DENIS BUCKLEY OUGHT to give Connacht’s fitness staff an immense amount of pride.
Not only is the prop a homegrown talent making strides on a national level, he’s doing so with an engine that can push him through 80 gruelling minutes of front row action – and beyond when he needs to.
The Roscommon man (who farmed himself out to Blackrock College in his school years) proved that engine capacity in May when he played 100 hard minutes away to Gloucester at the end of a long hard season. He then topped off the campaign with three appearances in a week for Emerging Ireland.
After a deserved break, last month he got back to the grindstone to lay the foundations for what he hopes will be an even better season for himself and his province.
“You come back in and there’s a lot of fitness and weights,” he told The42 with a voice that suggested he was relived to be over the worst of it.
“It’s obviously quite different to in-season. And maybe a bit more strenuous in that you’re doing three big fitness sessions a week and then you’re doing heavy weight sessions most days as well.
On top of that, you throw in some pitch sessions where we’re working on plays and patterns and stuff. It’s quite an intense period, but it gives you a good base to have a good season.”
Buckley, listed as 109 kilos last season, will stop short of divulging the big headline numbers adorning the wall of the weight room. Understandably enough, as the season (and Paul Bunce’s end-of-pre-season testing) still has a week to run.
“The structure can be quite individualised depending on different people. I might not have as much of the running and fitness as the other players, but I’ve had a bit more of the weights. That programme is tailored to your individual needs as well. For me, I’ve had a lot of lifting this summer, just trying to chase a few kilos and trying to build a bit of strength and power for the season ahead.”
The fitness sessions he has done, are not likely to be easily forgotten. Props are built for battles over inches, not kilometres.
“It can vary,” he says of the make-up of the three-session early weeks, “a yo-yo test which is a horrible 1.2 kilometre test where you do lengths of the pitch. That’s time-trialled so you’re fighting for as good a score as you can.”
And that’s the nice option…
“I’m not sure if you’ve heard of a Watt Bike,” asks Buckley. Players tend to speak in hushed tones of their gym’s new hi-the cycling unit as if they fear it may be listening in, waiting on an excuse to punish them further.
“It’s a pretty horrible piece of equipment. We’d do a 10k time trial and a 5k time trial, a 3k and then a 2k with just a minute rest in between.
“So it’s pretty horrible going.”
Ah, but it will all be worth it when Connacht are sitting in a top six place come the end of the season.
