EXCLUSIVE Inside the England rugby camp: JAMIE GEORGE reveals his day-to-day diary of how they are preparing to beat the All Blacks - including Whoop bands, sleeping in until 2pm...
and playing very little rugby! England will look to cap off their rollercoaster year by beating the All Blacks They lost the first game of the two-Test series last weekend, going down 16-15 Jamie George took Mail Sport through a week's worth of recovery and training By Jamie George Published: 17:00, 12 July 2024 | Updated: 17:39, 12 July 2024 e-mail View comments England are at the end of a gruelling season which began more than a year ago, when the majority of the current squad were starting their preparations for the World Cup last autumn. The players will summon up one last, herculean effort, just seven days after a blood-and-thunder encounter with the All Blacks in Dunedin. Here, captain JAMIE GEORGE explains to Mail Sport's Chris Foy how he and his team-mates recover, repair and prepare for another punishing Test, a week after the last one.
.. Jamie George has revealed his day-to-day diary inside England's rugby camp in New Zealand They will summon up one last Herculean effort against the All Blacks to round off their season LAST SATURDAY 'After the game, the medics will come to each player and ask, "Anything to report?".
If it is anything from a stubbed toe to a rolled ankle, you report that. They'll be checking in throughout the week and you'll be getting treatment constantly. 'There are always a few knocks and you recover in any way you can.
If you have a dead leg or any bleeding, you put ice on that area. Otherwise, rehydration is the key. When you play in a Test match, you weigh in and weigh out, to see how much water you've lost.
Generally, it is between one and three kilos. Three kilos would be a lot. In Japan, it was a lot – more than in New Zealand where I think for me it was about one-and-a-half (kilos lost).
'You rehydrate with water, salts and electrolytes, and you jump in an ice bath if there is one. There was one at the stadium last weekend, which was great. Then the message from Aled (Walters, head of strength & conditioning) was we can have a beer next weekend.
So, you have to rein in your alcohol intake quite significantly and try to get an early night. 'The best way we can recover is sleep and the guys are now wearing Whoop bands and other devices which track sleeping patterns. Steve (Borthwick) has spoken this week about trying to set sleeping records because that is the most important thing, so it's about who can sleep for the longest.
Theo Dan is a ridiculous sleeper and a lot of the young lads can sleep for ages. 'But you often end up having to play catch-up with sleep, on the back of a difficult Saturday night. Your mind ticks over.
I got to sleep at 3 or 4am and woke up again at 8am, which is not enough.' Players can lose between one and three kilos of water after playing in brutal Test matches Whoop bands (pictured) are used to track sleeping patterns and help the squad to recover SUNDAY 'That was a travel day for us which makes it quite difficult. We did recovery in the morning before we left Dunedin.
We try to get in a pool or an ice bath and get some treatment from the physio department. The main thing for us was to make sure we were all wearing our recovery leggings on the flight and for most of the day. 'Then we tried to do more recovery when we got to the hotel here in Auckland.
By recovery, mostly I am talking about ice baths and using the sauna. Saunas are a big thing in rugby at the moment and there is an amazing one here at the hotel. We all piled into there, then also into the ice, so it's about mixing up the hot and cold.
You probably do a 15-minute stint in an ice bath; three to five minutes in it, out of it then back in again. 'There will be a performance meeting and we all feed back, then our head of medical reports to our head of performance, who chats to Steve. They have a good understanding of what we need.
They also check out the GPS data from our game at the weekend. 'That last game was always going to take a lot out of us in terms of emotion and physically too. There is an emotional spike that comes from playing in a game like that, a come-down off the back of it and allowing yourself to feel pretty rubbish for a couple of days.
' The day after matches typically sees players make use of saunas to further recover To mix up the hot and cold, players will also jump in ice baths for several 15-minute stints MONDAY 'It was mostly just a walk-through for us this week. We weren't on the field, but we got through a lot of detail. We did some gym work, but the priority was about making sure we felt right for Tuesday.
