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David Davies

Mon, 17 May 2010 00:00:00 +0000

At the 2008 Beijing Olympics, British fans watched on intently as David Davies attempted to become the first man ever to win the men’s open water marathon. The Welsh swimmer had only attempted the 10 kilometre distance twice before but managed to claim a silver medal as he was narrowly beaten by Maarten van der Weijden of the Netherlands.

The swim had lasted almost two hours and the strain on the body was immediate. Davies was rushed off for medical attention and admitted that during the final lap he was almost delirious such was the stress on the body and the mind.

“Doing that 10k was extremely tough as by the end you are running on empty,” explains Davies. “Your muscles are exhausted from constantly pulling yourself through the water so it’s incredibly hard. I think I hit the wall at the end as it was all a bit of a blur.”

With the Olympic games in London just over two years away, Davies is firmly focused on improving and trying to capture the elusive gold medal. As well as his natural ability in the 10k he also hopes to improve on his 6th place finish in the 1500m.

“I train specifically for the 1500m and the 10k as they are my main events but it’s important to have a bit of speed as well. Even in the 10k you have a sprint finish at the end so it’s important to have that speed element which is why having a good 400m is so important.

“The fact that I tend to do long distances means that I can’t get too bulky so I have to be strong and lean. This means that my training generally consists of ten swim sessions a week, averaging around 35,000 metres. I also do two gym sessions a week which is generally weights and two land circuits which helps the core strength and power.”

It is this dedication that has led to Davies being one of the best 10k freestyle swimmers in the world. Capturing an Olympic medal after only trying the distance twice before points to an athlete with a natural gift. Yet, the man from Barry in Wales does not believe he was born to swim.

“I like to think that it’s total dedication as I have been doing it for a lot of years. You make a lot of sacrifices and you put in a lot of effort so it’s really tough, but when you go to the Olympics and if you succeed then it makes it all worthwhile. I wouldn’t say I am a freak who is naturally able to swim. I have just loved the sport and have really wanted to succeed. I have always had that drive.”

This ambition and will to win has been with Davies from a very young age. At just eight he competed in local galas and by twelve was part of a junior team travelling across the country. By the tender age of 17 he was competing against top athletes at the Commonwealth Games.

Unlike other teenagers who would be out in bars and pubs at the weekends, Davies was training hard and always had the sole intention of being the best. “It’s a very regimented routine that us swimmers have, but you soon get used to it and you run on auto pilot. My day pretty much consists of eating, training and going to bed early.

It might not sound the most exciting routine for a man in his twenties but the hard work is all worth it in Davies’ eyes, especially when he has the chance to compete in a home Olympics.

“There isn’t a day that goes by where we don’t think about it. The massive golden carrot that is being dangled in front of us really helps keep us going. I can’t even sum up how massive it is for Britain. It is such an historical event and we probably won’t see it again in our lifetime so I just desperately want to be there. It is certainly what all the training is focused towards.”

So what does the future hold for the talented long distance swimmer? “There are still lots of events taking place before the Olympics but of course everything is building towards that moment. I really think that the 10k could be one of the focal points of the whole Olympics as it is right in the centre of London. Hyde Park is a fantastic venue with great surroundings so I think there will be massive support.”

It will certainly be a fantastic spectacle as Davies fights for position along the Serpentine. He just hopes that when the time comes he will be physically and mentally prepared.

“It is a daunting task but preparation is essential. I know that when the time comes I will be in great shape so it will all come down to the mental side of things. If I can get into a good rhythm then it will actually go pretty quick.”

Davies is certainly in a confident mood now that he has plenty of experience under his belt and his advice for any budding long distance swimmer is quite simple. “Do as much training as possible and develop a good technique. Rhythm is definitely the key.”

David Davies will be competing at this year’s British Gas Great Swim Series, the UK’s largest open water swimming event, on 19th June in Suffolk and 3rd July in London. For more information visit: www.greatswim.org

Liz Yelling

Mon, 19 Apr 2010 00:00:00 +0000

Liz Yelling knows a thing or two about running marathons. Having spent the best part of a decade competing in long distance events she has demonstrated the commitment and desire needed to run the agonising 26.2 miles. The 35-year-old has twice competed at the Olympics and also won the bronze medal at the 2006 Commonwealth Games in Melbourne, Australia.

“It’s incredibly difficult to describe what people need in order to complete such a hard event. Dedication, commitment and desire are the first things that come to mind,” explains Liz. “I also think you need a certain amount of single mindedness as making yourself get up and train on a miserable day can be tough.”

The level of dedication shown by the Poole based long distance runner in training for major competitions led her to cover an astonishing 115 miles per week. This is a daunting task for any day-to-day runner but this hard work enabled Liz to set a personal best of 2:28:33 at the London Marathon in 2008. To put this achievement into perspective the average time for a female runner is 5 hours and 10 minutes.

A week of training in the build up to a major event requires Liz to train twice a day, six times a week. “In peak training I run over a hundred miles a week with one rest day. I tend to run twice a day five times a week but each run is different. Some days it will be an eight and a six mile run whereas the next day could be a 19 mile varied pace session.

“I tend to have a 12 week focus period and during that time I increase the mileage and the pace to make it specific to a marathon, but you can only really do that hardcore training for a limited period of time. I will also do plenty of strength training which will involve taking on a route that has plenty of steep climbs and hills.”

The physical conditioning gets the body ready for the challenge but the mental aspect is just as important. “You have definitely got to be able to train the mind to be able to deal with the distance and the time that you are on your feet for. It’s an awful long time to occupy the mind and stay focused. The aim is to avoid ‘hitting the wall’ and making sure that you get your pacing right. A lot of people talk about the proverbial wall, which is effectively when you run out of energy, but this can be avoided by fuelling yourself properly.”

It is every runner’s nightmare to reach the stage when you cannot push the body any further, which is why diet and nutrition is such a major issue. “Making sure you eat straight after running is really important as it helps start the recovery process straight away. This is definitely something that I struggled with when I was young and inexperienced. However, I quickly realised that if I was going to be training so hard I needed to refuel the body as quickly as possible.

“I am burning hundreds of calories each time I train so I need to take on board plenty of carbohydrates. I try and make meals from scratch using lots of vegetables as I have to steer clear of any processed foods, so I can’t have any treats such as chocolates or crisps. Sometimes it can be hard to avoid really nice puddings and cakes but then if I did eat them I know I wouldn’t perform as well.”

Like many runners, Liz feels as though she has improved with age. Having competed in marathons around the world she has learned that her pacing is one of the most important factors. “I used to train hard all the time. Every run I would try and make it count as I thought that training harder was better. Then when the volume went up I kept breaking down, so I had to start looking at how I could recover properly. I know it might sound a bit crazy, but I had to learn how to run easy,”

Learning how to run easy and at the right pace is also the advice that Liz offers to any budding runner. “I think the best thing is to simply go slow and make sure you can run the distance. Then as you get stronger you can increase the time and the pace. I think the mistake a lot of first time runners make is that they try and run too fast, too soon and they end up in a puffed heap on the floor. It’s about being gentle to begin with and building a solid foundation for longer distances.”

Having given birth to her first daughter, Ruby in late 2009, Liz shows no sign of slowing down. “I am back into serious training and will be taking part in the Chicago marathon later this year,” concludes the proud mother. With her training back in full swing there is no reason why this dedicated athlete cannot become a three-time Olympian at the London Games in 2012.

Liz Yelling is one of Lucozade Sport’s ambassadors. For more information on taking on the Virgin London marathon visit www.lucozade.com/vlm

Andre Winner

Fri, 05 Mar 2010 00:00:00 +0000

Mixed Martial Arts is widely regarded as one of the toughest sports in the world, combining submissions and knock outs, it takes a dedicated individual to succeed. Sportsvibe caught up with Andre Winner - an Ultimate Fighter series 9 finalist - to find out just how hard it is to become a professional cage fighter.

Now a fully fledged member of the Ultimate Fighting Championship, Winner will be showcasing his fighting skills across the globe. But when the 28-year-old is back home in England he trains with Team Rough House, widely regarded as the best MMA camp in Britain. Training with fellow UFC Fighters, Ross Pearson and Dan Hardy, it is here that he must hone his mat wrestling skills.

Yet, unlike the world of professional wrestling nothing in MMA is faked, fighters train in multiple disciplines and face the prospect of serious injury every time they compete. “When I am training I work on quite a few different areas such as boxing and Thai boxing which helps my striking. My strength and conditioning work is done with Ollie Richardson who is the Leicester Tigers' fitness coach. He gets me doing a lot of squatting, dead-lifting and bench pressing. Then when I head back to the gym I will work on my wrestling and Jui-Jitsu, which improves my submissions.”

