Naca Cawanibuka is someone who has been through the ranks of Fijian rugby. From player to head coach to strength and conditioning coach, the former Marist Brothers High School student has done it all.
He was behind the scenes preparing the Fiji 7s team when we won two Olympic Games gold medals.
Now he is taking his rugby knowledge to the Swire Shipping Fijian Drua side and perhaps help them to achieve rugby glory on the Shop N Save Super Rugby Pacific competition.
The Fiji Times spoke to Cawanibuka on the daily routine within the Drua camp and what it takes to be a professional Super Rugby player.
Times: Just tell us what’s the training routine for the players
NC: The program we have at the moment is that the boys train on Mondays and Tuesdays, Wednesdays are days off and they come back on Thursdays and Fridays with the weekends off. So its a pretty full on program, there’s a lot of work that’s going on within the gym arena where we focus a lot on injury rehabilitation, rehab work, strength and power. The boys do hard work in the weights area in order to develop strength foundations, explosive power and movement, and also there’s a lot of focus on functional rugby specific skill work that’s in built within the gym program. You can also see in the gym that there’s a few cardio equipment. So this is an area that we’ve really tried to improve in conditioning wise, but boys apart from all the running get to do work on the rows and the bikes and the skills, boxing. You see the gym floor there we do a lot of work there – wrestle work on the mats, the boys do functional rugby work and obviously with the weight training. The face off now, obviously its preseason, there’s a lot of work being done in the rugby specific area and also still working on conditioning and, and speed and agility, all those kind of things. We have different groups of players at the moment. As you know there’s players still in our rehab program, returning from surgery, some of them have come through the progressions and the stages of injury rehab and coming closer to returning to full training. And we’ve got the healthy group that’s into full rugby training, fitness and all those kinds of things. So, you know, we had quite a big block of work from July up to the last Super season – July through to September where we had like an offseason program going. Our preseason pretty much started in October and up to this stage. Times: We can see that a lot of the boys have trimmed up from last year. What’s been put into that? NC: Yes, it’s obviously the demands of Super Rugby, it demands a lot physically. Some of the boys needed to bulk up, they needed to gain lean muscle mass, and also get stronger, get faster and obviously get fitter. That’s just the nature of the game and also the profile of individual positions. What the boys need to achieve physically in order to do their jobs on the field, whatever positions they play.
Times: What role does nutrition play in a player’s performance?
NC: Just use nutrition is a massive performance pillar that we’ve worked hard on since our preseason started last year in Australia. So we’ve engaged a full-time nutritionist for the team who comes in and does body composition measurements with skin folds across the group. So we’ve got standards for each particular position as well. So there’s positional requirements for them in terms of body comp, and a lot of that is driven by nutrition. There’s a lot of work going on in terms of knowledge, a lot of our players need to increase their knowledge and awareness of the different kinds of foods they need to eat as a professional athlete because that will drive their recovery and recovery is really what helps influence their physical development; get fitter get stronger. So a lot of work has been done in that space. We have three categories – players that need to shred excess body fat and probably body weight as well; we’ve got players who the players who are already in the right space so they are maintain group, and then we’ve got of players, especially the younger fallas, who need bulk up. So the nutritional plans for them are different. When we provide lunch when they come in its all different based on their physical requirements. Having said that, the training demand is quite high. We all know the humidity, moisture and heat here in Nadi – the time of the day we are training. All that has a huge demand. The intensity of training – some of the boys who need to shred extra body fat need to come in in the morning as well twice a week. And so with that, you know, there’s a nutritional component that demands attention in order for them to make gains. So all that is in our overall program. There’s a lot of work we do with the coaches, talanoa and communication amongst ourselves to know what the players need and also the loading and the planning of the actual training week. At the moment are in our preseason cycle. We’ve got a few more weeks before the start of actual competition. There’s still quite a bit of work in the coming weeks for the boys to do.
FT: You been around Fiji rugby for a while. Fitness wise, what are some of the issues you see that players have coming from provincial level rugby to a professional environment like the Drua?
NC: There’s a big jump when they come to this environment. A lot of it is just knowledge of what it takes to be a full-time professional, basic knowledge about their body like appreciating the need for sleep in the evening. We target eight to nine hours, that’s optimum ideal kind of sleep time. You would need any professional athlete in this kind of environment where they are almost training five days a week, you need … where we are this time compared to last year, there’s been massive leaps and bounds. The boys have grown to become real men … – Naca Cawanibuka that sleep and rest in order for your body to regenerate and restock its energy. Basic understanding of nutrition, that’s why we ran classes with them early on in preseason – getting our musicians in presentation classes or medical department, educating the players and education and awareness because once the boys know what they need to do, how to do it the way so that they know why they dig it drives performance in terms of design. Awareness is a big one. They come in with very minimal knowledge of the potential but actually know whether or not they need to do it. So that’s our job to help the boys. So the jump from Skipper Cup level in Fiji to this level is a big gap. And I guess for us to make gains on a national level, we really need to help our coaches to understand. Firstly, the basic physical demand of the body. What the body is really – understanding nutrition, understand training its principles, and understand how we can get the boys fit, what to do in the gym – that’s the massive part. If we can get that right especially at Skipper and club level because now you’re competing with the best in the world, that’s what makes a big difference
FT: What is your message to Drua fans?
NC: This is the people’s and I’m sure after the first season people have come to love and enjoy watching the Drua. There’s still a lot of work, a lot of growth and learning that we will get to go through. We appreciate as always the fans out there who support the Drua. We have a job to do to make sure that the Drua becomes a brand that is respected in the professional rugby arena. It’s only going to be our second season and like I said, we’re still growing. Having said that, where we are this time compared to last year, there’s been massive leaps and bounds. The boys have grown to become real men and it will be a continuous process.
