“Getting the thesis done…An opportunity for rest”- interview with Caelan Doris
“I always loved getting home and I haven’t been home for this long since 3rd year summer...so what’s that, seven or eight years, so it’s great to be back”
The career of Mayo-born, Leinster number 8 and Ireland international Caelan Doris had started so well. Success in the Leinster schools system with Blackrock and rocket-like acceleration through the Leinster rugby
academy…tries and man of the match awards in the senior professional Leinster, the team of 4 European victories…an Ireland debut in Dublin against Scotland in February…then his lights went out.
Caelan got concussed in the opening 5 minutes of that brutally physical encounter- “It was a very scary couple hours”. His time on the side lines has been much longer than anyone could have expected. Medical
staff would have enforced a strict return-to-pay protocol following the head injury- Enter a pandemic. Enter the coronavirus. Covid-19 changed the world. It is changing the world. Talking about turning out all the lights.
“This period is probably good for my brain and not just my body”.
Two weeks ago Caelan and I spoke over zoom about what has he been doing during the global time-out.
Rather than getting primed for a huge clash against bitter rivals Munster on the 18th April Caelan has been spending time back home with his folks, in his home county- “I’m back in Mayo. I’ve been back here now for three weeks. It’s been nice. It’s been great actually; I always loved getting home and I haven’t been home for this long since 3rd year summer, so what’s that, seven or eight years so it’s great to be back”.
“Yes, the whole season has basically been put on hold”. As of now the plan is for Leinster to resume training as a team May 19th. There is scheduled to be a 6-week block of pre-season conditioning and prep work; this will precede 8 weeks of matches, which will allow the pro 14 and Europe competitions to be finished.
“They’ve sent us an eight-week plan until that focused and intense six-week period back in the facility. We are just coming off the first two weeks of this, which has basically been just rest…do what you want, do a few gym sessions- we don’t have to do anything if we don’t want to do it. But I think most guys have been trying to keep on top of things, to train and whatnot”.
Caelan is one of the lucky ones. So too Amazon; He has kitted out a garage at home with a squat rack, dumbbells and a sled so he’s good for equipment. The key for him was to take the recommended two weeks relative rest then ease back into body preparation. In order to get back to training-fitness levels he can’t overly neglect his cardio these days but he is also keeping on top of mobility, maintaining lean mass with solid nutrition, and exercises to keep his big body robust and supple.
A long-term goal of Caelan is to gain extra lean mass and also become significantly stronger. He is using this period of isolation and travel restriction to work on some elements to help with that big transformative goal. The body needed some rest; no tackling, rucks or mauls is helping the body recover. Now he can tune-up his body and add some muscle to help make it more resilient to the consistent shock and stress that his body will be witness to upon the season resuming. Rugby is an assault on a body physically and on the mind mentally. It is such a tough sport.
Perhaps that is the why behind his thesis which he now has the time to write- “The relationship between my performance and how mental toughness and mental preparation affects that. The hypothesis being that more mentally tough players will be able to perform better away from home. There's been quite a bit of work on it for the last couple of weeks. I'm not sure how I would have done it if the season had continued. I would have probably had to postpone it till next semester- so that’s another positive coming out of this, being able to finish that. I’ll be finished college by the time we go back”.
When I asked him about what he is doing now in the mental space- “…doubling down on all the usual kinds of rituals around performance like mindfulness, sleep, diet, visualisation, meditation…all those kind of core principles and making sure you really put time into those, even extra time- Just keep a bit of structure. So yeah, I'm going to be incorporating those much more when we are back playing”.
David Clancy: “What do you think is going to happen over the next few weeks?”
Caelan Doris: “I’m quite optimistic about it. Hopefully by mid-May it will start to clear and things will start getting back to normal. It’s unpredictable as well. I was chatting to the IRFU, who set us up with post rugby career mentors as well…which is interesting”.
I’m one of many looking forward to seeing Caelan run out onto the pitch at the RDS and the Aviva.
He will be ready again for those Friday night lights.