Yes, what is going on? Everybody. Welcome back to another rugby muscle podcast. I'm host always TJ and that smiling face with a huge beard that you can see across the other side of the screen is probably familiar to a lot of you, hopefully at this point, right? Alex, what's going on. Oh, much fun. Same off no much man, same old, you know, just same stuff. Different countries trying to get. Yeah. For both of us just trying to get stronger, right? Yeah, man. Just the exact same stuff. So we were talking the other day about actually we were talking about my own lifting and how I was my goal for some of this was to be in like the top 20%. And that sparked the whole conversation that we'll get into with this podcast about not even the top 20%, but probably the top, like one or 0.1% and how these people operate. Before I do that, If you're watching this on the YouTube channel, give it a thumbs up, make any comment in the comments below. Always helps out the algorithm do that right now. I'll give you a second to do that. And then we can get into this episode. If you're listen on wherever you get your podcasts go. I, if it's on Spotify, I think you can give five star reviews. Now, if it's anywhere else that you get podcasts. Please give us a five star review and a potential just type up whatever you want on the apple podcast. Cause that's the best way to promote the show and get it to more rugby players or more people that need it, which will help us, you know, grow and expand what we do here at rugby muscle, but best way to spread it is just to share over mate, I reckon anyway, Alex, let's get into it. So do you think, right let's before we like, talk about what the top, like 1% do, do you think most people aware of how elite the top 1% or even 0.1, let's go 0.1%. Should we the top 0.1% of athletes, you think people are aware of how different they are? Let let's let's look at as a, it's not 0.1%. Let's go elite. Okay. It's realist. It's less than 0.1%. 7 billion. Yeah. It's much, much less. It's like 0.0 0 0 0 0 1. Right. So we just say elite is much easier and it depends on the sport was was rich P's percentage. Is he 5%? Was it 5%. That's like, that's a lot of people that's like, it's like brand new, less than 5% people actually even go to the gym. Yeah. So that's like hundreds of thousands of people where we are really concerned about the top 100. Yeah. I mean, I don't even care that oh, top tech. Yeah. A hundred percent. Right? So it's like mind boing, small number of people, but it's the people you see over time. So like the big, the big name's Instagram, for example, like the, the top like super, super rugby players or the premiership players, but as a percentage of everyone playing rugby, that's tiny. And the standout players within that seem even less. Yeah. And no, like we see it, like, do you remember seeing a bow and Barrack try? He was playing for the blues and it was like a no look, switch to, I think I do. And he like launched it like 20. He launched it like 20 meters. And it was like on the, but like no one does that. Mm-hmm yeah. And no one does that. Cause he's a friend, you know? Yeah. And it just kinda that idea, like just don't know how good people are because we don't spend time, like around them not exposed to it. Yeah. And I think to even like, we'll go into lessons that we can get from there in the minute, but to put like my favorite one, I think it's like Wimbledon time right now in the UK. Like people are watching. The reason I bring that up is because for years and forever, basically the only context you have of tennis is Wimbledon, right? A lot of people in England will relate to that. Or, or if you're in the us, it's probably the us open hold on, wait one second. Much better. So for years it the, the. The only context you have is two weeks of the year where you're watching the top 0.0, zero, zero, 1% of people do their thing. Right. And you're watching it on TV. So it's not even like, you know, they say the TV adds 10 pounds or whatever, but like overall, it's a different experience to watching it in person. You're you have no idea how hard these people are hitting this ball point being is that you that's the only time you watch it, then when you go to play. That sport, like for a lot of people, you you've probably play, you probably go and play it. Having watched it for 15 years or however many years, and you go, oh, okay. I can do this. And I remember for me, when I was at. I'm pretty sure it was when I was at uni, I was like, I played a few times when my brother was just mucking around and then for one, like summer, me and one housemate took it seriously. And we went and played every week and I used to hit the fucking worst ever shots. Like he would set it up, like for the easiest shot in the world for me. And so I think, okay, I know exactly what I'm gonna do because I've seen the pros do it and I try and top spin it right in the corner. Half the time it went over the fence. Right? A lot, a lot of the other times it got caught in the fence. It basically as a percentage, it never it never really worked point being from that is that that's because the only context I've known is the top percent I should not be following that I should be doing. And this is what I did after about a month. I was like, fuck. All of my points that I lose is because unforced errors. So all I should do instead is just keep getting the ball in. And eventually he's gonna do the unforced error. If I stop trying to be fucking Roger Feder or whoever, and just try and hit the ball in the court, doesn't matter where eventually he's gonna mess up. So that was my new tactic. And guess what? I started winning like, it was ridiculous how that works. You are muted by the way, you know, just somehow mute yourself. So like, whilst you figure out how to unmute yourself, the point here is that like what you relate to TV and what you relate on Instagram or whatever you're seeing when you're seeing the top percentile, that's not how you should be operating or how you should expect to operate right. By definition. Most people are not in that top 0.001%. And that's fine. Because you've still got plenty of room to get better. But it's just that you should be aware of the fact that these people are freaks. Yeah. Can you hear me now? Mm-hmm sweet. Okay. Guess. Okay. So where I wanted to go from that is lessons that potentially we can learn and then other lessons that we should not learn from these like absolute freaks The quote that sticks out to me is from Tom Farrow, former England sevens actually might still be strengthening condition there with England sevens. And he did a quote for a seminar that I've watched that he said the best players are the best players, because they are the best players genius. Right. But it's, it's so true. Like we try and like basically see what