'The big thing now is physio and soft-tissue (massage) so you would be getting that every day. We will be seeing a physio and a soft-tissue therapist at least once a day. 'After a game like last weekend, you really don't feel like yourself early in the week.
Your legs still feel heavy and you have a lot of bumps and bruises. So, we shorten the amount of time we are on the grass, but that means we have to maximise the opportunity whenever we are on the grass. I think we've done that right.
' Monday will be a walk-through for the rest of the week with legs still heavy from the last game TUESDAY 'We were in the gym and it was high intensity but probably a lot shorter than we are used to. That is based off the game-load from the week before and the fact that it's the last week of the season. It's not too common that you bring it down that much.
You still need to make sure that that intensity spike is quite high. 'Tuesday is the big training day in our week. We don't do double (session) days here, but we might do stuff in units after the session and gym beforehand, leading into a walk-through, then on to the field.
All in, it's probably three hours in the morning. There were a lot of sore bodies and we were all still feeling it a bit after the match last weekend. 'The emphasis is on trying to get a big sleep on Tuesday night.
We will go out for dinner, sometimes in small groups of forwards or backs, or sometimes as a big group. It's just about getting out of the hotel, enjoying each other's company, then generally get back pretty early and be in bed to sleep for as long as you can.' Tuesday is the biggest training day of the week and players are then tasked with sleeping well WEDNESDAY 'This is a big recovery day for us.
The physios are available to us and we try to make sure we are not on our feet for too long or going out exploring too much. Again, it is about using the sauna, the ice bath, soft-tissue therapy, physio. Those are all the big priorities that day, making sure you are right for Thursday when we train again.
' THURSDAY 'It is a similar training day to a Tuesday, but the phases that we train for aren't as long. On Tuesday, you might knock the ball on, but they will play it out until there is an end point – someone is tackled into touch or scores a try or whatever. But on Thursdays, they will shorten it to three or four phases, so it's about tapering the running load as it is later in the week.
'By this stage in the week, all the recovery has really helped. I was certainly feeling a lot better in training than I was on Tuesday.' Sessions will be shortened on Thursdays and by then, recovery should have set in FRIDAY 'We've changed how we do things the day before a Test.
Under Eddie (Jones), the captain's run at the stadium used to be a training session and you would run through your first three plays, with boots on. But now it is a walk-and-talk exercise. 'I've never been a massive fan of them (eve-of-match training sessions), we've never done them at Sarries and neither has Steve, so it is just a walk and talk, the kickers kick at goal, I'll do some (lineout) throwing, individual skills – it's completely up to you what you want to do.
'We have meetings on the Friday evening. If there's any sport on the TV, we will get that on. It's very much a day where we try to chill, get a nap in if we can and get as much sleep as possible.
' The captain's run under Steve Borthwick is a walk and talk before a meeting in the evening SATURDAY 'You'll get more soft-tissue therapy in the morning, but it is recommended not to use the sauna or the ice bath in the 24 hours before a game, so we generally wouldn't do that on Friday or Saturday. 'On game day, we will sleep in as long as we can, but there is a sleep cut-off point. I think it was 2pm last week.
Aled knows all the science behind it and he tells us that there's no sleeping past 2pm for a 7pm kick-off. 'The only other thing we do is four hours before kick-off, we will do an activation. It will be in a room at the hotel, where we will do some stretching led by our strength & conditioning coaches, then off the back of that will do some maximal effort things like med (medicine) ball slams or squat jumps – things like that which spike your testosterone levels.
'Again, there's science behind it but I'm not the man for that – I just do what I'm told! Doing those things make us feel good, then obviously we go to the stadium, do the warm-ups and we're into the game.' England Rugby NZ All blacks Japan Share or comment on this article: Inside the England rugby camp: JAMIE GEORGE reveals his day-to-day diary of how they are preparing to beat the All Blacks - including Whoop bands, sleeping in until 2pm..
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