With the new coaching team eager to get started, Bangor Rugby Club hosted an informal pre-season get together at Upritchard Park this week.
With over 60 players attending this preliminary meeting, and more new faces expected over the coming weeks, it was encouraging to see such enthusiasm and strength in numbers.
This was a session where the new coaching staff, headed by Rupert Preston, could clearly state the club’s new targets and how everyone involved could do their bit to help kick-start a return to success in the coming seasons. For his part, Rupert shared his experiences while with Instonians recently. While part of the coaching staff there, the club’s 1st XV gained promotion to AIL section 2, with many outstanding performances against tough competition across all of Ireland.
With the motivational talk complete, the focus then turned to personal health, nutrition and fitness. The audience was fortunate to learn from Dr Mike Webb, team doctor for the Ulster Rugby squad, and a former Bangor Grammar and Bangor Rugby Club player. With a wealth of experience gained at the highest levels of professional sport, there was plenty of useful advice from his presentation on staying healthy, managing sickness and fitness recovery.
Strength and stamina are vital within any sport, none more so than in rugby, and to this end a full personal fitness plan had been put together by Tony Heffernan and Phil Neill, with Tony giving some useful guidance on how to make the best use of this pre-season period to maximise personal fitness. Squad based sessions are due to start in June, and will build over the summer months until full match training leads into the new season, starting this autumn. More details and dates will follow soon.
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Bangor 2XV rounded off their season in style tonight with a resounding 32-13 win at home to Banbridge .
In a very entertaining game at Upritchard Park Bangor 2XV impressed throughout against a side who had amassed 85 points against them earlier in the season. Nice to see the hard work of Tony , Stevie Addy and Coops paying off. With a full preseason planned from July the 2’s will be a stronger and fitter unit next season which looks bright with the amount of young talent we have at our disposal. Well done boys thats set the benchmark for 2011/2012!