they're doing and copy. And think that that's gonna make us the best players, but it's not like the best players just do what they do. And a lot of the time they're the best in spite of what they're doing. Like Daniel Cormier heavy was the world heavyweight MMA champion. He was doing wall drills for sprints, like the week leading up or two weeks out from his fight. Like that's fucking stupid. Okay. That's really dumb. And that's got nothing to do with why he wa but he was still the best. Like, even though, like, that's what he did. I mean, the thing is it's hard to post third, right? the fact is that most of us did share, like, you know, that's so is no that's these, like you gonna posture up so much kind of, but the point is that, like, that's not where we need to compare ourselves. We need to get these big rocks in place. So I think. Rather than no, no, we're not. Yeah. You throw me off there with that polished turd. Example. Cause it's the opposite of what the point I was trying to make is that like you can't, unpublish something that's already really beautiful and shiny, right. For lack of a much better phrase, a diamond in a rough, but I, yeah, I guess so I guess that's still gonna be, no matter how much you Polish the tur. The diamond in the rough is still gonna be significantly more valuable than yeah. Than, than the turd. Right. And that just is what it is. And some of these best players are the best. Now I think what happens is because like what hundred, a hundred years ago we would, we would only have read about these people on, in newspaper. Like two weeks after the fact, I would've heard, heard about them on the radio, but you would never. You'd never actually been able to contextualize it in your head now when you can. And this is the first, the first point I kind of wanna make on this is that you get the top you know, 0.0, zero 1%, like the real cream of the crop. I know we didn't wanna say the percentages. So you get the elite and they're on Instagram and we're exposed to them every day that we shouldn't be right. Because then that like make, then we're trying to compare that to. whatever we see day to day and immediately, this is where the sort of Natty or not brigade comes up. Right. Everyone thinks everyone's on steroids. Every athlete ever is on steroids. Like I get why people are making this argument, but I think these, a lot of these people just don't know how freakish genetics are. Like there's people in this world that are what, eight foot tall. Yeah. Like they exist just fucking insane. You're right. And there are also people that are two foot tall, also fucking insane, but they also exist. So how you can tell me that someone can't be, you know, 230 pounds or 110 kilos with a really low body fat percentage, like without using steroids is ridiculous. That's a stupid argument. And you should open your mind up when you hit, when you think that if you're thinking that. Yeah. There's not a lot of basis for it. Like you can't just say for it, like it, that's not how science works, but I think there's also like a way that, that sort of validates people to then like carry on doing whatever they're doing and, and think that, you know, and, and listen to people like you negatively telling 'em that they can't Polish a turd and they should just be like, oh, well, everyone else is on steroids. No, no, I didn't say you can't Polish tur. I said you only Polish tur so much. okay. All right. Fair enough. There's different sense. So because you can't Yeah. So if we look at what elite athletes do there are some things that we can take away, but there are also, I mean, there are things that we've already alluded to, that you can just throw out and say, okay, I don't need to do that. So can you give an example of something that maybe. Something that elite athletes do that we can use that we can take away and say, okay, us as not so elite can still take away and, and try and move forward. Yeah, yeah, for sure. Skill work and just been really fucking good at the basic skill. And like, for a lot of the elite guys, this comes really naturally, or the work ethic to just to work on the skill over and over again comes really naturally. Whereas with someone like me or like you we're like, do I just wanna do shit? And I wanna have. Yeah. And even, even though we are like genetic, like be gifted, we're not elite. Right. And we want changes. Whereas someone like, do you, do you follow Sullivan on Instagram? Who he's like a multiple world, Joe Sullivan? No, he's a multiple world record holder. Um, he, He, is. Does skill work, every single session, he just fucking drills it the entire time. And the reason he squats like 900 pounds, 200 pounds. Right. You know? Yeah. It's steroids, but also he's really pissed, you know? Yeah. Like there, there are also so many people that take steroids that don't have that anywhere near that amount of strength. Right. So it goes both ways. Absolutely. So isn't skill work. Yeah. Is incidental the, this attention to detailing and skilled. Really good. Yeah. Like the sevens, right. Well, you talking about your sevens players and the best players, the best players, best skills are just across the board. Yeah. There's no one that can't like, even Carl and Isles, who's like passing and hands, like traditionally you would say, oh, that's, you know, that's his weakest part, but purely because he's so rapid. Right. But for the most part, like he's still on a regular basis, works and drills his his hands and, and just his basic pass. And you think, and I've mentioned this on this podcast and this YouTube channel so many times at this point, but it still bears repeated. Is it like if you are only do, if you are only passing in your Tuesday, Thursday practice under pressure, and you're never actually just practicing the skill of passing. You're not gonna get any better at passing. And if you're not getting any better at passing you're, you're limiting yourself and how much you can improve as a player. We can also talk about rocking. We can talk about tackling. We can talk about all the skills that are involved in rugby for the most part, because we've got such a limited time in order to train these skills. We only do them like under pressure, preparing us for a game or in a game that's not giving us room to improve. Right. Even fucking. I was gonna say Kurt Kaba, but I could give like an example, not from like 30 years ago probably, but like guitarists, like elite musicians. Right. They will do. And, and like to the point where like their brain gets fried from, from trying to practice a musical, like if anyone knows how to practice, practice in a musical instrument, practice in a musical insurance, practicing a language, like just doing basic, basic, basic it's repetitive, and it's really boring, but. You're you are laying down pathways to dramatically increase your efficiency and your competency at doing those things. Passing is absolutely one of them, as you said, even like something as simple as squatting, right. For someone that squats all the time and is so strong that you squats, was it 900 pounds at 200 pounds? Yeah, it's ridiculous. Right? That's ridiculous. But he also, but he also practices. Squatting, which you think like, you know, how many people that are decent at squatting or even crap at squatting, don't even think about like practicing the skill of squatting. So, yeah, that's a good one. You, you support about musicians. There's a point of musicians. There's a YouTube channel called two step violin. Okay. And they're basically a classical music channel and they say you should practice 40 hours a day. If you wanna be. It's kinda idea. Right, right. