MELBOURNE has begun its week-long stay on Queensland's Sunshine Coast with a solid two-hour football, boxing and weights-focused session at its base at Twin Waters.
The Demons players arrived at Sunshine Coast Airport around lunchtime as they kicked off their pre-season camp, and once they had checked into their accommodation they got stuck into the session in humid conditions.
Veteran Jordan Lewis said he was interested to see the benefits of the heat-specific training many clubs have adopted in recent seasons.
"We're only up here for a week so whether that has any long-term effects, I'm not sure," Lewis said.
"It's probably about mentally getting away and getting to a spot on the coast where players can relax and enjoy their down time as well as train hard."
During the two-hour rotational exercises, the players broke into three groups which rotated every half-an-hour to 45 minutes.
The first group of 15 players worked on their craft and skills, run by assistant coaches Max Rooke, Daniel Cross, Justin Plapp, Troy Chaplin and Matthew Egan, with stationary ball-handling drills, run and carry drills and target-hitting on the move.
The second group hit the weights room, which was less a room than a large outdoor space with a massive shade-cloth covering the area out in the middle of the neighbouring bushland.
Assistant strength and conditioning coach James McGeoch had an emphasis on maintenance during the session. The players did deadlifts, pull-ups, functional movement exercises, lunges and squats.
Max Gawn and Tom McDonald displayed good form during their sets of deadlifts, Sam Frost excelled during his exercises and Christian Petracca and Billy Stretch were among those to get stuck into their program.
The last group was boxing, run by part-time boxing coach Jimmy Kostaras, elite performance manager Dave Misson and sports science co-ordinator Alex Sakadjian.
The players split into pairs and started with sets of uppercuts, hooks, jabs and criss-crosses. They then got a little more serious when they started sparring with each other, raising the intensity until finally they reached 100 per cent effort.
Gawn's reach from a standing position shone out, and his trash talk was just as strong, while Stretch was quick with the gloves in his sparring match with Petracca.
The temperature reached 30 degrees in the middle of the session and Lewis said it was something the players would need to get used to across the week.
"The club's been really generous in scheduling our training session right in the middle of the day," Lewis said.
"Usually we train during the morning but 2pm in the afternoon can be quite hot. But that's part of it, training under stress and training in an environment that you're unfamiliar with.
"For us it's good to get away and have high-quality sessions."
