Bruising ‘Kiwi Day’ revealed
SOME may call it madness and others genius‚ but Thursdays at Stormers’ training are no longer gentle strolls through match-day preparation‚ but rather a thunderously intense session designed to take players to absolute limit of their capabilities.
The 55-minute afternoon field session has become known as “Kiwi Day” around the High Performance Centre in Bellville.
It was a closely guarded secret, until flyhalf Rob du Preez casually tossed in the phrase when answering a question this week.
There was a pricking of journalists’ ears when Du Preez said: “Every Thursday, we call a Kiwi Day where we prepare for them [New Zealand teams]‚ because we know they pose a different threat. We go hard at each other on Thursdays.”
Du Preez did not expand and it was left to head coach Robbie Fleck to try and throw a fire blanket on the remark.
“Kiwi Day is when we really increase the intensity‚ physicality and the tempo of our training session‚” Fleck said.
“It’s a 55-minute session where it’s full on – and we try to beat match-day intensity.
“It’s full contact and hard. The full contact part is only a portion of the session, but it is all about doing more than is required in a match situation.
“The mindset is to beat a Kiwi type of game. We do it specifically on a Thursday, because it’s closer to the match and players are starting to feel the intensity of the game already. They’re starting to switch on.
“Some teams like to do contact on a Tuesday, but we prefer it being closer to the match day. The All Blacks do 10 to 15 minutes of it on Thursday as well.
“We don’t want to be like them‚ but we want to beat them‚ and they are now the standard.
“It’s been called Kiwi Day, but it could be called anything. We also have a Turnover Tuesday.
“We never used to do contact at the Stormers in a week leading up to a match, because some of the older players didn’t enjoy it and wanted to stay fresh.”
There is no doubt that the concept was brought across the Indian Ocean by Kiwi Paul Feeney, who joined the Stormers’ coaching staff this year.
The Stormers are correct to prepare as if they are playing New Zealand’s Chiefs every weekend.