In general, professional soccer players begin to lose pace in their mid to late twenties. Past thirty, other skills deteriorate as well and injuries take longer to heal. Players who can play at the highest level past their mid thirties are exceedingly rare. So, I wonder how things go for those of us who do not play seriously. Will I still be fast at 30 if I stay in shape? I'm not putting strain on my body by playing hard four hours a day, I'm not getting hacked down from behind, I've never had a serious injury. When I pull something, I can take it easy until it is totally healed. Sprinters can have world class speed until their late thirties and they put their legs under far more stress than I do. Do amateur players lose their abilities just as quickly as the pros or do we last longer? Not as long?
I absolutely disagree with your post. Soccer players lose their pace in mid/late twenties? Unless your talking about Chub Lampard, who never had pace to begin with, this statement is utterly wrong. Actually, it's been proven that a field player reaches his peak at around 27/28 years of age, so why would that be the exact time they begin to lose pace? I don't think you know what you're talking about. Also, there are tons of players in their 30's who are still world class. Sheringham, Keane, Zidane, Desailly, do you need any more proof. Whether or not a player starts to deteriorate is totally up to that player and how they look after themselves. If you eat the right foods, keep yourself in top physical condition, sleep, and rest at the right times, you can play at the highest level well into your 30's. So all this talk about losing pace in mid/late 20's is ridiculous...do your research before hand.
I haven't heard of players losing pace in their twenties unless they've been seriously injured. It's really more of a function of conditioning... I remember once seeing Peter Nowak sprinting up and down the field for the Chicago Fire and thinking "he can't keep this up for 90 minutes, he's 37 years old". At that age he was still one of the fastest players in MLS. And I'm not absolutely sure about this, but Brian McBride, at 30, seems to actually be quicker than he was 5 years ago. Players generally start to lose pace in their early 30s, and can hold on to their speed even longer if they keep themselves in top physical condition.
I'm 30, a former pro, (actually semi-pro or d3 to be fair), and I am faster now thatn when I was 20. I agree that it has ALL to do with how hard you work, but it's also a factor of wisdom as well. At age 20, most of our time on the practice field is spent in developing our minds, and any physical work we tend to do is simply conditioning.... not really in improving on our performance. Also, a lot of teen to early twenties players never touch a weight room. The opposite tends to be true for older players who now know how to play the game as well as they ever will, know how to stay in shape all year round, (There by cutting out the "conditioning" aspect of pre season that takes so long), and they have learned through injury or experience that the weight room can provide imcredible advantages in muscle strength and explosiveness. My mom came to see me play in an amature game last year and said (unsolicited), that she couldn't believe how much faster I was, even after two acl reconstructions on my knees....... I smiled about that for days! Eat Well Train with weights and Plyometrics all year long Understand how to play your role in every game Do these things and you too could be Peter Nowak..... except without the mullet though, okay? Enough of that already!