The recent phenomenon of inter-county teams holding early-morning training sessions has spread to Donegal.

The foundations for Dublin's All-Ireland success last year was built on their 6.30am workouts in the months of January and February, and now Donegal have decided to follow their lead in their quest to land the Sam Maguire in 2012.

Manager Jim McGuinness has divided his squad into three groups that meet in Letterkenny, Gweedore and Donegal Town at 7am most mornings. Training sessions are conducted in the Letterkenny Leisure Centre, the An Chuirt Hotel in Gweedore and the Mill Park Hotel in Donegal Town.

When the Donegal players had the first collective training session of the year in Castlefin last night, it was their second workout of the day as they had done a weights session 12 hours earlier. The Ulster champions are expected to train twice a day throughout the month of January. Tweet

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