Each fighter has their own style, whether it is kick boxing or karate, but Winner knows his most potent weapon is his striking. “I would class myself as a good all rounder but striking is probably my best aspect. It doesn’t really matter who I am facing, my background is in boxing so that is where I feel most comfortable. My game plan is pretty simple, stay on my feet and beat the guy up.”

This is something that Winner is extremely good at but the Leicester fighter still wants to improve his punch power. “When I am away from the camp I will concentrate a lot on my strength, so I will do weights four times a week. I do 135kg squats, that’s proper squats as well, I am talking about getting right to the floor.”

For a man that fights at welterweight and weighs around 70kg it is impressive lifting. “I also do chin ups with an extra 55kg attached to my body so my strength to weight ratio is pretty decent. On top of that I will do dynamic runs, bench presses, lead ball throws and chest presses.”

The weight limitations mean that he can never become over muscular and preparations must change as a fight approaches. Fight camps last around 12 weeks with training evolving as the day of the fight comes closer. “When I enter a training camp I like to be a bit over the weight, then from around 8 weeks out I will get down to just a few kilos over the weight limit. Then a week before the fight I will cut out the carbs and water load. I will also eat lighter meats such as chicken and fish.”

Although a non-title contest has a 15 minute time limit, fights are incredibly intense and demand high levels of physical stamina. On top of the heavy lifting there must be plenty of conditioning work. “MMA is an anaerobic sport, you are using a lot of muscles at once and it is pretty explosive,” he continues to explain. “I don’t really do lots of long jogs any more, generally I do interval training and hill sprints. You need to be able to go as hard as you can for those 15 minutes.”

The weeks leading up to a fight are the toughest, and it is during these crucial training sessions that the intensity is increased. “My routine becomes more fight specific in terms of conditioning; I do a lot more muscular endurance and cardio. I will start with a few rounds of skipping, and then move on to shadow boxing. Once I am properly warmed up, I go on to the heavy bag for five rounds with each round lasting three minutes.

“Next we work in bursts, so I will do 15 seconds on and 15 seconds off. This means that the first stage I’ll work at a fast rate and stay on my toes, and the next stage I’ll really dig in the punches. After this I will do around seven rounds of pad work and then finish up with some more shadow boxing.”

On top of all this cardio work, Winner has to prepare his body for the punishment that comes from taking kicks and punches to all areas of the body. “I do something called the Rocky ab workout, which is where you hold onto parallel bars and lower your self down, you then do a series of crunches by extending your legs at a 90-degree angle. It really tones the stomach muscles which is important for core conditioning.”

Even after months of hard training, Winner is happy in the knowledge that the fight can be over in the blink of an eye. “Once you step into that cage, you realise that all that hard work has been worth it and hopefully you can knock the guy out and be done in less than a minute.”

Beth Tweddle

Thu, 19 Nov 2009 00:00:00 +0000

Beth Tweddle was asked by sportsvibe what physical requirements were needed to be a world-class gymnast. The 24-year-old should know, after all, having just been crowned world champion in the floor exercises at London’s O2 Arena earlier this month, to add to her world title in the uneven bars in 2006, her uneven bars Commonwealth and European golds, her floor European titles, and a host of other major achievements.

“Flexibility, strength in all areas, all over stamina, power, balance, co-ordination,” she answered, before adding: “I guess that pretty much covers everything, doesn’t it?”
Of course, the South African-born gymnast who relocated to Cheshire before she was two years old is correct. In order to perform at the highest level in four contrasting disciplines – the vault, the uneven bars, the beam and the floor exercises – a gymnast just about requires every physical attribute.

It begins early. “Flexibility is crucial to any gymnast,” Beth explained. “I started the sport aged seven and immediately underwent incessant stretching exercises. The younger you are the easier it is and the longer the effect, although it’s never too late to start stretching exercises in life. Now I don’t have to do so much but in order to maintain a certain level I tend to sit in splits for a minute or two with my hands in the air, as opposed to helping me balance by placing them on the floor.”

Each of the four women’s disciplines requires specific demands. Take the uneven bars, for example. “I tend to do a lot of hand stands and hand stand turns,” Britain’s greatest ever gymnast, and our first ever world champion, continued. “A lot of training for the bars is centered around “inverts,” where your shoulders are rotated, your arms are up by your ears, your little finger is by your ears and your palms are forward. It’s a very strange position to find yourself in but it covers most of the physical demands of completing a successful set on the bars, including wrist flexibility and body turns, as well as stamina.”

Then there is the vault. “People think it’s all about how fast you can sprint to the vault but if you go too fast you don’t control your entry and that’s where it can go horribly wrong. You need to do a lot of leg exercises in the gym, squat jumps, ankle-raisers and some plyometrics as well, where you use blocks on the floor to jump over or carry out some rebound work to improve your spring. It is all about dynamic power.”

The beam requires a different set of physical skills yet again. “The beam is all about balance and ankle stability. One of the common exercises is to stand on one leg with your eyes closed for a lengthy period of time. Split jumps are useful, as are leg-strengthening exercises for the all-important discount at the end of the exercise. “
The floor exercises require all of the above. “A floor exercise takes 90 seconds which seems like a lifetime when you’re out there doing it,” Beth says. “During one exercise you will need plenty of stamina, flexibility and leg power, because the leaps are very important.”

Unlike many sports, however, gymnasts tend to complete most of their physical requirements by training or competing, rather than working out on specifics. “Performing, whether in competition or in practice, is the best way to get your body right and it’s hard to replicate the physical needs in any other form.

“What gymnasts require physically is so sport-specific that the only real way of ensuring your body is in the right shape is by performing the disciplines. You are full on until the week before a competition where your conditioning becomes a little less intense in order to stay fresh, but it’s only slightly less because you still need to be working on your skills. Timings are everything in gymnastics and if you are even a slight bit off it can result in an accident.”

Like all gymnasts Beth has had a few in her time, and none of them sound too pleasant. “With the vault and the beam your ankle is in most danger, although dismounts from the bars and the general somersaults in the floor exercises also place a lot of pressure on that area of your leg. The worst accident, however, is when you fall flat on your back or, worse, flat on your face. That comes from getting your timings wrong, and I’ve done it before off the bars and the beam, as have most gymnasts.”

Diet and nutrition also become more important because of this. “If I put on a kilo in weight it becomes 10kilos if my body is coming down from a somersault,” Beth explains. “At the moment I’m 52kgs and that’s about right, but the slightest weight gain or loss can upset my balance and timings, with disastrous results. So I tend to eat my carbs at lunchtime, after a breakfast of cereal or porridge, and this means pasta like a lasagne, rice, potatoes. Dinner tends to be a lot lighter, with maybe some chicken and salad.

“I train six days a week for around five hours a day, often fitting in my training in the mornings and evenings because many gymnasts these days are still schoolchildren. I’m 24 now. I’m an old girl.”
Old girl or not Beth, who has concentrated on the bars and floor exercises since last year’s Beijing Olympics, has no plan to bow out just yet. There is the small matter of more world championships next year and, of course, the London Olympics in 2012.
“By which time I’ll be positively ancient,” she concludes, with a laugh.
Not too ancient to be a serious contender for gold, though, to join the all-time greats of female gymnastics such as Olga Korbut and Nadia Comaneci.

Beth Tweddle is sponsored by GK Elite and Gymnova.

Jenson Button

Fri, 23 Oct 2009 00:00:00 +0000

Jenson Button laughs at the widespread belief that racing drivers do not need to be as fit as most other athletes. “After all,” the newly-crowned Formula One world champion says, “all we do is sit in a car most days enjoying a drive. It’s not as if we have to lift anything, run, jump or barge through someone else. What could be easier?”

If only that were the case, Button and his fellow drivers in F1 muse whenever they hear this well-worn and hugely misguided viewpoint. The truth of the matter is very different. The stars of Formula One are some of the fittest guys around and this, undoubtedly, played its part in the British driver's outstanding success this week.

“Your body is placed under enormous physical strain whenever you race,” he explains. “This is particularly the case when you are braking and cornering. The G-forces are similar to those felt by a fighter pilot. With deceleration forces peaking at 5.5 G’s, and lateral loads hitting 3.5 G’s, your head and especially your neck, with no real support, take a beating.”

