Life at Collingwood certainly has been an adjustment, but a necessary one with psychology and physical preparation certainly further ahead in the AFLW than on home soil. They can’t stress enough how important mindset has been through it all, finding journaling and goal-setting extremely helpful along the way. It’s actually hard to switch off from it because there’s so much to consider.” “You essentially wake up every morning and ask yourself, ‘How can I be a better athlete.’ That means you have to take into account everything in your life the people, the influences, your strength and conditioning, your nutrition, your mindset. “We say people probably think we’re a bit obsessed,” Rowe smiles. It always has been, each and every step of the way.
When is a little more obsessed coming out full#
“It’s a long evening, it’s essentially a full days’ work in the evening time so it’s hard for some girls who are working part-time as well,” the Ballina native acknowledges, both parties thankful to have so much time to dedicate to their adopted sport. Training evenings mean convening at the club from 4pm to 10pm, with time dedicated to video analysis, education with coaches and various other meetings alongside skill sessions and a collective group pitch session. Rowe facing Armagh in the 2020 championship. “The physical contact, the hits that you’re taking… we found ourselves firstly, starving, and secondly, just absolutely wrecked.” “You could train twice a day at home in Ireland but it’s just not the same. “You forget the intensity and the load that you put through your body, though,” Rowe adds. “Two weeks isn’t going to kill you, especially when you keep doing HIIT classes and stuff, you are keeping that fitness base going.” “Once we got back in, we actually didn’t feel too bad and our fitness stayed quite good,” Sheridan smiles. Fitness testing ensued and Collingwood’s Irish duo were soon in the thick of another relentless pre-season training slog. “It was about trying to get your body right again.”Ī couple of sessions and a flight to Melbourne later, they were straight back into the deep end. “We had never not ran for two weeks ever before,” Mayo forward Rowe jumps in. You kind of felt sluggish but it was good to get that in.” “We got out of quarantine Christmas Day, which was a Friday and then we got to do a running session the Saturday, 10 and-a-half, 11 kilometres. “We had gym equipment and stuff in the rooms so we were able to keep up strength that way but running fitness was something we were semi-worried about,” Sheridan admits. The focus was plain and simply on navigating quarantine on a day-by-day basis, before linking up with their team-mates and returning to the intense, top-level environment that semi-professional sport brings. They got through it, and kept themselves occupied through the 14 days. Training individually in their hotel rooms was challenging and “does take a toll on you mentally and physically,” both concede, but it had to be done. Sheridan facing West Coast Eagles last year. We still have to wear masks but there’s no cases, it’s not that serious. We obviously had to fly back to Victoria, to Melbourne, where we are now. “It was quite normal, nightclubs and everything like that are open as normal as pre-Covid.
“We had to do our quarantine in Western Australia so there were really no rules there, no face masks, no social distancing, no real speak of Covid,” Cavan star Sheridan recalls. Mandatory hotel quarantine brought the pair to Perth, cooped up in side-by-side hotel rooms for 14 days before bering reunited for Christmas. The return Down Under wasn’t exactly straightforward between visas, long-haul flights, restrictions and uncertainty about where they would end up before their eventual return to Melbourne. It’s Rowe’s third with the Pies, Sheridan’s second this one beginning like the last one ended, amidst the Covid-19 pandemic.
Team-mates, friends and housemates for quite some time now on both sides of the world, the Irish duo are gearing up for another season in the AFLW. We know that it can be taken away from you at any minute.” “We’re both so grateful that we’ve had the opportunity to travel and that we’re over here in a team environment. “It’s very difficult for people in Ireland at the minute,” Sarah Rowe shakes her head, sitting next to her Collingwood team-mate, Aishling Sheridan, not long in the door from training. THEY’RE LIVING THE Australian dream, but those back on home soil are never too far from their thoughts. Collingwood's Irish duo Sarah Rowe and Aishling Sheridan.