Ian O'Riordan talks to the coach who has brought Olympic-style training methods to Donegal in his attempt to 'own the summer'
'Do you want to own the summer? The excitement, the crowds, the atmosphere. The road begins Sunday, an exciting challenge by no means easy. Do you know exactly what you want and can you deliver? A controlled, absolute winning edge required. Get your vision together in the hours ahead.'
- Text message from Patsy McGonagle, sent to the Donegal footballers, 11.0 Thursday morning.
The evolution of the GAA trainer has gone into fast forward. From those who simply counted laps and blew the whistle we have come to those like Patsy McGonagle. Embracing the mind as much as the body, with expertise far beyond green fields. No stone left unturned but no new tricks either.
What McGonagle has injected into Donegal football in the past year and a half is difficult to measure. We know Brian McEniff kept the ship afloat by returning as manager when all other contenders jumped overboard but that would only be telling part of the story. In Ballybofey tomorrow Donegal start a championship campaign that has the potential to stretch long into the summer. And McGonagle doesn't see it any other way.
It's a mentality brought about by 12 years of being involved in international athletics, working with everyone from promising juniors to Olympic medallists. McGonagle was Irish team manager at the Sydney Olympics four years ago, and has observed most of Sonia O'Sullivan's medal-winning preparations, and the attitudes of the finest-tuned athletes in the world. Long ago he realised athletics had lessons to offer far beyond its own boundaries.
How visualising victory is as important as actually achieving it. Methods of steady progression, the need for complete exhaustion, and the benefits of ice baths in recovery. And the way most athletes will always have a few non-essential food supplements in the cupboard.
The day McEniff called him to form part of his new management team McGonagle was still unsure if Gaelic football would fit easily with his lifestyle, now chiefly dominated by athletics. He'd worked under PJ McGowan in the Donegal management of the mid-1990s, twice making the league final, and in other years found room to coach two local clubs in Ballybofey.
"Initially, Brian came to me to help him out for a period," says McGonagle. "Just while the whole thing settled down. A couple of weeks become months and I'm still here. In recent years it was always a bit too hectic with the athletics, and I suppose a sensible man would have thought things out and never got involved in the GAA.
"But if you're living in a close community, like I do in Donegal, it's hard when you're involved in sport to avoid the GAA. You'll nearly always be asked for a hand and I'd always be responsive to that, just to help see my own community do well."
At least his position as head of sport at the Institute of Technology in Letterkenny partially lent itself to such a heavy load. And he's been careful not to ignore his responsibilities with Finn Valley athletic club, the busiest in the northwest.
Yet, once he accepted the role, he knew exactly what he wanted to do: "Planning is the big thing, and breaking the training into periods. That's the way it works in athletics. The mentality thing came from athletics as well. Then there's the serious organisation and professionalism, in every respect. That's something you take for granted in athletics.
"I think it's only in very recent years that Gaelic footballers are looking for all that. I've noticed a massive difference in what the players expect now and what they expected 10 years ago. And that's because they know what everyone else is doing. They're playing in Sigerson and with other teams and know what works and what doesn't."
McGonagle's own athletics career was relatively short-lived. He'd fallen for the 1,500 metres and ran throughout his college years in England but was soon caught up in the organisational end of things. Returning to the county GAA scene has allowed him to put into practice much of what he learnt in athletics stadiums around the world. From the start, though, he knew he was working with a different mind and body.
"The obvious question I'm asked is to compare the Gaelic footballer with an elite athlete. Well I certainly have just as much respect for the commitment that the Gaelic player is giving. Not only in Donegal. Of course, the elite athlete is working in a different world, so in all honesty you can't compare levels of fitness with say someone like Sonia O'Sullivan.
"But within the constraints of their world the Gaelic footballer gives everything you ask of them. People still say the GAA player is not always as fit as they could be but that's less and less of a factor now. That probably was debatable a few years ago, but if you are a serious GAA player now then you'll be as near to speed as you can be.
"There is still room for small percentages of improvement if they were professional or even semi-professional. But you have to remember the long hours of travel they put in just to get to training."
In return, McGonagle gives the players that same commitment. The more he got to know them, the more ideas he embraced, influenced by what McEniff wants but also what other teams are doing. At the start of this season the panel was put on a weight-training programme for the first time and other elements, such as warm-weather training, are now seen as requirements rather than luxuries.
But with his athletics mentality McGonagle would rarely be without the stopwatch. Most of his early-season sessions involve running and that physical training was seen to kick in strongly at the end of the season, particularly against Galway in the All-Ireland quarter-final, and much of that came down to the planning process he learned from athletics.
"One of the first days I had them out Christy Toye said to me that if they'd wanted to run this much they would have joined Finn Valley. I was just running the legs out of them to get them focused.
"And it's not a two or three-month job, it's a seven or eighth-month job. We've used that even more this year, and I'd say we're even better organised. We won all our divisional games in the league but still didn't play that well. But the training has all been a long-term plan."
He tells a story, too, about this season's trip to the Canaries, where hard work turned into a bit of fun: "The first night the players were allowed a few brews to unwind. The first morning they were raggedy enough when we got them out of bed.
"So I pretended to get lost and I walked them for about three miles. And we just happened to be at the bottom of sand hills, which of course I'd planned. And we ended up running on the sand hills."
In more recent weeks he's brought in the ultimate form of recovery - the much feared ice baths, or in this case a barrel filled with cold water and bags of ice.
"Last year, I mightn't have been organised enough for that, but we've made it available. These are things that a lot of teams are doing, so there are no great secrets anymore.
"And that's a mental thing as well. You can only provide it. You can't drag the guy and throw him into the barrel and he doesn't always need to be there. But at least the opportunity is there. From my perspective I can only provide the best I can, and if the player doesn't respond then you can still walk away satisfied."
In other more sensitive areas, such as the use of food supplements, McGonagle knows it's best to let the players make up their own minds.
"I know athletes will want to try supplements and Gaelic footballers are absolutely no different. And that's a mental thing too. I mean if a player was taking supplements and either rightly or wrongly felt it helped his game, and then all of a sudden they're not supposed to take supplements, what do you do?"
Last year Anthony Harkin also returned to the frame to help with the training when McGonagle's athletics duties increased, and this season he's helping to blood 23-year-old Joe McBrearty as a trainer for the future.
He'll probably hit the team with one more motivational text message before tomorrow and then pass on one last word of advice: "Right now it's just about Antrim. Just like athletics you have to be as tough and as strong in the heats before the semi-final and final. If you back off you're caught out."