Then there is the workload a driver’s arms have to handle. “We may have power steering, but it’s not like any road car. Applying opposite lock at high speed requires a great deal of strength.,” Button says. The same goes for the driver’s quads. “When you hit the pedals you have to hit carbon pads very hard to produce the result you need.”

Sitting in a tight cockpit for a race that lasts 100 minutes requires a strong, lower back, Button adds, while incredible stamina is a vital ingredient, too. “One mistake, remember, can end a race and possibly lead to a big crash. We need to be able to perform at a high level of physical and mental efficiency, often when suffering from fatigue, heat and dehydration.”

In Malaysia four years’ ago where the track temperature exceeded 50 degrees Celsius (122 F), Button’s water bottle stopped working. “At the end of the race I was shaking and suffering from blurred vision, which isn’t very helpful when you’re driving the car at 200 mph,” he recalls. He was recorded to have lost 3.5 litres (nearly a gallon) of water in perspiration, which amounted to 8.5% of his body’s total water content. “The other wearing factor is the constant vibration experienced sitting inside the cockpit,” Button adds. “That tends to drain you massively.”

So F1 drivers do, after all, need to be in good shape. How does Button achieve his fitness goals? In the off-season he has a customized training and exercise regime. Some of this takes place at Club La Santa, a sports camp in Lanzarote, where he will visit on three separate occasions before the first Grand Prix of each season in March. “In Lanzarote, and also in the hills outside Monte Carlo, I’ll go running and cycling, both of which are good, cardiovascular disciplines and fantastic for general stamina,” he explains. “I’ll throw in some uphill skiing when I go to the French Alps, too. This is putting fuel in the tank for the next season.”

At the same time he eases into specific training. “There are three particular areas I concentrate on,” he says. “The first is all about core stability and balance. I perch myself on a large, Swiss ball, placing my outstretched legs on a smaller medicine ball, and then turn a round weight 180 degrees for as many times as possible using my arms. My record for this is 401 times.” This routine, he says, is good for your abs, your lower back and your arms. “It also replicates the exact position, and similar strains, experienced in a car.

“The second area of training is a general weights programme. It’s crucial to build up general strength and stamina, but it is as important to get the balance right. At my weight and height (6 feet tall and 155 lbs), I cannot afford to be any heavier without it being a disadvantage but, at the same time, I cannot lose my strength.

“The third area is the kind of exercise only racing drivers and boxers do, both of whom sport freakishly big necks. My trainer places a towel around my head at the temples. We then pull in opposite directions for a series of 30-second repetitions, working on the back of the neck, the front, then both sides. This builds up your neck muscles which, believe me, you need when you feel the G-forces pulling at you every time you brake and corner.”

During the actual season, which starts with the Australian Grand Prix on March 16th, much of Button’s exercise regime is covered by simply racing or testing. “The best training for a racing driver is actually racing the car,” he says. “A race weekend requires competitive driving on a Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Then you test the car from the following Wednesday to Friday in readiness for the next race. Often this requires covering 700 kilometres (435 miles) of a circuit. Believe me, you don’t want to be training for a day or two after a race.”

It all seems like hard work, although the trappings – the fame, the multi-million pound contract, the home in Monaco – make it seem worthwhile. “It can be very tough, with a great deal of dedication and sacrifice in the early years, and a lot harder work than people imagine,” Button concludes before adding with a world champion smile: “Hey, someone’s got to do it, though. And I wouldn’t swap it for the world.”

A week warm-weather, pre-season training.

4 Driving Specific Strength Sessions in gym per week: each session includes neck resistance exercises – 3 x 4 sets lasting 4 minutes each; 3 x 12 chin ups; 3 x 20 Swiss ball press ups; 3 x 150 180-degree turns of a 10kg weight, simulating a steering wheel.

Swimming: 4 sessions of 20 x 50 metres, most of which with floats and strengthening arms. Good for breathing, too, which is crucial for a driver.

Cycling: 2 x 1 hr, 45 min rides through Lanzarote mountains – high intensity.

Running: 1 x 8k run on road + 1 x mini-triathlon (8 x 50m swim, 32k cycle ride and 5k run) and 1 x duathlon (same run x 2, + same cycle ride).

Ben Ainslie

Thu, 08 Oct 2009 00:00:00 +0000

The world’s greatest sailor looks at you with thinly-disguised contempt when you suggest that the perception of sailing, and sailors, is that not an enormous amount of fitness is required, certainly not compared to that of many other sports.

Ben Ainslie has three, consecutive Olympic gold medals to his name, as well as a silver when aged just 19, a host of world titles and the accolade of now skippering “Team Origin,” Britain’s America’s Cup boat and, as he is quick to point out, he hasn’t claimed all this by not being fit.

“In my first Olympic campaign, in 1996 in Atlanta, I was up against the Brazilian, Robert Scheidt in the Laser class, and he was known not only to be the best in the world, but also the fittest,” he recalls. “I wouldn’t say I have ever been as fit as he was, but I realised from quite early on how fitness would be key to becoming a successful sailor, especially in the Olympic classes.”

It turns out that, far from being fat, bearded, pipe-smoking men as the caricature of sailors once depicted, the modern, racing sailor is a finely-honed athlete, and Ainslie is one of the best examples around.

“Sailing requires both endurance and stamina, and also great lower and upper body strength, especially in your core. In the Laser it was all about lower and core. In the Finn, where I have needed to bulk up when I switched classes after winning gold in 2000, you need upper body strength as well, although it’s immaterial if you do not possess the lower and core strength.”

The core and legs are vital for most aspects of sailing, but none more so than hiking, which is the action of moving body weight as far upwind as possible in order to decrease the extent the boat leans away from the wind. “The harder you lean out the faster the boat goes,” Ainslie explains. “It’s OK if you do it for ten minutes but try half an hour and you’ll understand why it’s physically-demanding. Then add on the fact that you’re doing it at least once a race, and you may have three races in a day, and it’s one of the reasons why you can be dead on your feet after a day’s racing.”

The upper body strength comes in handy when the sailor is required to pump the sails. “This requires great strength in your arms, shoulders and chest and the better you do it the quicker the boat goes once again. I’d go as far as to say that fitness is as important an element of being a successful sailor as any other aspect of the sport.”

When Ainslie moved up from the Laser Class to Finn for the 2004 Olympics he had to add an additional 15kgs of weight. “It wasn’t by living in Burger King, unfortunately,” he says. “It was all muscle, acquired in the gym. And it was a load of protein shakes that made me feel sick most days. Even now I eat like a horse, but it all goes on either sailing – which is sport-specific in terms of training – or in the gym.”

The triple Olympic champion spends 90 minutes to two hours a day working out. Often an hour’s intense work will take placed in the morning, followed by an afternoon’s sailing, and then a further hour back in the gym in the evenings.
“Much of my exercise regime centres on running and cycling for stamina and lower body strength, and then weights for all over, but especially my upper body. I tend to do three sets of 15 minutes sprinting on the treadmill, or an exercise bike. I also spend a lot of time on weight training specific to the demands put on my body by sailing a boat. So, for example, I’ll work on the cable pull with high repetitions, and this is useful for hiking out of the boat, or for pumping. I’ll bench press, squat, use leg extensions, and I’ll work on my abs using medicine balls.

“As for my diet it tends to be a lot of fish and chicken, carbs such as potatoes, rice and pasta, and lots of vegetables. I’m 32 now, which is no real age for a sailor, but already my body is changing as it grows older, and I need to ensure that my physical advantage over my main competitors remains.”

“Close to the Wind,” Ben Ainslie’s autobiography, is out now, published by Yellow Jersey Press.

Kyran Bracken

Thu, 01 Oct 2009 00:00:00 +0000

Back in 2007 Kyran Bracken, the England and Saracens rugby player, was wondering what he was going to do with himself as retirement beckoned. He’d enjoyed a spectacular career, winning the World Cup with England, captaining his country, being awarded an MBE for his services to sport, and winning 51 international caps, as well as playing for the British & Irish Lions in 1997. But he had no plans for the immediate future.

Then the phone rang and a voice asked him if would be interested in competing in ITV’s “Dancing on Ice” show. The rest, as they say, is history. Bracken went on to win the show – against all odds – and now spends much of his time skating in front of audiences who flock to see his very own “Kyran Bracken’s Ice Party,” which features many of the celebrities who have appeared on the ITV programme.
Even now Bracken shakes his head at the improbability of his story. “I hadn’t been skating since aged seven and couldn’t even stand on the ice at the beginning,” he recalls. “Jayne Torvill said I’d be out of the show within two weeks but nobody had taken into account my competitive nature, or the fact that although I wasn’t a performer like the actors and actresses, singers and news readers who were on the show, I possessed the physical balance of a sportsman. I saw it as a challenge, just like so many rugby games, and my many years experience as a rugby player meant that my body and mind could adapt to a new set of circumstances quicker than most.”