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, because it take, and that's the other thing. It's it's skill work. It's not like I see people practice. I'll take a lot of people if I do skill work with them and we'll practice that skill for 15 minutes and there's already a dramatic improvement in those 15 minutes. And like you think, well, that's just 15 minutes. Imagine, imagine if you did that 15 minutes, twice. like two times a week. So then like, you know, you did 30 minutes, two times a week, and you did that for 10 weeks. Like you would lay down, not just some foundation to like, make a big improvement that then would just regress. You would lay enough of a foundation that you would probably improve at that skill for life. Right on two. I mean, it doesn't even have to be 30 minutes, two, 15 minute sessions a week for 10 weeks, and then you could pick another skill. And if you systematically did that, You would level up all your skills or just to continue if you want to be in that top 0.001%. You'd work only those skills and, and that's it. Scrum halfs are a, a fantastic example. I know like Aaron Smith will still go and just real kneeling passing, like probably four days a week, like for months at a time, you know? And he's been renowned as the best scrum half in the world for quite a while. Now, you. I'm sure. South African fans are gonna come at he still your back FA, but he was taking all back size this week, right? Yeah. But he's still there still like first twist swim off. Yeah. They, so, yeah, definitely 10 years. Yeah, the elite guys just do the boring stuff over and over and over and over again, because number one, like that's what they're paid to do. Probably if they're elite number two. Because they've already got good foundation in other areas, which is something that I was, I was gonna get into and I'll get into in a second, but like that affords them the time to work on that skill work a lot. You know, anything else you want to add to that skill work component comes down to like more elite mindset? Just a mindset point, just like it comes down to like elite mindset, more of an like a physical gift. They're just happy to do that stuff and there's robots just because they know the reward is gonna happen. Yeah. I think it's fostered from positive experience, right? Absolutely. Yeah. Cool. I think on that one, the, the negative or side of this, or the, the sort of, one thing that you can't take away from these people though, is that they repeatedly work on. Like all the basic skills, but they've also got a lot of these elite people will have like one genetic differentiator that allows them to already have started this either this skill or like for rugby, the sport in general at a higher level, Les obviously will go back to him as the perfect example. Dude's a freak when it comes to speed. Right. He also works a lot just on his speed, but that's his one differentiator. You could also look at Lewis ream and say speed again for him, but you could also look at like Freddy Stewart, like he's six foot four or six foot five. He's a fullback. Yeah. Right. But he's got that. Like a lot of people within elites will have like one thing where they really stand out that makes. Like unique in their abilities, right? Like, is, is it Andy good? Would you say Andy goods? Elites? Because he's not your traditional like sportsman. Right. But he consistently performed at premiership and international level. So like a relatively good degree. So I would say his differentiator is his understanding of the game and his skillset. Yeah, I would say Andy good is about as elite as they can mate. Like again, he's another one where. Because he was that good at like he's kicking of the ball. Like I think at the time, and probably still, if you look back like that, that was his main thing. Right. He kicked the ball so well, which then like made everything else easier cuz then he could read the game. Well, and by the time, you know, he got into his like must have been late thirties or whatever when he was playing and he was like obscenely outta shape, like cuz younger, he wasn't, he wasn't always outta shape. But as he got better at reading the game, he was able to. Drop off physically, but still maintain a high level of for partly because of the position that he played. And partly because of like how he played and everything, but also because of the fact that his intelligence went all the way up. Right. So that afforded him to go down and you would say, ah, fucking, now I'm in better shape than, and good. Yeah. But you're not a better rugby player. And like, we can all say that, right. yeah. Like the guy benefit, he became a better asset to the team, like the older. Well, he saved a few teams from relegation. I believe. Yeah, they got are fucking start now again, there's something that, but like it's glaringly obvious with Andy. Good. But it goes back to that Daniel, KME a point like that doesn't mean that you should look at the elite, like the freak of Andy. Good. And how good he was as a rugby player and say, oh, okay. I'm a fly half. I'm aspiring. I should go get a beer belly. I should skip preseason and then and then come in and play, fly off. And I'll be the best. Like that's essentially what a lot of people are doing when they look at elite athletes and they say, okay, I'm gonna do like, Daniel, call me. I'm gonna, I'm gonna do war drills for speed before my fight. Like but it is nuts, right? Yeah. It's just, but that, that's just what it is. And, and these elite people. We talked about Johnny Payner. I was listening to him. Talk about, he worked with he worked with Tyson fury and did their strengthen conditioning for, I think it was the first Deontay Wilder fight. And. He like, he was just a consultant because, you know, he knew like the, one of the coaches knew him and said, look, let's, let's get this guy in. He wasn't there for the camp because the camp was at big bear. And so he laid out all of the strength and condition work that they should