So welcome to the sample and podcast formerly Sports talks.
Now, why did I change it? I change it, I change it.
I changed it because I felt too confined.
I felt a bit like I had to just keep going on there snc
Merry-Go-Round when my life had evolved and my career has
evolved and I'm at a point in my career now Are, you know, I can
go in whatever Direction I want in a point in my life as well,
which is really powerful to me and really, really motivating in
that way, you know, battling with some some demons.
As we all do, some Temptations to a, you know, whenever you see
the bloody Six Nations on the TV, want to be out there
coaching and doing all that. But you know, it's part of the
COS do you want to grow or do you want to stay?
And I want to grow and that's been I really like the story of
my life is always being growing on to the next learning new
skills, doing different things, becoming a different person.
I think that, you know, the most noble pursuit of Master is the
Mastery of self, and if that means that you keep growing,
then you should. I think it's Eeveelution.
And I think it's wonderful, but it doesn't mean that I'm not
going to stop. Stop talking about speed.
I love to be the coach speed all the time and my certification
sport speed, and the work. Shops in everything like that.
You know? It's my love, it's a passion of
mine and I love doing it. And bringing these ideas to you.
And he's coaching techniques and and the application of stuff is
really important and the foundation of everything that I
do. And but you also can talk about
other things we can, you know, bring on guests, that run gyms,
we're going to bring on mindset people.
We're going to bring on the bloody Postman, whoever the
sample and podcast is that Sits who I want to talk to when I
want to talk to him, why I want to talk to him and how I want to
talk to them about whatever they want to talk about.
And I think that's a huge part of it.
I remember, you know, I've I got on a podcast that it meant that
I made it. You know what it means is really
what I thought is that you know I get a podcast and people value
me and show me value. But you know, it's that approval
for my for myself and you know from someone else rather than
just you know pressing record and doing it myself and That's
basically how I've done things from speaking and training and
all those things that I just went and did it and then built
it and I was it. And so, that's what I'm going to
do again. But don't forget that you can
watch these vote on Spotify, think if you turn the phone, if
it's on the phone or, you know, I will upload them to YouTube as
well. So there's plenty of opportunity
for you to see me talk to you as well.
Not just listen to me because We will be doing whiteboard
sessions. We do know is a cool stuff,
which I'm really looking forward to sharing with you.
And, you know, I just wanted to start really impart by telling
my story and sharing part of my story and I'm going to tell you
so many stories, but I'll tell you the cliff notes.
And the goal is to keep these quite short unless we have
guests on or special special things.
You know, these are going to be hopefully under 10 minutes.
And, you know, today I just want to tell you the story of how
from underweight 13 year old rugby player.
I ended up, you know, working for the team that tried to sign
me the day. I broke my leg and that's a
pretty cool story that I think so.
Yeah, I was, I was, I was young and I was skinny and I got let
go from saracens for being too skinny, but I was tall, you
know, I'm currently six foot four and about 100 kilos and
Myra Rugby player and weight was, you know, 98 and I was to
about 10% body fat at the time. And that was that was solid.
I was very athletic and, you know, the moment probably a bit
too heavy play American football, but that's for another
day but different sports. But so I was, I was told that I
was too small and it really knocked my confidence as a
player and over the years and ended up about 17 getting asked
to play for the first team at my local club.
And then Simo came into My life, and he told me if you're going
to play for the first team Sam, you need to lift weights.
You need to get stronger, you need to protect yourself.
You know, I was 17 by then and still very skinny.
As about 70 kilos 6-foot 1642. They didn't have much left in
me, growth wise and Simo play for England, and for wasps
before, just as the game turned professional, and he took me
under his wing and, you know, on a Monday night I'd have to run
up to the Local Rugby Club, which was about 25 minutes run.
And then he brought me into the gym which was an old storage
room and had been turned into a gym for the lads at the Rugby
Club and mainly, for Simo. And it had some mismatched
donations, but there was loads of resistance machines and
there's a squat rack in the corner and a old hand bike are
dying thing. And you know I turn up thinking
right? I'm going to be lifting, some
big old weights and now Samoa was like you see all these
machines. You going to Do 10 reps of each
one and you're going to do it 10 times through, and then you can
go home and then you come back the following week, and then you
can just going to try and add more weight, and that was it.
And that was my training program.
And you had bench press. So you had chest, press your
shoulder press. You had row had leg extension
hamstring curls with calf raises adapter, like inside outside,
like you name it, it was there. And you know I was it was a
tough circuit, I was sore but over time I started bulking up
start putting on weight and you know taught me something really
useful about General preparation.