The show, and subsequent life as a professional ice skater, has served as a ready-made replacement for life as a rugby star. “I feel the same adrenalin and buzz standing behind the curtain waiting to go on the ice and perform as I did standing in the rugby players’ tunnel,” he admits. “In many ways I enjoy skating more than rugby. For a start I’m in a lot less pain, and I think I’m better-suited to the rehearsed life as a skater, rather than the more spontaneous, instant decision-making role a rugby player has to take on.

“I absolutely love skating although if I was competing at the Olympics or the world championships, where the pressure’s really on, I’m sure it would be horrendous. I used to watch Torvill and Dean in their pomp and, like everyone else, thought they were fantastic, but only now do I understand just how good they were. It wasn’t just their talent, of which they possessed an abundance of, but their sheer hard work that made them the best.

“I’m a better skater now than when I won the show by a million miles, but there are still six year-olds in England better than me. What they can’t do are the lifts that I can to raise my dance partner, or the throws because for that you need strong arms.”
This is precisely what a man who lifted weights all his life as a professional rugby player has, although Bracken reveals how his body has changed so much since leaving the oval ball behind for a pair of ice skates.

“My body shape was straight up and down as a rugby player but since become an ice skater I’ve developed more of an hour glass figure, with my hips much slender than they used to be. Ironically my biggest concern about skating was my back, which gave me all kinds of serious problems playing rugby. I say ironic because I discovered just how good skating is for your back because to be a good skater is all about core stability. Everything is focussed on the area from your thighs to your ribs and by simply skating you are constantly exercising all this era, and all the key muscle groups.”

Bracken’s body actually presents him with a number of advantages, such as his low centre of gravity and natural strength. “I’m not a short man (5 ft 10in) but I have a short legs and a long body, and I’m naturally strong on the lifts and throws which is an area some ice skaters and dancers struggle in. For this you need strong arms and shoulders, strong quads and especially big glutes, which is where all the weight from the lifts stems from. You’ll find that all male skaters have enormous glutes.

“As a result there is no regime of off the rink training because a one hour session of non-stop skating, practising various moves like the spin and the axle, trains every part of the body required to perform. I usually do two minute acts, which is the same as an intense two minutes on the rugby field, and in a show I’ll perform a number of times. When I’m training I’ll go to the Alexandra Palace ice rink in North London once a day for an hour, and that is more than enough.

“The biggest similarity between playing rugby and ice skating is the transfer of balance from one foot to another, and even from the inside of your foot, to the outside. That’s put me in good stead now that I skate for a living, although I’m still pinching myself how I’ve made such an unlikely transformation.”
As is the rest of rugby.

The Kyran Bracken Ice Party plays in Blackpool 23rd to 31st October, 2009, and will again combine celebrity skaters, professionals and standout music acts. Go to www.kyransiceparty.com

Watch Kyran showing Sportsvibe some moves he's picked up on the rink.

Watch Kyran's video shout to Sportsvibe here.

Rebecca Adlington

Mon, 15 Jun 2009 00:00:00 +0000

There will have been many over the past year envious of Rebecca Adlington as she collected two Olympic gold medals, an OBE, the crown of Europe’s top swimmer of the year, and a third place in the BBC TV Sports Personality of the Year award, but when she explains just what she has to do to achieve her sporting goals, then it is evident the 20-year-old from Mansfield deserves every plaudit that has and will continue to come her way.

As always, it is the high profile achievements that get everyone talking, such as winning both 400 and 800 metres freestyle gold medals inside the Water Cube in Beijing last summer, the latter breaking a 19-year-old world record set by America’s Janet Evans when Adlington was just six months old.

But all the hard work takes place in training and in her meticulous lifestyle which few young women would wish to swap for all the world and, as the Nottinghamshire star explains, it is pretty much all year round.

“The last year has been very different because of the Olympics I was busy right up to Christmas with various media commitments and functions to attend,” she says. “Most years, though, I take two weeks off after the season’s main event, which this year will be the world championships in Rome in August. That’s it for the year in terms of time off.

“You’d be surprised how much fitness you lose as a swimmer in just a fortnight, although the period is crucial to prevent physical and mental burn-out. By my reckoning you need three weeks to make up for each week you take off, so it is a good month and a half of training after you return to the pool before fitness is regained. “Then it is a case of a series of 15-week cycles, leading up to Christmas and the short-course championships which most of the swimmers enter, even if I do not, then the Easter trials for whatever the major event of the summer is, and then finally the worlds this summer.”

The training changes little over all this period of time, and the hours required are demanding, to say the least. “I am up at 4.45 in the morning every weekday, ready to train normally in Nottingham between 6 and 8. I then return to the pool for a couple of hours between 5 and 7 in the evenings. I repeat this five days a week, train for half the day on Saturday, and have Sundays off to re-charge my battery.”

Under the watchful eye of her trainer, Bill Furniss, Rebecca will cover a staggering distance of 7000 metres, or 140 lengths, in one session, taking half an hour to warm up, and then a further 30 minutes to warm down. “The hour in the middle can be anything from 12 x 400 metres, to 24 x 200 metres, and sometimes we do kick or pulling sessions as well.”

This, essentially, is what Adlington does 11 times a week, 50 weeks a year. If it sounds boring and repetitive, she assures us it is anything but. “It’s no different from what most working adults do, which is go to the office and stay there from 9 to 5,” she argues. “Besides, it’s never quite the same. The sprinters in our squad will swap one or two sessions in the pool for the gym as they need more explosiveness. I train alongside 25 others, mainly in Nottingham but sometimes also in Loughborough and we all help to motivate each other. My fitness, endurance and speed are essential to my success at a major championship, and when I or others achieve something good and return to the squad, it motivates all of us to try our hardest. Bill (Furniss) also mixes up those 7000 metres a session by asking us to perform multi-strokes as there is no way you could cover that total distance using just freestyle, and it is good to work on different muscles.”

With all this effort, plus the early morning starts it is no surprise that Rebecca is in bed by 9.30 at night at the latest, and she also requires a nap on her return back home following the morning session. “Without that nap I’m terribly moody,” she admits. “Like a lot of sportsmen and women, I spent much of my time being really tired, and forever apologising to people when I yawn in front of them. I must come across as rude sometimes when I am just shattered.”

But this is not all. As if her 280 lengths per day in the pool is not enough, she also runs for 25 mins and completes a circuit in the gym twice a week. “The run’s at a reasonable pace because it’s with a male coach and a male swimmer,” Rebecca reveals. “It’s hard in the winter, especially when it’s cold and raining, and sometimes my asthma can play up as a result. In the gym it is never with weights. I tend to work on core exercises using my own body weight, concentrating on sit ups and stretching.”

With such a demanding schedule placed on her body Rebecca needs to stock up with food and liquid intake and, although she is disciplined when it comes to takeaways, she also insists that nearly everything is OK in moderation.

“I have three pieces of weetabix for some breakfast with sugar, and normally a yogurt as well,” she says. “For lunch I tend to drag it out over a couple of hours. It tends to be three ham or cheese sandwiches, then maybe a half hour wait before some fruit and more yogurt, then another delay before a cereal bar and popcorn. Dinner is quite late as I train until 7pm each night, and am not home before 7.45 pm. I am a big lover of pasta, as well as chicken, so dinner is often something like a lasagne or chicken breast with vegetables. I also have a couple of biscuits just before I put the light out. All day long I drink water, squash and energy drinks.”

It is some commitment for a girl still so young, but already so successful, and even in the week of competition she will only cut down her workload two eight sessions. Yet the rewards are there for all to see, and Rebecca Adlington is far from finished yet.

“So far I have won at the Olympics, but not at the world championships, and I haven’t even been to the Commonwealth Games before, which are next year in Delhi, and this is all before the London Olympics in 2012, so there is much to aim for.”

Is it all about the titles? “No, it’s all about the performances and the times. If I get those right the rest tend to follow, but it’s a mistake to aim for a gold medal and by doing so forgetting about the process to get you there.”

Her advice for any future Rebecca Adlingtons is something she cannot be accused of avoiding herself. “I’m afraid in all sports, and especially in swimming, you cannot replace hard work,” she concludes. “There are simply no short cuts, but the harder you work, the more successful you will become.”