do. And all, well, basically the condition work they should do to help him prepare and Like, because he did his camp up in big bear. The main thing that he kept saying to them was you should probably not be in big bear because you are gonna, you are, you are, you are there only for, you know, six weeks or 10 weeks or however long the camp was you're then gonna come down back to sea level for at least a week or two weeks before you come. Any other, any positive adaptation that you get from the altitude is probably gonna be lost in that time. For the most part we've seen the science say that like, after, I think it's like 48 hours or something, it gets dropped. You are, you've gone to mute again. The other thing is that you see from that he was saying was like, or training, isn't gonna be as good as well because you are an altitude. You're not recovering as well. You're you are not gonna be able to breathe as well. Like just, you are not gonna have as good a camp. Up in big bear high attitude, like it's just not gonna be conducive to, to having a better camp, but like he likes it. He's seen other people that do it and fighters like people fighters love big bear. You know, they, they love training up in an attitude and making things seem hard. You see people training 'em with an attitude mask cuz they think it's hard. Does that necessarily help their performance? Well, science is pretty clear that it doesn't right, but still you'll get elite athletes doing the same thing and Tyson fury. Who's gonna go and tell him that he's not doing everything right. Because he's literally the best in the world. Dude. Guys' got, he's such a gooder, right? Yeah. He doesn't do like, yeah, you been quiet again, mate. Like it. Whispering in a good way is really okay. Yeah. You got now. Yeah. Yeah. I think it comes back to the, the skill work thing. Yeah, no, hold on. Let's just, I'll tell you what we're gonna do. Hit that link again, cuz you're on a big delay and it's just let me try this. But yeah, the point of that, like story is that I think with, you know, Tyson fury and, and, and a lot of you see this more in fighters than you do with rugby players, but guys will go with their instincts, which sometimes can serve them well, but more often than not like it actually doesn't work at all. So going by Phil is like a. Seen as a good thing for these athletes, but like, you know, if Andy good went by Phil and had a big belly and still played really well. Could he have been a better player if he'd have got himself in better shape? Part of you wants to say yes, right? Because like, obviously right, obviously not having a beer belly, obviously being in shape would help you be a better player, but then that would also discount the massive psychology side of these things. Like you said they do already, like a lot of the elite mindset people like they're already doing a lot of, they're already making sacrifices. They're already doing things that are kind of outside the normal. So anything that like sort of takes away from that can potentially mess that up and actually have them play worse. Do we know that for a fact? Mm it's hard to say, but, you know, it's, it, it basically means. You know, you, you shouldn't necessarily rely on what these people are say. Like these elite athletes are saying they're they're best players, not because of these things that they're doing, but because they're the best, right? Yeah. Just necess be better than us. Yeah. Very frustrating. Right. I believe it that's. Yeah. I mean, we're, we're all here, but so, but then on the flip side of things, right? Another thing that elite athletes do, and a lot of them will do really well. And it is never, always in like just one domain and more often than not. It's like, this is what you'll see is elite athletes will just shut up and put in the work and they'll have someone else that like, even like the most elite power lifters in the world. We'll offer programming to everyone else, but they still won't program themselves. The best, the best teams in the world will have coaches like obviously, right. But. That means that they're having someone that they listen to, that they respect to guide them because they're not being emotional about their own decisions and their own choices. Head coaches, coaches in general exist for a reason because they have a different skill set and a different eye than what you, as an athlete are, are having. And I think, yeah, the best players like do nothing and the best athletes do nothing other than just listen to their coaches and try their best to do that. There are a lot of, there are a lot of cases for that potentially like, you know, best like really elite athletes, like, you know, your PRIs that might end up bitting heads with coaches or Chris Ashtons. Should we say that's, that's probably a more relevant one. He's had like seven clubs in like the last four years still started but the point is, is that, that, that they have coaches. Tell them what they need. And then go ahead and do that. And they'll just put in the work. It's interesting. One Johnny May was speed development. He went away and something outside of this coaching structure, right? Yeah. Well, I think I, I, yeah. I said that with what's his name? Mike Brown did that, like Mike Brown for the longest period of time was like the steady Eddie. And if anything, he was like a little bit too slow. And then all of a sudden he got fast and not just fast to like be okay, but fast to stand out. And he became like the best fallback in the world for like a couple of years, you know, that's fine because he outsourced it. And again, like, if you go back to your, your realm and power lifting, right? All these power lifters, not all of 'em actually, but a good percentage of 'em know the UN they understand what's needed to be a better power lifter at this point. Right. But they still have someone else take care of their training. Even it's really simple. They could do it themselves. But how many power lifters in the world like coach themselves at the world? Marik maybe, and even then Chad's a programming and that's about it. Well, so she's still got a coach. Yeah. Yeah. So like something as simple as that, like they ha you know, they still have a coach when you've got all these different areas. Like, I think it's just having, like having a coach, having someone else tell you exactly what to do. And, and you can just focus on doing it is much better than trying to figure out what you've got to do, obviously with your own biases and, and blind spots that you're gonna take. Like miss out on that. And, and probably that's another reason why these people do that. Not say constant Bo in work, but they do real simple skill work over and over and over again because they're accountable because someone else has told them that's what they've gotta