USA vs Canada Day 1 (Saturday)

Let me first start with last night and the traveling side of things. I love the thought of lots of rugby players traveling from all over to get to the same destination. This has always fascinated me and I have always looked for rugby players traveling when I am traveling. No one else has really ever understood my fascination with it, but it’s like we are all working towards the common goal, to play more rugby. It doesn’t matter what tournament you are traveling to, or what scrimmage or practice or whatever…but it makes my heart warm to know that rugby is happening all around us all the time!

So yesterday I traveled from Austin to Denver where I hooked up with Cheeks, Lynelle and Jaime L…we were conveniently on the same flights. I was however unfortunate to be sitting with a woman and her son…both of whom had never flown before. They were amazed at the TVs in the back of the seats but couldn’t figure out how to change the channel or make the volume go up or down. They kept asking question after question about flying and God knows what else. All I wanted to do was read my book and take a nap! But I felt bad for them (the son was quite agitated and VERY nervous about flying) so I tried to be kind and answer their question and put their fears to rest. Once we got into a regular cruising pattern the next crisis was the TV doesn’t play unless you pay the small fee, something like 5 bucks. But the woman couldn’t get her debit card to work, so I swiped it like ten times and finally got it working. Then she was worried that she was going to be charged 5 dollars times ten. I assured her that it would not happen as the card reader was just simply failing to read. She didn’t believe me, so we asked a nice flight attendant to verify and of course she wasn’t going to be charged. It only charges if the card actually gets read and you get a confirmation message on the screen. So we got the son watching cartoons and happy with his little headset on.

At this point we are about halfway through the flight and the beverage cart was coming.The mother and son once again have never flown before, so I wasn’t sure if they knew it was a complimentary service unless you wanted alcohol or something fancy. So I showed her the magazine (or brochure) that gave the list of free beverages. They were amazed that they got a free drink. All in all the flight was a little less peaceful than I wanted, but not too bad at all. The landing went off with a hitch as the son was enthralled with his TV…so thank God for that! So we arrived in Minneapolis St. Paul and met up with Jaime B and our ride. AJ was our ride and he plays for a men’s club team here in Minnesota called the Mayhem. AJ was SO nice and polite to us women…but alas we did get lost and ended up spending a lot of time squished in a ford explorer. Finally we arrived at the National Sports Center Dorms here in Blaine and headed upstairs to find out our roommates and get settled in our rooms.

I had remembered the bunk beds from U23 camp a couple years ago, but had forgotten about the squishy mattress that all the air expels itself when you lay on it. Plus anytime you turn over the rustling is so loud! So we spent the night turning as quietly as we could and apologizing to each other. I actually slept a lot more than I thought I would, the first night in a new place is always a nightmare for me. All the new noises and smells, I usually don’t sleep very well. We awoke at 7am the next morning for breakfast and then training.

The first training of the day was about 3 hours and we covered a whole hell of information. We spent plenty of time split working on scrums, lineouts, back plays and back row plays. There are three scrumhalfs here so we spent a lot of time trading in and out. A funny note is that each scrumhalf also had to double as a prop and even participate in the lineouts. The coaches were trying to have us play each other (we brought about 31 players) but a prop had injured her back early in the morning and a lock had also got injured…so us BIG scrumhalfs got to fill in. Of course the scrums were uncontested, but it was still fun to be in there for a few minutes. Then we rucked, mauled, scooted and ran our way as a “loose forward” through the team runs. The lineouts were particularly fun as we they were new to everyone and everyone is either a jumper or a lifter. So after finding out that I had never been really taught to lift, the jumpers would mainly get a lift from behind and I would just try to catch some shorts on the way up! So it was interesting to learn everything on the fly and ruck more than I have ever thought of or wanted to ruck in my life. The best move was when they called slow ball and a power up and I was like…well shit I don’t know how to do that, but I can follow you! Also catching up at scrumhalf has been interesting as well, I had never done any of the drills while Katie and Rose are old pros at them. So I would watch a cycle and then jump right in to see if I could do it. I don’t think I did half bad, but it definitely wasn’t pretty. Some of the lineout drills where you bounce the ball off the soccer goal or post were particularly helpful, as I have always just tossed the ball in the air.

So after that training session we chowed down lunch and then had a short chalk talk session about defense and all that. The session was a lot shorter than we thought and we were still digesting lunch as we headed out for the second training of the day. After the meeting we did have about 20 minutes to lay down, but then the scrumhalfs, flyhalfs and back row had to be out early to work on problem solving at the back of the scrum. The drills here were AWESOME! I have never received instruction on what to do if the scrum is unstable and all that. Of course I was always taught to just have the 8man pick and fix it that way. Today we learned that you can do pitches (8man pivoting to block the opposing scrumhalf and and I take the ball on the run), a pelvic to pelvic scrumhalf pass (a pull up and out pass) and what the flyhalf can do to make a messy scrum easier on everyone.

The next cool theory we worked on was the zero ruck idea. I think I can explain this enough to make sense…at least I hope. Basically if your team is on defense in the GREEN ZONE (so 22m and in) you can call zero ruck. So that means that your team lets the other team ruck after a tackle has occurred, but NO ONE on your team returns the ruck. At this point there is still no offside line, as no ruck has occurred (a ruck is one or more players from each team over the ball) and we were instructed to flood the passing lanes. At first we were all really confused and we argued over the rules and the merits of doing this. Of course this is pretty risky, but since we are in the green zone you can afford to take some risks. Imagine being the scrumhalf of the attacking team and looking up to realize that your passing lane to the left and right is blocked and two girls are waiting to KILL you as soon as you touch the ball. You would shit a brick right?So we worked
on this theory for quite some time, letting each teamwork offense and defense. We figured out some ways to go against the zero ruck and some ways to really mess with the attacking team. It is an interesting theory and is totally dependent on the referee for the match. We shall see if it works against Canada on Monday or Wednesday.

Now we just finished dinner and are heading out for a video session. No one knows what we are watching, but I’m betting that we are watching the USA vs Canada from ITT’s last year. Great match and I will enjoy watching it again. Funny those only about 4 people from the video are at camp this year. A ton of new faces and young blood makeup this team. We have meshed well though on our first day and I am looking forward to the next few days. I am officially listed as a reserve for the Canada game, but am hoping to still get on the field and do some work of my own. Just wearing the USA jersey is enough excitement for me, if I got on the field…that would just be the cherry on top.

More later!