Carolina Kluft

Mon, 18 May 2009 00:00:00 +0000

There is an old cliche in track and field: those who compete in either the men's 10-event decathlon or the women's seven-discipline heptathlon are jacks-of-all-trades, but masters of none. Carolina Kluft was the exception. Until last year, when she switched to long jump, the Swede was the Olympic, World and European heptathlon champion at just 23 years of age, and, by virtue, the top female athlete on the planet. She is only the third heptathlete in history to top 7,000 points ( a total based on performance, and calculated using separate formulas for running and field events), and is also the best long jumper in Sweden and 200 metre runner, as well as rated third best at high jump and in the sprint hurdles. She was also extremely competitive at the remaining three events in the heptathlon: shot put, javelin and 800 metres. "I used to love playing every sport as a kid," Kluft explains. "I guess that's why I ended up becoming a heptathlete. That way I could still play at all kinds of different things."

Kluft was blessed with incredible natural talent. But she also worked devilishly hard to maintain her position, as any champion does. There difference, however, was that she required unprecedented commitment and dedication. When her season came to an end she took four weeks off to unwind, rest and prepare for the start of a fresh, annual cycle. "The rest was between mid-September and mid-October, she says. "I chilled out, rested, saw my friends and family, and did all the things I was unable to do when I was training."

Before she knew it, however, she was back, with the first two weeks always the most intense. "In the autumn into early winter it was very physical and non-specific," Kluft explains. "I worked on general speed, strength and stamina. The period between October and December was the most important period of the whole year. This was when I was putting gas in my tank to be used not only in the summer, but also in the spring during the indoor season. This lasted from January until March, and then in April, I'd have another burst of general stamina and strength-gaining training."

A typical day for Kluft spanned out like this as she worked out in her home town of Vaxjo in southern Sweden. Her morning began with work on the shot put inside a sports hall. She would putt the shot for 90 minutes, screaming with either effort or frustration if she was dissatisfied, yelping with delight when her put met her expectations. Then it was on to the gym where she performed a series of exercises for over an hour, including weights, sit-ups and various other body conditioning exercises. "I concentrated on the explosive in the gym, especially when it came to weights. Many of my events in the heptahlon - such as the long jump, high jump, shot and javelin - relied on a sudden explosion of power. That's why I did only three or four squats, for example. It didn't take long, and it may not seem much, but the weights were at my maximum, and so I had to produce my explosive best. If I did it eight or ten times each go, I would be all muscle but unable to use it."

After lunch Kluft would make the short journey from the Vaxjo sports hall to the athletics ground, which had an outdoor track and an eight-lane sprint track indoors. For the next hour she would focus on the hurdles, bounding over a set of eight like a kangaroo, and working on her hamstrings and calves, where all the strain was felt. Finally, five hours later, she ended her day after a stamina-sapping series of 16 back-to-back 200 metre sprints. "Don't forget, you needed to be very strong to maintain the high standards at the podium end of the heptathlon. It is two long days and seven competitions in one. That's why I often competed in single events at athletics meetings. Of course, I wanted to win them, but they were designed mainly to sharpen up that particular discipline for when I competed in the heptathlon."

Kluft recognised that whilst she needed everything to perform in her event, she also needed to have the right balance. "My best and most natural events were the long jump and high jump, and also the sprint events, and that meant I needed to work more on the others. The danger, though, was to concentrate too much on them to the detriment of the others. Too much upper body weight, for example, may have helped my throwing, but it would have affected my jumping. I tended to focus more on technique than sheer power, and therefore spent a lot of time working on the technical sides of my events."

She also had a set pattern. "Six days a week, every week of the year except for my month off," Kluft reveals. "One day was two and a half hours, the other five were five hours. I always had Sundays off in order to recover, and Saturdays tended to be my long-jumping days. I ran 400-metre laps carrying small weights in both my hands. In fact, the only event I did not specifically train for was the 800 metres, but that's because all the training for the six other events was more than enough to see me around two laps." Besides, by the 800 metres, the final event of seven, Kluft usually had the heptathlon wrapped up.

After all this hard work must come hard rest. "I never used to be able to stop, but my coach forced me to rest and later I could really see the benefits from it. Apart from ensuring I kept my strength and fitness, it was also to avoid injuries. Heptathletes, because of the sport's contradictory demands, are often injury-ridden, but you have to listen to your own body, and you must train also to avoid injuries. Much of my training regime was prevention-based. So I worked a lot on my hamstrings, for example, or my wrists. This was not to improve my times or marks, but simply to condition my body."

Can such a supreme athlete give any tips to ordinary punters who like their athletics? "Try and find an exercise that suits you best," says Kluft. "I find that you can never go far wrong in any sport if you are a good runner. Running is great for stamina and for strength in so many parts of your body. It is the very centre of most sports. But, most important of all, you've got to enjoy it. if you don't, then stop and find another sport to try out."

Or seven, in Kluft's case!

Victoria Pendleton

Tue, 10 Feb 2009 00:00:00 +0000

You might be forgiven for mistaking Victoria Pendleton for a long-distance athlete, so slender is her figure and small is her height, but do not be fooled by the extremely attractive exterior.

The 28-year-old is a ferocious winner, as her medals cabinet at home in Cheshire will vouch. Pendleton is the world’s supreme track sprinter, with world, Commonwealth and now Olympic gold medals to her name in the individual sprint, the event where two riders play cat and mouse with each other before a desperate dart to the finish line.

She most probably would have added golds in Beijing in the keirin and team sprint events, too, if the Olympic authorities had included them in the programme, but had to make do with “just” the one Olympic title.

Now she plans to go for more gold in 2012 at the London Olympics, picking up more titles at the World Championships and Commonwealth Games along the way, and few would bet against her achieving her goals.

“It’s the hatred of losing, more than the joy of winning, that keeps me going on, pushing myself harder and harder, and never being satisfied with myself,” she explains, by way of justifying a lifestyle that is big on practice and training, and small on virtually anything else. “But winning Olympic gold medals makes it all worth it.”
Her week is pretty much the same every week, beginning with a two to two and a half hour gym session on a Monday morning, which involved Olympic lifting, and free of weights. The trick is to gain the right amount of muscle mass, and not any more.

“I do mainly power clean and jerks, squats, upper body and core stability work, which all helps to make my cycling style more efficient,” Pendleton says. “The main exercise is the squat with just the bar, because the glutes and the quads are the most important muscles a cyclist has. I don’t use any machines in the gym, save for a leg press. Core stability is also massively important, because it is from your core that you generate all the power through your legs.

“The male cyclists don’t do any upper body work because they already have enough strength through their shoulders and too much upper body muscle reduces drag and makes you less aerodynamic. That said I need enough upper body strength to hold the handlebars firmly enough at pace without my body wobbling which, in turn, would cost me speed.”

The afternoon is all about explosive power, and the search for the best cadence, which is the number of revolutions in a minute or, in layman’s terms, the speed a cyclist can pedal. “The afternoon session is from 2pm to 5pm and in that time I will practice flying 100 metres. These only take six and a half seconds each, and I’ll do it five times, but on each occasions it is high cadence, and maximum power, so much so that you need the time to recover from each one. My event is all about sprinting, rather than stamina.”

On a Tuesday morning Pendleton will spend 90 minutes out on the road. She tends to avoid the hills around Manchester, where her training is based, because she requires anaerobic exercise, which is short and intense, rather than aerobic exercise, which is longer in duration, but low in intensity.

“I stick to the flat on the roads and travel at a moderate 30K an hour because the hard work is done in the gym and on the track and if I went into the hills I wouldn’t be able to help myself but pedal hard and fast which would convert my muscle fibres away from how I want them, which is anaerobic, not aerobic.”

Wednesdays see another two and half hour free weights session in the gym, followed by two hours out on the roads, and she will return to the great outdoors on a Thursday morning, for a gentle one hour “recovery session” before re-appearing on the track for an important afternoon session.

“This session is all about acceleration, which is a key component for a sprinter, who either has to accelerate away from her opponent from the front, or accelerate past her from behind, from virtually any distance out from the finish line. I tend to do between four and twelve efforts on the track in the session, all at maximum effort again, and in times ranging from six and half to thirty seconds. It’s pretty painful stuff, but it’s got to be done.”

Friday mornings are back in the gym working primarily on her glutes and quads, and then the afternoon is spent on the track working with the motor bike you see used in the keirin event. “This session is all about high cadence, and high speed. You follow the motor bike around the velodrome, at speed, and in the bike’s slipstream. This may involved three to five 250 metre laps of effort at speed, then a couple of laps at maximum effort, and at very high speed, over 500 metres.

