Shuttles in the snow - how do cricketers train in winter?

Grace Ballinger, The Blaze's left-arm seam bowler and a Hundred title-winner with the Northern Superchargers last season, uses her BBC Sport column to lift the lid on pre-season preparations.

Cricket is inarguably a summer sport, characterised by blue skies and long, bright days.

For English professionals, the season runs from early April to late September, leaving six months fixture-free.

Some opt to spend these months in the heat of the southern hemisphere, playing club cricket in Australia, whilst some play in various franchises and foreign leagues across the globe.

Others find themselves trying to catch a high ball from gloomy white skies on a cold January day in Nottingham.

A winter of training in England, an option myself and many others have chosen to take, differs wildly from the competitive summer and the perceived glamour that sometimes comes with it.

Cricket is meant to be played in dry and favourable conditions - two words that do not match up with English wintertime.

Training for a sport which is so heavily reliant on the weather can therefore prove difficult.

There aren't many (or any) other sports in England that are so seasonal - the weather takes away any opportunity for pitches to be produced and used.

The option is either to try to replicate outdoor skills inside or, for fielding and fitness aspects, accept the harsh conditions and brave the outdoors.

Match play is hard to replicate indoors, and tireless hours bowling at targets and hitting balls out of a machine can be sometimes tiresome, despite best efforts from staff and players alike to keep things engaging and exciting.

Still, there is no denying that being a professional cricketer is a great job.

The work is based on playing a sport you love and the summer is packed with travelling the country, playing at the best stadiums.

This competitive summer - opening the bowling in front of a packed out Headingley or Edgbaston - can feel a long way away from completing shuttles down the River Trent in the snow.

A winter of training is composed of physical work, technical and skill development, and classroom tactical time.

The program is individualised, allowing people to work on what is relevant to them.

The pre-Christmas months are dominated by fitness work and technical work-ons. Fitness tests are frequent and cover all bases, ranging from anaerobic capacity to maximal strength tests.

This winter period allows you to get into good condition in order to perform throughout the summer.

The regime isn't as strict as that of footballers - there aren't any Pep Guardiola-style weigh-ins post-Christmas, and rightly so.

The winter is effectively a time to improve your fitness and skills, similar to the pre-season of any sport. Yet it is a far longer pre-season than most sports, covering almost half the year.

Whilst cricket is a team sport, it is unique in having isolated skills and roles. Team dynamic is key, but not as integral as in football, for example.

Some team-mates will go months without seeing or working with each other.

Whilst some are in England, some are operating on the other side of the world in a completely different time zone.

You may not cross paths until a couple of weeks before the season begins.

But there is sunlight at the end of the tunnel. Many sides end their long winter grind with a pre-season tour to get some much anticipated game time in.

These tours are usually in March, to warmer climates such as the United Arab Emirates, South Africa or India.

Tours allow for time on grass to implement the skills you have (hopefully) gained over the winter period.

They allow teams to try different players in different roles, and perfect your first starting XI ready for April.

For now, with the weeks filled with early morning conditioning sessions and fielding in winter gloves, time on grass in warmer temperatures certainly feels far away.