference between the Bronco and the Yo-Yo test?
The Bronco is one continuous maximal effort over 1,200 metres of shuttles. The Yo-Yo gives you a short recovery between 20-metre shuttles and progressively increases the pace, so it measures how quickly you recover between efforts. Rugby taxes both, and some coaches consider the Yo-Yo a better fit for forwards.
Should I lift weights during preseason?
Keep lifting, but reduce the volume. Heavy strength work and high-volume running compete for the same recovery, and in the weeks immediately before a season the running is what you are being assessed on. Build strength in the off-season block instead.