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How soccer players train for chaos - July 7, 2026 - Vox
Soccer might be one of the hardest sports to train for. Players need endurance to run for 90 minutes, with only one 15-minute break. And in the World Cup knockout rounds, if there is a tie, match time could extend to 120 minutes. Over the course of a game, the average player runs between 6 and 8 miles. But endurance is just a piece of the puzzle. Players also need to be capable of explosive acceleration, quick stops, jumping, and have a surprising amount of upper body strength.
Plus, soccer is really hard to predict. Unlike sports like cycling or rowing, the exact movements of a soccer match are dependent on the movements of 21 other players and can feel completely spontaneous.
In order to find out how soccer players can train for a sport that is so physiologically complex and chaotic, Vox producer Nate Krieger went to a practice with Brooklyn FC, a professional soccer team in the USL Championship League. He talked to forward Stefan Stojanovic and tried a drill designed by the team’s head of performance, Michael Higbee, to see how hard training for soccer can really be.
Read more about the fitness required to play high-level soccer:
Chris Barnes on the evolution of sports science in professional soccer: https://robertsontrainingsystems.com/blog/chris-barnes-podcast/
Sportsmith is a platform for trainers and coaches that has a lot of information about sports science and fitness. https://www.sportsmith.co/learn/
This Sports Illustrated article breaks down how many miles a player runs in a game, broken down by position: https://www.si.com/soccer/how-many-miles-do-soccer-players-run-in-a-game
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The fight over America’s national story | The Gray Area - July 3, 2026 - Vox
Who are America’s heroes? Who deserves our admiration and a place in our nation’s story?
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In today’s episode, guest host Jonquilyn Hill talks with constitutional law professor Kermit Roosevelt about his book The Nation That Never Was: Reconstructing America’s Story, which argues that America’s most important ancestors are not the founding fathers but the heroes of Reconstruction. The two discuss the importance of founding myths, why Americans are constantly fighting over “the real America,” and what it means to be American.
Guest Host: Jonquilyn Hill, Host of Vox’s Explain It To Me podcast
Guest: Kermit Roosevelt, constitutional law professor and author of The Nation That Never Was: Reconstructing America’s Story
00:00 Intro
03:16 America’s two foundings
07:20 The fight over America’s founding myth
15:18 Why every nation needs a story
21:43 Does a national story have to be a success story?
34:06 Why are Americans so attached to their ancestors?
42:02 Will the political pendulum swing back-and-forth forever?
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Democrats don't know how to fix America’s spiritual crisis | The Gray Area - June 29, 2026 - Vox
Sean talks with Connecticut Senator Chris Murphy about the crisis lurking beneath America's political dysfunction. Murphy’s new book “Crisis of the Common Good” argues that the country is suffering from a collapse of connection, belonging, and purpose. They discuss loneliness, powerlessness, liberalism, democracy, Trumpism, corporate power, social media, and why so many Americans feel disconnected from their communities, their institutions, and each other.
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Host: Sean Illing (@seanilling)
Guest: Sen. Chris Murphy (@ChrisMurphyCT)
00:00 Intro
01:11 America’s ‘spiritual sickness’
06:34 What does it mean to pursue the ‘common good?’
10:33 In America, the powerful profit from ‘the disintegration of the broader populace’
12:14 The story Trump is telling America
16:25 How does the Right diagnosis America’s spiritual crisis?
23:14 Why the Left’s rhetoric isn’t landing
36:35 Bernie Sanders and the Democratic Party
38:48 Why AI is the most important policy fight of the future
We would love to hear from you. To tell us what you thought of this episode, email us at [email protected] or leave us a voicemail at 1-800-214-5749. Your comments and questions help us make a better show.
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Vox.com is a news website that helps you cut through the noise and understand what's really driving the events in the headlines. Check out http://www.vox.com.
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