Saturdays are half days, featuring a two hour ride on the roads, and Sundays are very much a rest day. Rest is very much a part of the Pendleton programme.
“There is no cross-training, and definitely no running,” she says. “Running makes you prone to injury, especially as cyclists have powerful leg muscles but weak tendons as a result. Whenever I’m not training I try and rest as much as possible. I even avoid going shopping as it means standing around which will impact on my training.”
What makes Pendleton stand head and shoulders above the best of the rest, apart from her willingness to train harder than anyone, is her ability to pedal at a high cadence. “You can work at it, but it’s mainly down to your natural muscle fibres, and the most important ingredient is to have speed of movement through muscle contraction. I’m not a strength athlete but I’m powerful for my size and weight and I can maintain high speed for longer than others.”

It is only when she approaches a competition, such as the Beijing Olympics last summer, or the 2009 world championships in Poland in April, that she eases up. “The sessions just prior to competition may be lower in intensity, with smaller gears and faster wheels to create less resistance.”

In general, though, it is punishment all the way. “There are some days when I can barely walk as a result of the previous afternoon’s work. Sitting down, or getting up from a chair can be murder. Sometimes my knees and joints are so sore I feel like an old lady, I don’t have much cartilage left in my knees which may lead to a re-construction, and I’m sure I’ll have considerable arthritis when I’m older. I’ve been reasonably lucky in terms of injuries so far, but typical cycling injuries normally result from crashing in races, with broken collar bones the most common.”

As someone who spent her final year at university studying nutrition and sports science Pendleton does not need to be told how to look after herself, either. “I’ll eat four or five pieces of Weetabix with two table spoons of sugar for breakfast, have a couple of protein shakes during the day, some tuna pasta for lunch, and chicken breasts, rice and vegetables for dinner, with plenty of fruit, although I’ll also have a chocolate biscuit from time to time, and even the odd curry. If you deny yourself completely you will end up craving. On top of that I’ll drink two litres of isotonic drinks riddled with electrolytes a day, plus at least two pints of squash in the evening.”

It is a very controlled lifestyle that Victoria Pendleton leads, and one that has led her to the very summit of her profession. “It’s a short career and I have to give it my best shot,” she reasons.
There is no doubt she is achieving her goals.

Michael Carrick

Tue, 10 Feb 2009 00:00:00 +0000

It is a given fact that footballers need to be fit, now more than ever, but no one player needs to be fitter than the central midfielder. Michael Carrick, the Manchester United and England star, can vouch for this.

“I’ve no idea how far I cover in one match but it will be many miles, and a fair amount of that distance is a series of sprints from a standing start,” explains the 26-year-old, who picked up a Premiership League winners’ medal in his very first year with United in 2007, as well as appearing in a Champions league semi-final, and a losing FA Cup final at Wembley, after his high-profile transfer from Tottenham Hotspur. Last season he went even better, winning a second league title and a coveted Champions league winners medal.

“The point about playing in the centre of the park is that you need to be able to do a bit of everything, from helping out your defence by tackling, to supporting your attackers. This means that your main area is from one eighteen yard box to the other, and getting from one to the other as quickly as possible can sometimes make the difference between scoring a goal, or conceding one.”

But that’s not all. The modern day central midfielder needs to be able to sport a complete array of footballing skills in a manner that, say, a defender, or centre forward does not need to so much.

“Well, you need to be able to tackle for a start, and make headers at both ends of the pitch,” Carrick, the former West Ham and Spurs player continues. “You should be able to cross the ball, have different levels of speed, stamina, the ability to be able to recover almost immediately from a sprint and be able to do it all over again almost instantly, be able to shoot, and come up with a fair quota of goals each season. It makes you a jack of all trades.” And, in Carrick’s case, a master of them all.

The physical requirements, then, are many and varied to be a modern day footballer, and especially a central midfielder. “Even in the eight years I’ve been playing as a professional footballer the game’s become much more physical,” he explains. “The main required ingredients are stamina, core stability, upper body strength and also leg strength. The stamina speaks for itself. You need to be as fit in the 90th minute as you are in the first. The core stability is for balance, and also injury prevention. The upper body strength is for the various times you are fighting an opposing player for the ball while the power in the legs, apart for shooting, is needed to make the bursts.”
Carrick’s season usually starts on July 1st. Depending on international requirements, he would have had four weeks off in which he chooses to holiday, play some golf, and visit the gym only a couple of times. Pre-season, like everything else in football as it becomes better educated in its player preservation, has changed since Carrick’s early days as a footballer at West Ham.

“Back then you might not even see a football for the first ten days because the emphasis was on running laps of the pitch or going on cross-country runs,” he explains. “Now it’s different. It’s still physical, but you rarely get to run for more than a couple of minutes at a time. Less is more, but the less is very physical and intense. We do shuttle running, and a great deal of strides, with maybe 30 seconds on, 30 seconds rest, then a minute on, a minute off, and so on, as well as going for sprints with a sledge tied to your back carrying weights. We focus a lot more on technique these days, playing keep ball or five-a-sides, but it all works on our overall fitness as well.”

Then there’s the gym. “For core stability I use a ball to balance on and perform various exercises and weights. We also use large, elastic bands to tie to walls or around our waists to perform step ups, or perform quick feet exercises through ladders with a weight tied to your back. We also need to work on our legs using weights again. Every weight exercise we do – squats, power cleans, jerks etc – are in moderation. I need as much strength as I can get, but without having to carry extra, unnecessary muscle. I need to be strong, but quick, so there’s no point looking like a body builder.”

Pre-season is traditionally the time when the fuel is put in the player’s tank for the season but even at the start of the season Carrick admits to not being ready. “It takes you three or four games into the season before I’d say you are completely match fit,” he says. “It’s because, for all the pre-season training and friendly matches you don’t get the intensity or the edge that you do in a Premiership game.”

A player like Carrick’s week begins the morning after a Saturday game when he reports to training for some warm-down. “I come in on a Sunday to work on an exercise bike or have a splash around in the swimming pool, just to warm down the muscles from the day before,” he explains. “If I’ve been a sub the day before and only had ten or 15 minutes on the field, I may well do some sprint exercises with one of the physiotherapists on the pitch after the final whistle so that I haven’t wasted the chance to keep ticking over.”

When United have a game each weekend Carrick has a 90 minute training session each morning at their Carrington training ground which lasts from 10.00 until 11.30 and usually involves five-a-side and keep ball games, as well as working on the next opposition. “Then I tend to go straight to the gym for a 20 or 30 minutes to keep my upper body and legs in shape. In the unusual event of no midweek game the boss will give us a day or two off. I tend to do very little as I realise rest is as important as exercise.”

Most of the time, though, it is a case of Saturday, Tuesday or Wednesday, then Saturday or Sunday again for Carrick and his United teammates, with Champions League, and possible FA and Carling Cup commitments. “When that happens you have little time to do anything except play, recover and travel,” he adds. “You can’t sleep on the night of a game because of the adrenalin, then your body needs to recover, say, on the Thursday, you’re still not right on the Friday, and then you play on the Saturday again. It’s even harder if you’ve flown back through the night from a European trip midweek, but a combination of the adrenalin and your high level of fitness sees you through.”

Indeed it does, and with the controlled stretching during training, and the 20-minute static stretching in warm-down that always follows, the modern-day footballer is fitter and less susceptible to injury than ever before.

Which is just as well if, like Michael Carrick, you are a box-to-box fox.

Visit www.puma.com

Fitness Box:

Pre-season:
Shuttle running and strides: 30 seconds on, 30 secs rest, then 1 min on, 1 min rest, then 90 secs on, 90 secs rest etc.
Core stability: Swiss ball exercises with weights.
Harness exercises: step ups.
Ladders: sprinting through ladders using high knee action.
Weights: squats, power clean and jerks in moderation.

Season: When 1 game in week.
Sunday: 1 hour recovery from game on bike or in swimming pool.
3 days of the week: 90 minute football skills training session, which incorporates fitness: 5-a-sides and one touch games in small squares of the pitch. At least 20 minutes of stretching exercises to prevent injury. 30 minutes moderate weights in gym, working on upper body and legs.
2 days rest.
Match day: Pre-game warm-up: stretches, sprints, ball skills. Post-game: warm down if not involved or played just a few minutes from the bench: series of sprint shuttles from goal line to half way.

James Haskell

Sat, 07 Feb 2009 00:00:00 +0000

At first glance you would be forgiven for believing James Haskell makes a living as a body builder, so huge are the muscles that ripple across virtually every part of his body, but it is an indication of just how physical rugby union is these days that the 6ft 4in, 112kg heavy 23-year-old is a rugby star for London Wasps and England.

