There isn’t much to Paul Haines, however in Arizona, the slightly built former formula 1 fitness guru along with strength and conditioning coach Steven Schwerdt carry plenty of weight.

On day 9 of the 2XU High Performance Training Camp in Arizona, Haines and Schwerdt extracted every last bit of energy from the playing group during a torturous game simulated fitness session.

“Today was planned to be quiet a tough session, we really wanted to expose the guys to a game load at training today, so we did break training up into four 25 minute blocks” Haines said.

“It was more to expose them to that workload at altitude and it will give them confidence going forward that they have done the work at altitude and when they get back home they know they have done the work.”

For four 25 minute sessions, the playing group battled against each other and at times themselves, pushed to breaking point, but with a clear understanding the effort put in now, will reap rewards when the season proper gets underway.

“The boys ended up doing about 16 or 17 kilometres this morning and it combined all football conditioning type running.”

Rookie Henry Schade like many of his team mates glad to see the back of one of the toughest sessions on tour.

“Last weeks conditioning running was pretty tough, but that was up there though, I was cramping at the end of that, it’s good though, one in the bank” said Schade.

And then, just as they thought the day had finished, Schwerdt dropped a bombshell on the shattered group.

“What I know from my experience playing, is that footy also produces unexpected stuff that science can’t plan for, so today’s our extra time, you guys work out who your slower runners are, make sure you are pushing them up and make sure we finish as a group because what we are preparing for is the unexpected that occurs in games and you all know what I am talking about, you have all been in games like that where stuff just happens and it goes and goes and goes.And with that, the group set off on another trek through the Flagstaff forest, Haines saying their attitude was unquestionable.”

“We went for an extra run at the end of training and to the boys credit their attitude was sensational, it was just a couple of klm’s to tick their legs over but when they are fatigued it was quiet difficult but they really pushed through well and their attitude was sensational.”

“The challenge now is that there are a few stiff and sore boys which we were expecting and now it’s up to them to be able to recover well and make sure they do everything they can tonight to back up for tomorrows quality wrestling session.”