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cpwigan wrote:

weststand-rich wrote:This is where RL is particularly backward - a world class brand like Wigan should have an elite crossover with the leading UK sports University Loughborough and shouting about it from the rafters.

To those who think hammering up Haigh and Rivvy is the answer to our problem, sorry but you're wrong. That type of work is part of a balanced programme, but if that's all it took then the enthusiastic unpaid amatuers who train with guts and drive would be playing for Wigan

Rich we are not talking about how to become players. Everybody knows Pryce has/had ability but they also know that for all the ability if you are not fit enough physically / mentally then you are wasting your time.

What concerns many is that there seems to be a very namby pamby approach to conditioning. I do not claim to be qualified but my understanding is fitness / strength. You stretch yourself, the body reacts and adjusts and become better equipped and you keep doing that.

Is that not what the armed forces do with ordinary people? Boxers in a more demanding sport flog themselves and use the physical elements, marathon runners have to put in the hard slog.

Modern Gyms make their money from people playing at fitness, never turning up. Strikes me Wigan RLFC play at conditioning and it is their livelihood.

Hi CP.

I guess we're both singing from the same sheet here - we don't think Wigan's conditioning is up to much. Where we would differ is in the approach. Getting a good flogging in training is fine but that only brings limited results if every single session is flat out. For consistent, gradual, improving results there has to be a balance between hard sessions and 'easier' sessions. Easier sessions is a misleading description really, becuase it 's actually conditioning a different fitness system. I could actually believe (but don't think it is the case) that our players are being flogged too much and can't cope with the workload.

For example, take a marathon runner = training doesn't take place constantly at marathon pace or marathon distance. Sessions build in distance over 3-4 months and have a mix of long slow runs to build aerobic fitness and shorter but faster runs of hard intervals to build speed. The marathon event on race day is the sum of the different training that comes together on the day.

So how do you gauge how hard to train? 2 ways. Take resting heart beat as soon as you wake up. If it starts to rise over a period of days after it's been say 60 bpm for a month then you're training to hard in terms of volume and/or intensity. Do our players each have a personal heart rate monitor to do this? I would guess no. The second supplement to this is a daily training diary to log workloads, positives, negatives etc. Given some of our players can barely write that's possibly a bit much. But you get my drift.

From casually talking with my Wigan insider over the years, I get the impression a lot of the strength / power / endurance flexability work is years old and is done because that's what's always been done. I don't think this is good enough - in the old days footballers used to have steak and eggs before they played and it was just about the worst pre-game meal you could have with modern insight. I've got an interest in endurance conditioning and have a science background and from an informed amateur's perspective would suggest that some of the training structure Wigan use is ad hoc .

I agree Rich and I think we are closer to the same hymn sheet than you may think. Pryce is different to most players because he is far bigger. He is like a prop in terms of conditioning. So he needs an individual personalised plan. With normal conditioning I know they use periodisation across the year etc but clearly the initial period that had an emphasis on fitness did not work with Pryce so he still needs that. I would question whether he needs to even be playing and if he was not they could train him more intensely re conditioning.

He does need driving that is obvious to everybody.

The only reason that Noble likes Pryce is because he is 6'5". He is a very limited rugby player skills wise and has no real speed and is very unfit. To top it all he also has no heart. Whether any of this will come is debatable. However for these reasons he definately shouldnt be in the squad for the forseeable future.

weststand-rich wrote:This is where RL is particularly backward - a world class brand like Wigan should have an elite crossover with the leading UK sports University Loughborough and shouting about it from the rafters.

To those who think hammering up Haigh and Rivvy is the answer to our problem, sorry but you're wrong. That type of work is part of a balanced programme, but if that's all it took then the enthusiastic unpaid amatuers who train with guts and drive would be playing for Wigan

I think when people go on about Inga running up Rivington they are just making a general point there seems to be a lack of the hard work being done with Pryce.

I think we all realise it's much more scientific than that but with both Pryce and also Feka there have been questions about their fitness that even the simplistic approach of "doing an Inga" would help!

Dave