Is that it doesn't have to be too fancy and it's just about
conditioning, the body for the next piece and over for five
months, that was there was a whole preseason.
So yeah, from July to about September when the game's first
started, we were doing all of that and I had seen some results
and then he started teaching, Me how to hang clean and do squats
and I was like, well what about bench?
He was like, fuck bench, you're a winner, you're fast.
You need to have strong lower body and be explosive, sweet
house, like let's go. So he started teaching me how to
hang clean and they were like these muscle hand clean tool at
old bars. Like these that didn't Spin and
you know it was like just rip it off the ground and rip it off
the thigh. Sorry and it was amazing
experience. And at that time I was
captaining the The under 19's when I was 17 and playing in the
first team, and I got into the national magazine, the Rugby
World for scoring, it was 22 tries in 22 games, and I was one
of them and kick and go. And I was one of the most that
time it was 11 games of the regular season says playing
Saturday Sunday. I was one of the highest point
scorers in the country and so it got a bit of notoriety which
then started getting me a bit of attention and I was phoning this
time, I was Finding Owning a lot harlequins, front desk, trying
to get tryouts and trials at academies and I remember I spoke
to a guy called Tony dip Rose whose Academy Amanda on the
phone and I was like 17 year old kid.
Like trying to say to him, I wanna come play for you.
How do I come play for you? What do I need to do?
And now I called, you know, back saracens.
I was ringing them up and it was like I think about it now and I
was like that is just So cool. And I can't even remember who
that person was, if I'm completely honest.
But I know the fight because it's the one that's still in me.
And and I love it, and I was able to be in a position there,
where, you know, a couple years later, I ended up playing 17 end
up playing against Bristol. The, their second team within
the Premiership at the time and on a Monday night.
Right for Henley Hawks second team and for a tryout and then I
didn't go through, I played and it was a good game, you know,
Premiership quality players experience.
So it was really really good and and then I went back to amersham
until I was 19 just to fill out a bit more wasn't ready?
And I'm completely honest I was a bit scared and I had so much
loyalty to Simo and the teams that I was with and you know I
wanted to You something that was never done before I still wanted
to, you know, when I was a big fish at that point, I was I was
really valued and that was meant a lot to me.
And I am ended up going on a national cup.
Run with the under-19s and we got to the last 16 to the
quarter-final. The last eight.
Sorry. Of the best under-19 team in the
country in England and we got bowed out.
We've got when were mauled over the line by Red Roof on a really
wet and windy day. And we were like a fast,
expansive playing Team, the mauling wasn't for us.
And and so then I kind of that was it and I made my decision
and then I ended up going over to another team.
I went to Henley and then I got put on Trot on loan for a
four-match loan to get some game time because I went back and I
then ended up getting scoring with my first touch of the ball.
Went over in the corner and felt amazing.
Perfect way to start my campaign with a new team and then last
five minutes played the whole game last.
Five minutes I was really solid, we were winning.
It was a close game box kit. And up, I've chased it from
inside. My own is on I-95.
Meet line were under a lot of pressure, and I was like, I need
to make this tackle to relieve the pressure to our over chased,
a cut across the guy. He tripped his knee, hit my shin
and I broke my leg and is one of the most and agonizing
experiences of my life. There's very painful but at the
same time as 19 and I realized that me playing professional
rugby was over so it was a really interesting time and it's
very tough. If experience that I went
through and you know, that there's two thousand seven, so,
the championship wasn't a professional League.
It was either you get into an academy under-21s, as a
professional player, or you don't.
And that was it. So, it was over and I had a
trial pending with Munster over in Ireland, and I broke me.
Then that was it, that was that done broke my leg game over and
I fought to try and keep that try alive, and it never happened
and that was it. And the the A part of this whole
story is that that day that I broke my leg.
The academy manager from wasps, turned out to a mission to watch
me play the day. I broke my leg because he was
looking to sign me for wasp Academy now.
Funny story off the back of, that is only found that out
after Rob Smith employed me as a strength and conditioning coach
for wasps Academy three and a bit years later.
So sometimes it's not meant to be be but sometimes everything's
meant to be and and that's what we take forward from that story.
So hopefully you enjoyed that and I look forward to sharing
more about why Eeveelution into how I became whatever you think
I've become and I look forward to seeing you on the next
episode. be but sometimes everything's meant to be and and
that's what we take forward from that story.
So hopefully you enjoyed that and I look forward to sharing
more about why Eeveelution into how I became whatever you think
I've become and I look forward to seeing you on the next
episode.