Haskell, expected to feature heavily in the 2009 Six Nations tournament that begins next month, needs to be this big and this strong, just to be able to compete at the highest level against opposing men sporting similar physiques. It requires dedication to the cause, and hours upon hours each week of training, but on top of the immense strength and muscular physique, Haskell also needs to be quick with feet and mind, and possess enormous stamina to last 80 minutes of a game of rugby.

His week, unsurprisingly, is busy, and dominated by his profession, even on a Sunday morning, which is usually the morning after he has done battle for Wasps or for his country, and lost up to 3kgs in a little over 80 minutes of sport in the process.

“I tend to wake up battered and sore on a Sunday morning,” Haskell explains, with a grimace. “It would be nice to have a lie in but it’s more important to attend a recovery session at the Wasps training ground in Acton, in West London. This usually means a 20 minute massage, a ten minute ice bath with constantly running water to prevent numbness, 15 minutes on the bike or out jogging to loosen up, and a long stretch. In total it takes 90 minutes but it’s essential to do this to set you up for the week.”

And what a week it turns out to be, especially for the back row forward, who somehow finds time to squeeze in extra training outside that provided by Wasps.
It all begins in earnest on a Monday morning in Acton when Haskell gets to work on strengthening his legs in the gym for a 45 minute session, often combining this with general weights working on his pecs (bench presses in reps of between 8-10), glutes, quads, calves (squats, again with 8-10 reps), lats, biceps and forearms (pull ups for as many times as he can lift his heavy body) and more work on his biceps using dumbbells and long bicep curls. After a long lunch break it is on to the training field for a rugby session, concentrating on the more technical aspects of the game, where the backs and forwards divide and Haskell gets to work on line outs and scrums.
Tuesdays tend to be spent out on the rugby field all day. “We spend 90 minutes in the morning working on new moves and tactics but in the afternoon it’s a lot of contact and conditioning work. The ELVs (Experimental Law Variations) which have been brought into the game this season means there’s a lot more kicking and running backwards and forwards, so we now do a lot of shuttle work, where we have to sprint from the try line to the 22 metre line, hit the deck, jump back up again, and run back, for as many times as you can in blocks of 18 seconds. That tends to kill most of us off.”

After a Wednesday away from the training ground, where Haskell sorts out his business for the week, it is back to Acton on Thursdays where a major day of training takes place. “It starts with a power session in the gym,” Haskell explains. “We tend to focus on two areas: Olympic lifts, such as the snatch, cleaen, jerk and pulls, followed by more explosive stuff, with lots of bounding (2 sets of 3), frog jumping (2 sets of 5), and sled pulls. After a mid-morning break we’ll work on the technical aspects of playing in the pack, such as line-outs and scrums. After lunch it’s a big rugby session, which includes contact.

Fridays, the day before the big game, tend to be relatively easy, where Haskell joins his teammates for a morning team run, in which Wasps run through all the moves and tactics planned for the next day, and yet more work is undergone in the all-important line-outs.

On the Saturday morning of a home game at Adams Park in High Wycombe, the ground Wasps share with the football league side, Wycombe Wanderers, Haskell usually wakes up at his parents’ house. He then has a warm-up session in their garden. “It comprises of 4 to 5 sprints, then a series of drills with high knees, heel flicks and skips. I arrive at the ground 90 minutes before kick off and then get strapped up, to support my ankle, wrists and thumbs, and to protect my shoulders and forearms, which I always seem to land on. Then I have a massage, concentrating on my hamstrings and calves. Before official warm up I like to go out on to the pitch to catch some high balls and do some sprints, then it’s down to final preparations. This consists of jogging laps of the pitch, a series of what we call karaokes, which are running placing one foot across the other, and a few big hits on tackle bags. We return to the dressing room five minutes before the kick off, usually with a good sweat on.”

As if all this is not enough, Haskell also has two extra methods of training. One is to see Margot Wells, wife of the 1980 Olympic 100 metres gold medallist, Allan, and a highly-rated sprint coach. “I tend to see Margot three or four times a week, which includes my Wednesday day off, and often on a Friday as well,” he says. “She helps me find speed, dynamism and power, ingredients that a modern day back row forward requires. Midweek she oversees extra gym sessions, with more jumping, bounding and squats, as well as working on a boxing speedball, to help arm speed, and stair jumping. On Fridays it’s more sprint work.”

Haskell has also begun to go to a Hammersmith gym for wrestling sessions. “It breaks up the monotony of training, and is very relevant to the position I play in, where it’s all about body position, balance, moving from one position to the next quickly, and manipulating my opposing number, either by dumping them or by getting back to my feet as quickly as possible to get past him. I try and go once a week and wrestle with Mixed Martial Arts guys.”

To sustain all this Haskell has the kind of diet that would be a glutton’s dream. “For breakfast it’s always porridge, with fruit, two boiled eggs, two pints of fruit juice and a green tea. I’ll have a mid-morning protein shake, then a lunch of fish or chicken with vegetables and a yogurt. After the day’s second training session I’ll pop into Nando’s at Ealing Common, where we get a 20% discount, for some chicken stir fry and salad, and there’s still time for a healthy dinner, which is often salmon or sushi, or sometimes an Italian in the Kings Road which Danny Cipriani and I frequent often. I guess I also knock down 8 pints of fluids a day.”

On top of all this Haskell treats himself to the occasional blow out. “If we win it’s a large Domino’s pizza and a beer, if we lose it’s just the pizza,” he admits.
Yet this monster of a man boasts just 9% body fat. “Not bad for a man weighing 112 kgs,” he concludes.
Not bad at all.

Visit jameshaskell@jameshaskell.com

Andrew Sheridan

Sun, 30 Mar 2008 00:00:00 +0000

Andrew Sheridan is widely regarded to be the strongest man in rugby bar none. The Sale Sharks and England loosehead prop can dead lift weights up to an astonishing 300 kgs, and bench press around 210 kgs, showing the kind of strength every other professional rugby player talks about.

But, then again, it pays to be strong if you are mad enough to be at the coalface of international rugby union, especially if you have to face the man known affectionately as “Big Ted.”

There was a time when a prop used to be round. Now, with professionalism well and truly kicked in, Sheridan is the epitome of the perfect front row forward: 6ft 4 in, 19 stone (121 kgs) and yet just 12% body fat.

It is pretty obvious that he needs to possess an extraordinary level of strength and fitness. “On the basis that each eight-man pack weighs around 900 kgs, that’s 900 pushing towards me, and another 600 kgs (the second and back rows in his own team) pushing behind me,” Sheridan explains. “That’s 1500 kgs crashing into me from both directions. That’s a lot of power.”

Indeed it is, especially when you consider that with the number of re-setted scrums these days Sheridan has to face this surge of power 30 to 40 times each 80-minute game. “And that’s before you include all the rucks and mauls, and everything else I have to do in a game.”

Which is what? “You need aerobic fitness to sustain your stamina for that amount of time, and also anaerobic fitness because rugby requires a series of short bursts of speed, and minimum recovery times.”

You also need speed which, traditionally, props have never had, but then not every prop has been like Sheridan, the man attributed to almost single-handedly destroying the Australian pack in the 2007 World Cup quarter-final in Marseilles. “I’ve run the 100 metres in 11.9 seconds,” he tells you, without batting an eyelid.

But the main area in which Sheridan has to produce strength is undoubtedly his neck. “I’m a loosehead, and that means you have to counter-act a tight head prop whose job is to bear down on you and put all his weight on to your neck. It’s the reason why props tend to have so many neck and back problems. In return it’s my job to get under the tight head and push him up. Whoever wins that battle helps to decide which pack of forwards is dominant.”

With as much as 4 kgs in weight lost during each game, and as long as three days to recover the physical battering of a test match, it is little wonder Sheridan is bordering on being a fitness and, especially, weights fanatic. “Let’s put it this way,” he admits. “My favourite programme on TV is “The World’s Strongest Man.!”
At the end of each season – usually in May – Sheridan is supposed to have four or five weeks off, but he still maintains a slight training programme. “I don’t feel good if I haven’t done something most days,” he explains. This usually means a swim, a game of tennis, or a jog. It is on his return to the club in late June that a 12-week, pre-season period begins, designed to put fuel in the belly for the long, hard season ahead.

