First two days

25.05.2014
First two days catch up

So pre-season is intense! My feet are wrecked, and I'm totally knackered, but it's 100% worth it so far.

Monday we started off the day with an S&C team meeting, and a meeting with the physio team. This consisted of just getting our bearings with the protocols to follow, which players are in each group, and how many of the guys are still recovering from existing injuries etc.
Another meeting followed but this was with the squad and coaching staff. Those players who were already back to begin training watched a slideshow explain the layout of pre-season, and told about a few new things that are being put into place for this pre-season/season.
After this, we had to unload a huge delivery of supplements. The new supplier is Maximuscle/MaxiRaw, and we had 3 pallets worth of Whey, Casein, Creatine, Beta-alanine and tons of protein bars and flapjacks too.

Next up - Shake duty! At the moment the 3 interns are in charge of making the post-workout smoothies, next week it will be taken off our hands as there will be a "nutrition volunteer" to do that side of things. And thank God! The smoothies are an absolute ball-ache. If it were only shakes, it would be fine. Water/milk, couple of scoops of this and that, then shake. But with the smoothies its water/milk, scoops of supps, smoothie packs and other stuff. It just takes time because we have to blend them up in batches of only 2-4 players at a time. Sucks.
The shakes were needed for post-weights. We got to sit in on these weights sessions which was good as the players are on a fairly generic program at the moment whilst the coaches figure out any existing issues with imbalances etc. It was a total body workout consisting of a lot of super-sets with very little rest. A couple of lads vomited after this session - which goes to show that it was intense for weights.
After each group did weights they also had a conditioning challenge using the rowing machines and Watt bikes. This was good to gauge where the players are at and to see how they push themselves at everything they do.

This was the final session of the day, but as a group we all went up and did our individual workouts to finish off the day. After training for so long at the Hill Performance Center in Worcester, and mostly by myself, it's weird to be back in a very commercial gym. I had to wait for platform to squat!!! WHAT?!?!

DAY 2

Another busy day. We started off a little later with a meeting at 830, so Richie and I decided to get an early morning workout in (details in training blog to come later).
After our meeting, the first session of the day was Therapy. In this the boys do a lot of mobility/flexibility work focused around any weakness or work-ons found in the screening on day 1. It includes a lot of rolling with foam rollers and lacrosse balls, and use of bands for distraction.
The next session was running. This counted as a conditioning sessions for the players and consisted mostly of tempo runs based around their speed maxes and performance needs.
Rugby training followed the running session, it's been placed this way to put the players in a higher level of fatigue when practicing skills. A lot of teams won't do any kind of rugby training this early in pre-season but Quins like to as handling and fast play are two of the biggest facets to their performance.

The next part of the day was Yoga. Group one did "Hot Yoga" - this is done by using a "HotPod" which raises the temperature to 40degrees C, and the players then practice yoga within this environment helping to ease any tension on the muscles and also raise a high temperature meaning they sweat a lot.
Group two did "Power Yoga" - this is based more around calisthenic bodyweight movements and seems like a lot more of a standard yoga session.

So that is basically a quick summary of the first two days of their training, and my internship so far. It has been incredibly hectic, and very eye-opening, but I am definitely loving every minute of it. The lads seem to be opening up to us quite well which is good, but there are still plenty more to come back.

Til next time