do, right. Yeah. For real. Yeah. What else can you think of Stems from the elite athletes and potentially misguides us normal folk on what we should be doing to achieve those sort of levels. That's a good question. Two things. One is actually how hard they work, but in respect for recovery, right? They, a lot of the time they're just better at recovering. The, they might be able to handle two sessions a day. They might be able to handle three sessions a day, whereas your average person would just burn themselves out. That's one thing mm-hmm And the second thing is I think PE I think comparison here is, is the people of joy to choice. Yeah. Right. When sub elite athlete or like normal athletes trying to compare what they're doing to the truly elites and it just fucking, it just breaks your. Yeah, I, I think so, like I could reel off a load of different stories at this one, but like, it's just you, like, I think you are a good example, really like to show how not of an elite athlete that you are. Like when you first started squatting, like seriously squatting and, and not doing the 200 kilos to like 30 degrees depth that you used to do when I was with you at uni. But when you started properly squatting and taking it seriously, what, like what sort of weights were you messing around with? Basically cuz like maybe like one 50 to one 70. Yeah, right. 150 kilos. Like something like that. Like when you were truly humble, humbling yourself and like starting from the bottom. and that's still with a decent level of training in that. And with still a decent amount of genetics, there are gonna be some people that will step into the gym and their first time ever will be able to squat 160 kilos or maybe their second time. Right. Once they've got a bit of technique and they can squat more than that without ever trying. And you are really, really, really fucking strong you know, but they're, you know, but they've got like, like without even trying like. They can, they have a level that is just crazy that you wouldn't believe. And then that's why I think like the Natty or not stuff comes out. Cause people are like, no way that person must be on steroids, but like no, like freaks are just gonna be freaks. Yeah. Yeah. It's true, man. And it's it kills you. Yeah. I think the one that like the recovery one is also a really good. because it is like genetics, isn't just muscle strength, size, et cetera. Genetics is all of that stuff. Like I think if you look at a lot of the top, I think rugby players will, will, will count in, in this because you know, the ones that survive are the ones that can get through like a lot of work in the course of a, of a week. Right. So they'll not just survive. But they'll keep getting better and better and better and better. Like, that's one of the reasons that, like, just thinking about it now, that's probably gonna be the biggest factor in why I couldn't progress higher and higher is because like, when I would go to Poland camp after one week, I'd be like wrecked and maybe that's because I'm not accommodated to that level, but it's also probably that to do my gen genetics. Like I just can't get through as much training now as I would like to. That's just a. And that's just, that is what it is. There's nothing, there's no recovery thing that I can do. That's gonna help. I just have to slowly over years and years and years build up my tolerance, build up my fitness to be able to get better. Like when you're putting in that environment, like you are either just crash and burn and get injured, or you slowly for sure. And probably actually not slowly at all, like just rapidly get better until you're at a level where you're elite. Yeah. And I think that's, again, that's another, that's another thing with freaks is just the amount of stuff that they can do. That's a, that's a, that's a great shot. And if they're able to then do double the amount of work that you can do, they're gonna not potentially, I guess, like progress at double that. And therefore, you know, when you gain yeah. Or I mean, or slower, but E even if it's not double your rate, you like, you multiply that out over years and we're looking at marginal gains territory where that's just getting ridiculous at that point. And I think, yeah. Yeah, recovery's a huge one. It's, it's hard for you that though. It's but the other thing is, is also like genetics. Like when we talk about genetics and recovery, it's also, and we also spoke about psychology. It's also temperament. Like you look at any of the top. I mean, bodybuilders is a good example because these people are like, that's all recovery. It's about building muscle as, as you can. And yeah. Taking a fucking time of steroids, but all the top body builders in the world are all chilled out. They're all ridiculously chilled out. Like Ronnie look at Ronnie Coleman. Like, you know what I mean? Have you ever seen him angry? Cause I haven't, you know, like you've seen the video, like he's just having a good time. He's just chill. Jay Cutler, same thing. I dunno anybody builders these days that was when I first started lifting those with the two dudes that the only twos that count Robby players as well. Right. That a lot of them are like just chilled out blokes and they'll go for a coffee and they'll just chill out and they'll just relax. And they've got like, like Joe Marla, like it's just funny. He's not like I'm trying to think of anyone that like just seems really highly, well, like highly wound up and Owen Farrell probably Yeah, but, but he's, he's almost like Andy huge in the fact that he just reads the game so well, like he's just a great, he's also, he's also pretty big at this point. He's massive. Like he's in great shape, but also I think you, you read nothing about him away from the pitch, which suggests that he lives quite calm life away from me. You. And like, that is like one of the biggest look at Meto. Like he's got his fingers into a few different pies, but he is also just a really chilled out bloke. And you can go on and you can just like, you see a lot of them and you see these interviews and there are some great ones, but then there are a lot of interviews with like top level rugby players where it's just boring stuff, because they're just not up too much. Cuz they're just chill and, and like, that's great because that's helping 'em recover from the sheer amount. Training that they've gotta do. The other thing on that side of things, as far as recovery goes, is that like that's, that's kind of it that is really unseen from like us people that are living in the normal world compared to the elite athletes is the, like, when we are looking at their social media and we're look like, cause that's probably our primary insight to these people, we're looking at their. Let end work. Right. We're looking at the, the, a real curated, even if