Hull FC are into week five of pre-season.
05:00, 05 Dec 2025Updated 08:07, 05 Dec 2025
Hull FC winger Harvey Barron. (Image: Hull FC)
Hull FC have upped the ante in pre-season training, with winger Harvey Barron noticing an intensity increase as the first-team get through week five of their training programme.
With the full squad now in camp, Hull have stepped things up, mixing their training between fitness, wrestling, and skill drills alike. It’s a mixture Barron is enjoying, with some key areas identified as John Cartwright looks to take his side into the Super League play-offs next year.
Speaking to Hull Live, the winger, who has been in training since day one on November 3, said: “We’re into week five now and we’re definitely building it up. It’s been good. I wouldn’t say they started us off easy, but we’re definitely building it up to where we are now. It’s been a faster week now, much faster than we’ve had previously.
“The coaching staff have been mixing it up. We’ve done a lot of skill drills, but with intensity as well. We’ve been doing a lot of simple drills but making sure that it’s all done properly, so when it comes to 13 v 13 games, we’re all locked in with that.”
As for the big areas of improvement, Hull know they must reduce their error count, with some of their performances, particularly mid-season, hindered by unwanted mistakes with ball in hand. Focusing on ruck drills, simplicity is working best in order to fix things up for 2026.
“We want to knock the simple errors out,” Barron continued. “We had too many of them in games, even when we were winning, simple errors at the play of the ball and things like that. We’re just trying to knock them on the head and then build on that.
“We want to progress to the next level now and we tap into everything. There’s a lot of stuff to work on but a lot of our fundaments are already in place. It’s just tuning a few things up.”
As well as working at their University of Hull base, Hull have been out in the countryside too, taking on a hills exercise last week. Getting around Raywell and the surrounding area, the squad were put through their paces, split into two teams, with players tasked to carry around some heavy objects, water, weights, etc., with them.
“I quite enjoyed it,” Barron said. “I think a lot of the boys enjoy anything off-site. It gets us away from the training ground for a bit and into something different. It keeps it fresh. We split into two teams; it was tough, but everyone enjoyed it.
“It’s good for morale and togetherness. When you do stuff like that, you mix with different players; like on the field, I see a lot of my centre, half-back, and back row, but working on the hills, it’s different. I was working with Harvie Hill; we’re the same height, so we could lift the things we had to carry together. You end up bonding and mixing and matching with people that you wouldn’t normally spend time with.
“There’s been a lot of that in pre-season. We’re one big group. Everyone mingles in and sits wherever they want to sit and stuff like that. We all look after each other.”
Of course, Hill is one of eight new recruits at the club and is joined by the likes of James Bell, Joe Batchelor and Sam Lisone. Impressed with what he’s seen so far, Barron added: “They’re all great. They’ve settled in really well. The boys have welcomed them all in. They’re good lads as well as players. We’re all there to help each other, and in training, they look like they’re ready to go.”