I'm starting with the end.
There's a lot to be learned from Ric Suggitt, head coach of the USA Women's 7s team. What a motivational human being. I'm very lucky to have been able to hear him speak and spend some time with him!
He came to us late on Friday night [our last night of training], fresh off a plane. But his energy and enthusiasm didn't show what exhaustion he was probably feeling underneath. Talk about a busy guy! Right after spending the end of camp with us he flew out to Canada for the Super Sevens tournament. Air travel and being in different time zones is NOT an easy task.
The majority of the notes that I took during Ric Suggitt's talk are direct quotes, because he nails so many things right on the head. I paired them with photos from the trip, so I can always remember to apply them to my rugby career and associate them with with positive rugby memories.
Attitude
Fitness
Fundamentals
Game Play
A montage of movie clips was shown to depict the different things that make a good attitude:
Be explosive.
Face your fears.
Don't waste your talent.
Over Achieve.
HEART! It's your heart, play with it.
Play smart.
Play with Passion.
I haven't mentioned this yet, but every single morning and evening I had been reading Rudy Reuttiger's autobiography. By far the most inspirational book I have ever read. I marked down different pages and starred different paragraphs on passages that were specifically motivating - I felt like I was marking down every other page!
....anyways, one of the movie clips that Ric showed that night was from the movie Rudy. I straight up cried.
Some of the girls who had seen me carrying the book around and reading it said to me after, "Hey! Your guy Rudy was up there!" The next day, Emilie Bydwell also came up to me and said "Hey! Did you see Rudy shown last night?!"
I cannot think of a better human being to be associated with.
Even when you're conquering fears, doing it with a smile on your face makes everything that much easier. Especially in rugby, any player or coach can attest to the importance of being able to conquer your fears. You can't go in for a tackle with fear in your eyes, or you're going to get knocked on your ass and/or injured. When you're able to work on your fears, you gain confidence and technique. FEAR more than anything can be detrimental to someone's rugby abilities. I have wondered why some people are so naturally good at rugby without seemingly putting any work into it nor doing any conditioning for it.....although everyone needs hard work in order to make it far in rugby, confidence alone can also make you improve in leaps and bounds.
And it can even be a fake-it-until-you-make-it scenario: even if you're afraid or nervous [it's natural], PUT A SMILE ON YOUR FACE AND COME DO YOUR JOB. I am my toughest critic, by far. It can be hard for me to fight my own inner negativity because I strive for perfection and the best I can do. But just having a quick reality check by putting a smile on my face does wonders. It reminds me WHY I put so much time and effort into this sport, because in the end it makes me happy. And NOTHING can touch that.
UGH....I can barely get it out....
We will all get to an age where we can't play rugby anymore.
So every damn millisecond that you get on that field is a blessing and a privilege. Even if you feel tired from work or the pressures of life and "don't feel like" dragging your butt to practice, DO IT BECAUSE IT'S FUN. Someday, you're gonna wish more than anything in the world you could go back in time and have just one more rugby practice, or just one more minute on the pitch. I know I will.
**let the sappy tearz begin.**
Although it's such a simple sentence, this can be digested in so many ways. Putting intention behind your actions, and thinking before doing, goes a long way. This can be implemented into many different contexts.
For example, I have been struggling to increase my speed - I have been trying to go for runs and time them to see if I can get my average mile down, however in sprints I still seemed to burn out immediately.
But when I approached my crossfit coaches asking for help on specifically speed, they pointed me in a whole different direction. I was doing the completely wrong workouts, and my sprinting ability lied asleep the whole time. They introduced me to the concept of fast and slow twitch muscle fibers, something I had never heard of before. But learning the difference between the two was what made me learn how blind I've been to real speed workouts!
Fast twitch muscle fibers specifically give you a major boost for a short period of time, hence why they are useful for sprints. They're also useful for sprints because they can activate and fire off energy at the drop of a hat. But while they're able to give you that initial boost immediately, they also tend to burn out quicker.
Slow twitch muscle fibers are more concerned with efficiency rather than power. They fire more slowly so they can convert oxygen into fuel for a longer period of time, hence why they are good for long distances. They last longer but they're not stronger.
The muscle fiber types we possess are primarily left up to genetics; and the amount of a certain type of fiber you're born with has been proven to influence what type of sports you play. A sports medicine study showed that sprinters possess 80% fast twitch fibers and marathon runners possess 80% slow twitch fibers. It's still up to discretion whether or not training can change your fiber types, typical nature vs. nurture argument.
HOWEVER, me trying to go on long distance runs just to see if I can increase my mile time does NOTHING for sprints. I'm just activating my slow twitch muscle fibers over and over again and strengthening them instead of activating my fast twitch fibers!
So moral of the story: I need to start doing more workouts with the undivided INTENTION of increasing speed. Quality over quantity. Specifically do sprints that I only exert myself on during the actual sprint. It's a beehotch, but it works. Over the past weekend I scored two breakaway tries in one of our sevens tournaments, and I've only scored like 4 tries in my whole life period!
....don't tell my club team, or else I'll have to shoot the boot (none of them have realized yet that it's the first time I've scored on this team). This will be a funny test to see if anyone on my team actually reads this ;)
Another way that Ric taught us a lesson about intention was through "selective attention tests" that you can find all over youtube:
These can apply to rugby in many ways; if you're running with the ball and only looking at the defender in front of you, then you may miss out on gaps that are wide, or a potential overload that's occurring, or a number of other options you may have. That's one of the beautiful things about rugby - you need to be able to look a few steps ahead sometimes rather than just what you're currently presented with.
K-A-R-M-A.
I have NEVER seen it more present in any other sport than I have in rugby.
If you put the time in, if you never give up, then you WILL be rewarded and see the results.
It may not be right away, but as long as you keep at it then you'll see your hard work pay off. There are absolutely NO SHORTCUTS in rugby. The best players give it 110% every day. They also treat their fellow teammates the way they would want to be treated, that's what makes rugby players in general some of the greatest people you'll ever meet! You can't work alone, so you better get along with the people that you need to lend you a helping hand and support you on a breakaway!
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