it's like a longer video, even if you watched an hour of their week, right? Like I dunno, or I guess what, how long are these England documentaries? They're not even like 10 minutes long, right? Point being is that you get a tiny snippet of the most intense stuff and the most entertaining stuff. there's so much time where it's just chilling out or doing that, like boring skill work, as we said, or taking 20 minutes to do the warmup thoroughly, because they've got an issue with their, whatever they've gotta do. Like that stuff. The, the amount of unseen stuff is kind of really really underplayed because of the social media world that we live in. And we only see the, you know, the curated top part of, of, of. What people do as far as like strengthening condition particularly goes, but getting better in general goes, you know, we only see the highlight rule. We don't see anything else. I'm gonna give you an example here, man. So I got a, a lifter she's gonna the world for um, for her her squat in a moment about 4 0 2. She, so, uh, She's she's elite. She she'll break a world record in the last two weeks. She hasn't squatted over 300 Uhhuh work. Yeah. Like that's that's that she'll only go like 3 93, 3 95 lefts. You see the, the amount of time you've got in like 2 97. Yeah. And you don't see the scrum halfs doing 100 passes. every single morning off of each hand, just to, just to start their warmup for the handling stuff. Like there's so much stuff that you don't see on social media. And I think like, because of, I mean, and that's that why, what social media is, is there to do it's to show highlights and stuff, but you, if that's all you see, that's all you think there is. Like it's really unglamorous, you know? And yeah, strength work is a, a fantastic example, right? Getting strong is so simple, particularly for like to get into the percentage that you need to, for rugby, like to, to like improve your rugby performance. You don't need that much more work. And if you really need to complicate it, you're probably strong enough. And there's probably other areas that you need to develop in your game that would have a much bigger bang for your buck. I, I did that in a speed video, same thing for speed, right? Like people love to do sleds and people love to like, like the entertaining stuff, especially on social media is the stuff that gets more popular because it's entertaining. Not because it's the best, you know, people want to do what, like people like one of the most popular video. Of you saying bolt training is not anything to do with his sprinting drills or his, his block work or his, all of the other stuff? No, it's his gym workout. And guess what? It was shit like, it doesn't that, wasn't why he was really fast. He was really fast because he was really fast. Like this is people and I've done this already, and this is fresh in my mind. Cause I've just done a video about your, the speed work that people think that they need to. If you are already in the gym and you've been in the gym three, four times a week for a couple years, but you've never strung together. 10 weeks of just going to the field and sprinting going in the gym is not speed work. There's nothing that that's not what you need. That's not your solution to get faster. Your solution to get faster is go out and do sprint work. Like, and then you look at even Carlin Isles. His, his sprint. He's still, hi. He hire as a coach and he has people tell him what to do to get faster. He also spends time working on his weaknesses and his passing. Like that is why he's there. Yes, he's a freak as, as far as speed, but he's still working on his speed and he's still working on all the other boring skills to help him be at that level. Like he puts in a lot of work on top of being a freak of speed. You got anything else that any other examples or notes on what, like the elite people sort of mislead us as to how freakish they are? Yeah. One more like we don't realize the shape of them as well. Yeah. I was gonna say the actual, she size. Yeah. Can you remember the first time you stood? Next question, rugby player. I, I can, I can, it was Richard Horton who is really skinny and it was a Wininger and he is like, he was like, not as good a as he could have been, because he was so skinny, but he was rapid. But I remember looking again, Jesus Christ. That guy's massive and yeah. And here's the thing, especially with rugby players, but lifters in general. Like, or, or just, you know, freaks in general is because they're freakish. Perfect example is Harry Akins Harry Akins or REU, but he might just be Harry Akins at this point. Do you know who that is? No, he's a former team, GB sprinter. And I think he's like quite popular on social media these days. I don't follow him. I heard this story about him. It must have been six years ago, maybe even longer at this point. Yeah. It would've been long. Yeah, it would've been longer. It would've been at least seven or eight years ago when he was in the team GB. And this was from forgotten the name of the guy, but he was their nutritionist and this guy was so like freakish genetic. That he was too muscular to sprint. Like they'd done all the calculations, not to sprint, to, to be an elite, like top tier a hundred meters world final sprinter. He was too heavy. Right. They'd done all the metrics and figured out like this guy's too heavy. Probably should have played rugby earlier, but whatever. Right. He was so, so big even though that, that he had to cut him off lifting. Right. Cause they're saying, look, look, your lifting is putting on too much muscle. Like you're gonna have to stop lifting because you're building too much muscle, which is slowing you down, like from this perspective, right. Normally building muscle for sprinting is kind of a good thing. Particularly Rob players is kind of a good thing. This is a real specific pigeonhole example. He was then like just doing his sprint work and because of his diet, cuz he was eating like a certain amount of protein. He was still gaining muscle just from the sprint work because he was that much of a freak. in a good, in a good way, know, never lifted, but was still gaining muscle just from doing sprint work. They, that they had to really lower his his protein intake to the point so that he could try and lose muscle so that he could get faster. This is what we're dealing with when we're dealing with freaks. Right? You could also name any, like, not any, but a, a large amount of Pacific islands that are naturally massive. they spend no time in the gym trying to get massive they've then become professional rugby players. They don't have to do any of the high trophy work that like we have had to do to get to grow muscle and they can then focus all of their work on all these other areas and like, If anything like you look at man, Laie