Leaner and meaner Stormers impress Steph du Toit

The Stormers’ fitness and conditioning coach Steph du Toit is impressed with the players’ improvement in terms of their body fat percentages six days from their first serious outing of the season.

The Stormers take on the Cheetahs in a pre-season friendly in Zimbabwe on Saturday.

Under their new approach the Stormers are looking to players to be lighter and more aerobic‚ with the game demanding that more players are on their feet at any time. “We have had a different approach to our fitness this year‚” Du Toit said.

“We have a younger group of players so we have lengthened our preparation time and we’ve had longer days.

"We've thrown a lot of load on them‚ which comes with a risk of injuries‚ but most have come through.

“We are better prepared than this time last year because we have got through much more volume than at the same stage last season.

“Technology has moved on and so we have adapted considerably from when I started in 2010. “The key focus is about speed‚ which is the component that is most influential in terms of player identification.

"We are very focused on improving everyone’s speed and to do that you need to cut players down to the bone [in terms of body fat] and skin folds.

“The game is getting faster‚ but it’s not getting longer. It’s simply about players having he skill to run faster after contact. That goes for all positions.

"They have to do something at high velocity after contact.” It’s all very technical for the Stormers but simply they want more players on their feet at all times.

It’s an approach the All Blacks and New Zealand teams have followed for years.

The more players up and involved in the game‚ whether on attack or defence‚ increases teams' chances of scoring or stopping opponents scoring. Paul Feeney‚ the New Zealander skills and attack coach recruited in the off-season‚ has been central to this change of culture at the Stormers. “Robbie Fleck [head coach] has put on an emphasis on our skills‚ which I’m in charge of doing‚” Feeney said.

“We have put a lot of focus on it and hopefully we’ll see the fruit of that in pre-season games. ‘It’s about getting back to your feet quickly – within three seconds.

"If you have 14 men standing you have a better chance. If you have two on the ground and two more getting up slowly‚ you can’t get line speed [on defence or attack]. “So it’s about getting off the ground quickly and back into the line. Tired and lazy players won’t allow that to happen.”

- TMG Digital