“It begins with speed and anaerobic tests, just to see where we’re at. Then we go through the four main areas of being a rugby player: aerobic, anaerobic, weights, and skills, with three sessions a day, except for Saturdays, when we have two. Sundays are days off, but we still undergo some cardiovascular work for an hour, on a bike, or in the pool, just to loosen up the muscles.”

Once the season begins Sheridan’s schedule is a little more set in stone. “Mondays are not overly physical if we’ve had a hard game on the Saturday,” he explains. “We’ll have a weights/conditioning session in the morning, and a rugby skills session in the afternoon. I tend to throw in an extra neck session on top most days as an injury-prevention precaution. Tuesdays tend to be more challenging. The forwards tend to work together, working on line-outs, driving using a scrum machine and picking up the ball and running. There’s a lot of contact involved and it can be very physical. A second session in the afternoon is more skills-based. Wednesday’s involve a rugby session in the morning, then weights and conditioning in the afternoon while, although Thursday is technically a day off, I tend to have a long swim. On a Friday we have what’s called a team run, which is a short but intense session out on the pitch and in the warm up period before the match kick off on a Saturday afternoon we’ll have a few scrums, with three players pushing against three more, and hit a few tackle bags, just to get you warmed up. On a Sunday morning I wake up feeling like an old man, and that’s when we have a recovery session, which is usually in a pool, on a bike, or just a few gentle stretching and fitness exercises to loosen up the body.”

This process is repeated week by week, for eight and half months of the year, before Sheridan then undergoes his ten-week, pre-season regime. So does the softly-spoken giant have time to do anything else?

“Well, I have my brick-laying qualifications,” he says. “But I spend quite a bit of my time sleeping.”
Is it any wonder why!

Fitness Box:

Andrew Sheridan’s Strength Regime:

Neck: 3 times a week, using a neck harness, which includes pulling 90 kgs and holding the weight for 30 seconds repeatedly, and also a neck dead lift, using a harness and a 60 kg dumbbell before squatting and applying weight on to neck.

General strength: Strong man exercises, such as dragging large tyres, hitting tyres with sledge hammers; dead lifts with bars up to 300 kgs and bench presses up to 210 kgs x 3 for back and legs often 4 x per week.

Core stability: using Swiss balls and lesser weights lifted to strengthen lower back through balancing.

CV work: swimming (128 lengths per week), shuttle running, “down and ups” – sprint, fall to floor, jump up for more sprints and falls. Anaerobic work: 8 x 100 metre sprints, with 30 second recovery intervals in pre-season; then training games in regular season.

Wayne Bridge.

Sat, 16 Feb 2008 00:00:00 +0000

Wayne Bridge laughs as he tries to defend himself but knows his teammates at Manchester City are spot on. “They think I’m a bit of a gym monkey,” says the 28-year-old left back, with 32 England caps to his name. “They might be right,” he adds.

Indeed they might, because however fit his superstar friends at City may be, nobody quite does fitness like Bridge.
Part of it is because, with former Chelsea temmate Ashley Cole as competition for his place in the England team, Bridge needs to find any edge he can.

But the main reason is simply that Bridge loves to feel fit, and when you hear him explain how his week pans out, assuming he has a game from Saturday to Saturday, then it is no surprise to discover just how fit professional footballers tend to be these days.

“If I’ve played on a Saturday I’ll usually have the Monday and Tuesday off,” Bridge explains, making it sound like he has it easy. He guesses this thought. “You’ll see why we need to relax when I go through the rest of the week.

“Training tends to start at around 11.00 a.m on a Tuesday, but I’m in two hours before because I like to do more. This always begins with a series of hot and cold plunge baths, normally two minutes in each five times, which helps the blood flow.

“Then I start my own circuit, which normally means 45 minutes on an exercise bike, with a minute sprinting, then a minute slow, or sometimes a good, consistent pace to get a sweat on.

“Then it’s on to leg weights, using one-legged squats with no weights, then 5 kilo medicine balls, then 10 kilo balls, usually in reps of six times two. The legs for a footballer, especially a defender who needs to make big tackles and long clearances, are massively important, so we need to look after them well.

“In addition I’ll do some bounding exercises, using big jumps on to a bench, to increase my power, and some cable work to strengthen my upper body. I balance on one leg and then use the cable like a backward wood chop, as well as doing the same thing balancing on a Swiss ball for core stability. It sounds a lot before I start official training, but it sets me up for the day.”

Then proper training begins, which tends to be gentle for the first day back. We have a circuit which we repeat, which involves a series of 30 second exercises on the training field. The aim is to work on quick feet, changing direction, heading, volleying and a few skills, and this will include using the ladder on the ground and a series of abs exercises. The morning will end with an ice plunge to aid recovery.”

Wednesdays tend to be more skills based, although Bridge will have again already trained for two hours prior to the official period. “I do pretty much the same stuff each morning although not always weights depending on how tired my body feels. On the field we have keep ball sessions, then a short game between defenders and attackers. The defenders then head off to work on their specific job, which means heading and clearing, while the forwards tend to focus more on crossing and shooting. Training will last two hours and, on the Thursday, ninety minutes.”

Once again Bridge has already been at City’s training ground for a couple of hours beforehand on the bike and in the gym. “Then it’s down to skills and tactics. We’ll play some keep ball, with two in the middle and the rest one-touch passing around in a small box, before a match between two eleven-a-side teams. Afterwards I’d have a massage after three days of training.”

The day before the big game tends to be short and sweet. “I won’t do my own thing before training on a Friday, and the training session usually last an hour. We’ll do some more keep ball exercises, and a short, one-touch game of two in the middle, before a five-a-side game just to keep up our skills up there for the next day. The morning ends with another plunge bath.”

On the Saturday the players tend to stay relaxed until fifteen minutes before they go out on to the pitch to warm up. “That’s when I undergo a number of stretching exercises in the dressing room, concentrating mainly on my hamstrings, glutes, quads, calves and groin. I wouldn’t class myself as an old man but at 28, and with all the football behind me, I definitely notice the stiffness in my lower back. At 21 when I played at Southampton I felt like a whippet, but not any more.”

The warm-up period before kick-off is crucial, and surprisingly intense. “We stretch every major muscle group again to be nice and loose, then have a series of sprints across the width of the pitch with high knees and heel flicks, and side to sides when we side-step across the pitch, before a longer stretch. Now there’s no danger of pulling a muscle so we’ll practice some long-kicking, just enough to work up a sweat.”

In the 90 minutes of a football match Bridge tends to run between 11,000 and 12,000 metres, mainly in short bursts of speed, and can lose up to 4 kilos in weight. “It’s crucial to possess both speed and stamina,” Bridge says. “That requires power, and good core strength, with strong muscles to deal with all the twisting and turning.”
Like any footballer he has suffered from niggles, but Bridge has only been badly affected by two injuries. “Three years ago I dislocated my ankle and had some major ligament injuries as well in the February, and didn’t come back until the start of the next season in August. Even then it didn’t feel right until Christmas. They said it could have been a career-threatening injury, but I worked extra hard in training and rehab to get myself back. I’d lost a lot of leg muscle so getting it back was the biggest part of the rehab. It was the same when I had a hip operation. The prognosis was twelve weeks out, but I made it back in eight.”

When injured Bridge never touches alcohol, nor enjoys the “blow-out” that every footballer treats himself to now and again. “We’re talking fish and chips, or maybe a burger, but only after a game,” he explains. “The rest of the time it’s a highly nutritious diet which has changed beyond recognition in the past three or four years in football.”

Bridge’s food intake is large, which underlines how much work he puts in to his profession, judging by his 80 kilo weight, and 7% body fat ratio. “I never used to eat breakfast, whereas now it’s scrambled eggs and ham on brown toast, then a lunch with a third carbs such as pasta, a third protein such as chicken, and a third vegetable, which tends to be broccoli, with a yogurt and fruit. In the evening there are less carbs. I tend to eat a chicken or pork steak, with plenty of veg or salad. All day I’m also drinking water, weak squash, isotonic drinks and protein shakes. In a game it will half a litre at half time, and two litres immediately afterwards. If we win, and it’s two and half days before training, I may treat myself to a glass of wine, but games come so thick and fast these days, even that’s a rare.”

Long gone, then, are the days of footballers with a paunch, with a pint of beer and steak and chips after games. The modern Premiership footballer is a sleek, fitness machine, highly-educated in the art of keeping fit and well-nourished.

Wayne Bridge, it seems, is the perfect example of today’s football star, and even his former assistant manager at Chelsea, Ray Wilkins, is impressed.
“Ray calls me his super-middleweight,” he reveals, with a laugh. Quite clearly Bridge packs a punch.