like, they carry too much muscle that sometimes their, all of their work in the gym is gonna be like prehab and rehab to, to try and prevent them from being injured. And even then it still doesn't work. Right. Cause some of them still just get massive. This does not mean that that's what we have to do. This just means that this is what the elite is. Like potentially a lot of us as rugby players don't even need to grow muscle. In fact, that would be suboptimal for us because not necessarily because it's gonna slow us down, but the amount of work that it would need to gain that muscle just as gonna like, is, is not as efficient as doing work in all of the other areas that we could train. And definitely that could be said for strength, right? Someone is out there who can squat 220 kilos and is still trying to add more to his squat. like as a, as a casual tier six back row player, like that's, that's not, that's, that's not the, the, the idea. In fact, those people, like the amount of work that take like the amount, I don't know if I would ever be able to squat 220 kilos right. Like you are gonna say yes, and I'm gonna say, okay, but the amount of work that I would have to put in to do that is gonna take away from all the other areas that I want to focus like myself on. And that would like I could do it. Right. I really could. But the, the, the need for me to do that just is not there. Right. I could then grapple against someone or, or, or, you know, whatever competition against someone, you know, play rugby against someone, one on one, which it doesn't happen. But for this example, that's what we're gonna do against someone that squats 240 kilos. Right. That doesn't mean he is gonna smash me. That just means that he can squat that. I can't that's it. Right. And again, that's just the way it is. I remember when I was at Glendale and I'm sort of, we're sort of rambling here, but this, this is a good way to finish the pod. I remember I was at Glendale raters and Johnny Ryberg was there. Who's now fans of the MLR will know him as the Wininger. I think he was the top tri scorer for a couple years in the MLR. He he's known as the quadricep with, with eyeballs on a, like the sort of commentators call him. He's a LA Tini w. Guy is a free, I remember going into the gym and watching him, I think it was 220 kilos. It was at least 200 kilos and he was just squatting it for sets of 10 reps. Like it was nothing and right. So that, that helped, like, that was just his ability. He could already do that. He didn't have to work at it. And in fact, he wasn't really working at it. If anything, he was just maintaining the freakishness that he already. If I was like the amount of work that I would've to put into to get to do that to my squat would not make me the rugby player. He is this it's just a showcase of the genetics that he has that makes him the rugby player that he is. And like, that's, that's what you gotta understand when you're looking at elite athletes and what they're doing. With their training in the gym with their bodies. Like it's just not the same, the same rules don't apply to you or I, or most average people, or even like really decent genetic people like decently gifted people. The same things just don't apply now, does that necessarily mean that I couldn't have been as good a rugby player as it he was, or, or, or, you know, that those sorts of questions and, and I, I might encourage people that are listening to this to think this way. No. There are still other areas that you can work on. There's still lots of things that you can do to improve. And I think you said already comparison is the thief of joy a hundred percent when you're comparing yourself to other people, because you dunno what they're doing. Like there's no point they're on their own path. You're on your own path. Comparison works really well when you compare yourself to yourself one year ago, three months ago and look at what you've been trying to improve since then. And it, and it works both ways because if you compare yourself, One year ago and you are not any better in any measurable way or, you know, you are not really sure. Or maybe you've gone worse. Like that is a reason to kind of be like, ah, fuck. Like, you know, I should be better than that, right. That that's that you, but that's good. That's an alarm bell that needs to be run to then wake you the fuck up to help you move forward and get, actually get. I think a lot of people will, will gladly compare themselves to others and just say, oh, they're on steroids or ah, they're freaks. Or, or even like, say, oh, I'm, I'm stronger than this guy or whatever it is. Right. But they won't compare themselves to themselves a few years ago. And that goes both ways. Right. You can compare yourself to someone else who's elite and be like, fuck. Now I suck. Might as well just give up. And then you say, actually, hold. You've gained 20 kilos on your deadlift this year. You've also lost body fat. You've got significantly better. Why you like, how dare you say that you're not doing the ING. You do this three years in a row. Maybe you're not coming. You know, maybe you're not gonna become a 0.1 0.001 elite person, but you're gonna be significantly fucking better, which will enjoy or help you enjoy your sport of rugby, like that much better. Or if you're just a lifter, like you'll still enjoy that. And you, you. I've got a good reward from the work that you put in. Yeah, for sure. I think are we wrapping up now? Yeah. Why not? But you can go on. Yeah, I was gonna say just because you're not super elite doesn't mean you can't be really good, but they're the reason I was saying, like you gonna Polish so much, you can still make it really slim. Have you seen varnished so you can get, you get kangaroo mate? No, I haven't seen why, why would I have seen varnished chooses? Don't don't I thought you were gonna reach and grab a varnished shit then and show up to the camera. I mean, it's not really my thing, but like, this is a sounded like you were prepared. Yeah. That's a whole point is podcast. Those, you brought it up pretty early, you know, I thought, oh, okay. Yeah. It's poor shadow them. I know this is a surf brand for kangaroo food. Okay. And, and basically they released. As like a people not ever be super, you can still be really fucking good. There's plenty of people in either the top two, 300 in the world who maybe don't have the, but they make up a voice. Right. There's plenty of people who like, like, like me and you. Like, we are, we are like relatively good at what we. Right, but we never made a top tech, but it was still better than almost everyone. Right. I was gonna say I was encouraging people to the oh yeah, yeah, yeah. Take, yeah. So yeah, like you can not get to the 0.001%. Right. Especially for rugby, right? You don't need to be the 0.001% in, in