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Fitness tests under Pintus: “I'm very happy with the players. They came back in very good condition”

Writer's picture: angelsmadridistasfangelsmadridistasf


From 60 injuries in the 2020-21 season to less than 30 injuries in the 2021-22 season! What changed for Real Madrid? Antonio Pintus, the legendary figure admired Florentino Perez and the whole club of Madrid, returned. Before joining Real Madrid, the Italian physical coach worked with great clubs such as Juventus, Udinese, West Ham, Chelsea, Monaco, Marseille, and Inter.

Antonio Pintus was appointed by Real Madrid in 2016. Zinedine Zidane, the manager of Real Madrid at the time, is alleged to have demanded his signing. Zidane had previously worked with Pintus at Juventus from 1996 to 1998.


Real Madrid, together with Zidane, Pintus, and their staff, went on to win the historic three-peat from 2016 to 2018, however, the Madrid coach announced his resignation from the club not long after, taking his staff with him. Antonio Pintus, on the other hand, chose to remain at the club, which the manager did not approve of. This is reported to have caused some tension between them.



When Zidane took over as coach of Real Madrid in 2019, he made it obvious that he didn’t want to work with Antonio Pintus, prompting the Italian to consider his options. He later joined Conte’s Inter Milan, while Real’s physical coach was Gregory Dupont.


Dupont’s time at Real Madrid, did not go well, with the team suffering a total of 60+ injuries in a single season. Pintus, on the other hand, was doing a fantastic job at Conte’s Inter Milan, as he usually was. After winning the scudetto with Milan and with Conte departing the club, Pintus was expected to follow in his manager’s footsteps. However, he returned to Real Madrid with the return of Carlo Ancelotti.




This summer, Real Madrid has decided to publish more details about his work as the pre-season trainings are taking place in Valdebebas with the team almost completed and set to leave to USA for the summer tour very soon. The first week of work was completed and the team had to perform a high-intensity training session under the guidance of fitness coach Antonio Pintus, who now all of the players (except Benzema) under his orders.


On Thursday the team was completed as those who had been in international duties in June were still enjoying their holidays. The internationals checked in at the Hospital Universitario Sanitas La Moraleja-Edificio Ana de Austria and Real Madrid City to undergo their medicals before catching up with Carlo Ancelotti, the coaching staff and their teammates. The only one who is still missing is Benzema. The Frenchman will have a few more days off and will join the squad on July 19.



As reported by Real Madrid, Antonio Pintus was in charge of a training session featuring fitness tests with the players wearing masks to simulate the effects of training at altitude. The fitness coach explained this method on Realmadrid TV: "The test is carried out using a mask with a layer 5 system. It is certainly not hypoxia training. It's a test designed to find out the players' aerobic and anaerobic thresholds and their current power. The mask works to analyse oxygen and carbohydrates. We need to know the percentage of one and the other in order to determine the player's condition at the moment".


He continued: "The result helps to personalize or at least give some direction to the work the team is doing. Pre-season training is based on an aerobic foundation of long runs which is then used hand in hand with the direction and objective of shorter and faster runs".



"I can find out from these tests if the players still need a long, low-intensity base running work or if I can start working on a more intense and faster training. The break in training in November due to the World Cup will be good for me, because we can do another pre-season and work a little bit more for the players who stay behind. It will be different for the players who're going to the World Cup. They'll have to rest one hundred per cent when the come back and then return to work gradually. It's going to be completely different for the two groups".


Praise for the team: "It's essential to know where we are and how they players are at through these test. I'm very happy with the players. They came back in a very good condition. It's also a result of the work we've done over the past year. I'd like to thank them first of all. When the test turns out like this, it's not down to me, but due to their hard work".




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