any, any realm. Right? The, the point of rugby is that you have to be kind of just good enough, a lot of different levels. Have you seen the YouTuber? Mark? I don't even know Mark Lewis. He's like a ultra runner and a, like a, but he's like six, five, and his whole thing is like being above average. but he runs a 20, he, he, he runs a, a, a 20 sub 20 5k. He runs 5k and like, I think it was like 18 minutes or something. And he's like 50. And it's like, just goes to show that like, you don't have to be. And, and like, that's still great, but he's still like, not even in the top, I'd say 20% of. No, maybe he's in the top. Sorry. He is in the top 20%. He's easy in the top 20%. Right. But he's not, he's not like when, if he goes to a real popular race, like that's not even close to like elite runners times, you know? And that's okay. Right. That's that's fine. I think he did a video even like, and he tried to run hundred meters. He eventually first he tried to run one lap at MoFA 5k, even been 10. World record, he couldn't even do, or he could just about do a hundred meters and like he's not slow. It's just that like the top level is that is that top level. It's kinda like car and Isles. Like if you are a Winer, like you sh you don't need to be as fast as car and Isles to be like that. Great. You just need to be fast enough. Like you need to be competent enough and you can be really good in other areas. I mean, isn't just the wing is the one, the fastest player in the team. Yeah. Right. Blue point now boat and Barrett's fucking rapid Umani brothers. They're incredibly fast. Yeah. Right. There's SCU, as I was talking about before, he's the one Barrett. He was damn, his strike was high. Yeah. But what's your point there? Is it being fast? Is that important? I'm saying if you're a Winer and you. The fastest person in the team is. Okay. Yeah. Or if you're a prop and you're not the strongest person in the team, it's also okay. Yeah, for sure. Like, like you, like yeah, we are looking at like, when you are look especially, rugby's one of the best sports for this is that you like, you, you, you are almost. Not necessarily punished, but there is no need for you to be elite in any area. Like, like you, you, there is, there is, yeah. Real saying that your eliteness or whatever, is that your, is your differentiator definitely still work on that and make yourself like that better. But there's also so many weak points that you can bring up, make your game better. And your rugby playing experience overall, like so much better, right? Yeah. Yeah. Definitely. The positive, not a just us like smashing on people. Cause they're not at least. Right. But you know, the point is, is that like, if anything is kind of liberating, it's liberating to that. You've just gotta work on your own journey. If you just gain, you know, extra little bit here and then a little bit here, like you round that out and you keep, you keep adding, adding, adding like year over year, over year. And that's the cool thing about rugby. It's. it's not just adding strength. You're not just focused on, you know, all of this one year work to add five kilos to one lift. That's gonna make all the difference. You've got all these different areas that you can work on that like, you know, you are not elite in any of them, but, and this is, this is kind of my thing I think, is that what I try and do is like, no, I don't squat more than anyone in, like, I'm not the strongest squatter in the gym. Should I say, nor am I the strongest dead lifter might be the strongest venture, but I'm also out there running 10 K faster than anyone that can squat more than me. And most of it can squat less than me. Like I can also do that. And then if I go and do a 10 K race, yeah. I'm like, there's like literally hundreds of people finishing ahead of me, but I can squat more than most of them, you know, and like just being good enough in a few different areas. It's it's cool. Massively advantageous for rugby, but it's also just cool for life. Like that's what being a human is about. That's why we're good. That's why humans are dominant. What do you think? Yeah. Boom. Yeah. All right, mate. Yeah. All right. You, you generally share, like we've spoken about how being elite, isn't what you should be looking for on social media, but a lot of stuff that you share on social media is like the top fucking ridiculous percentage of. Of power lifters and stuff. Where can, where can people follow your Instagram and, and see this stuff? Yeah. I'm super lucky that I get to work with top level guys and girls. So best place inspire me is could Wiki virtual coaching? Yeah. On Instagram or coach Alex. Kabuki I think on I'll put it in the link below. Yeah. I think what's also good that what you share is like you share both ends of the spectrum as far as like you've got some real elite athletes there and. You've got some real basic principles that not a lot of people stick to that you share that like still works for them. Like, just because a lot of elite people do stupid stuff doesn't mean that you have, you should like, they, they benefit from that. If they just do simple stuff, like all of a sudden they still, you know, they're still being ly strong and they're actually like adapting better. The other thing is that you do share some insight to real unique, like. Like you said, like periods of specialization, like different. I don't wanna say advanced techniques cuz that's that, that can get really misconstrued, but you use special tactics of them that you wouldn't need to use with people that aren't lifting, the amount of weights that they're lifting that pays also pays dividends. And that aren't trying to get the, you know, it's not, there's a different, you know, rather than Polish the turd, they're trying to Polish that one little corner of the car that isn't quite polished perfectly. And so that requires its own different strategy. I think you share that quite interestingly. Thank you. All right. Good mate. Let's wrap this up. Thank you very much for watching this podcast. If you enjoyed it again and you haven't left a comment, what are you doing? Leave a comment, even if it's just for the algorithm, let us know what freaks you've seen in your rugby career or in your lifting career, or let us know. If you think Alex should shave that beer. Oh, man, it's becoming a bit of a mess. Your girlfriend's coming into town very, very soon. Is she in town already? She's getting in town tomorrow. She it's gonna be too late now, mate. You, you got, I mean, they're gonna comment that you should have shaved, hopefully by now you, you have taken a shape by the time they watch this, you have shaved. You look much better. It's all good. Thank you everyone for joining five stars on any of the podcast platforms or just a thumbs up and I see you guys in the next one.