February 12, 2003

Traverse Bay Blues Youth Rugby Club starts second season

By Carol South
Herald contributing writer

Mauls and moles, ruts and scrums - these are just a few rugby concepts that some area athletes are learning as part of the Traverse Bay Blues Youth Rugby Football Club.
Beginning its second season, the team is coached by six veteran rugby players who are also members of the Traverse Bay Blues, a local adult rugby team.

Herald photo by Carol South
Devin Tremp, front, rips the rugby ball from Jacob Preston, as coach Chuck Benson helps with the drill Thursday evening at the Immaculate Conception Middle School gym. The two St. Francis juniors are both members of the Traverse Blues Youth Rugby Football Club.

Practice began last Thursday at the Immaculate Conception Middle School gym with eight teenage boys from four schools in the region: Traverse City Central and West, St. Francis and Elk Rapids High Schools; a student from Suttons Bay High School may also join the team. More players will join as wrestling and basketball seasons wrap up and the coaches hope to field a 22-man squad at an April 5 Michigan Cup tournament in Howell. Six games follow during the season, which runs through mid May.
The coaches face an uphill battle teaching students the fundamentals and nuances of a game few have even heard of, much less played. While rugby is hugely popular worldwide, especially in Great Britain and its former colonies, it is less known in the United States. The sport is actually considered the original football, originating at an English soccer game in the mid-1880s when a player picked up a ball and started running.
However, this history does not mean it is familiar to football fans or players.
"Last year we had one guy who had never seen a rugby match before," said Paulie Phillips, a 20-year rugby player from South Africa who is one of the Alliance coaches.
Despite this lack of knowledge, Phillips said the team did well.
"With a squad of about 20 guys, we had a 50 percent season," he said, adding they swept their first three games. "They played with a lot of passion and pride and we've got a lot of experience this year."
To help with the learning curve, the coaches spend nearly an hour of each practice going over the rules and showing and analyzing films of rugby games. They emphasize that all players on a 15-member rugby team can pitch laterally, run with or kick the game's egg-shaped ball, using strategies and moves different from football. A typical rugby game spreads the ball handling around to all team members, a sharp contrast to football.
"We've had football players who have never touched the ball before in their whole career because out of 22 players, only seven or eight get to touch the ball," said Paul Fitzsimons, one of the team's coaches and a rugby player for 30 years. "Here, everybody touches the ball and the game is all about ball possession."
The game field is called a pitch and players are always moving during the game's two 40-minute halves. This means no time outs and no substitutions and if the ball goes out of bounds, a player simply throws it back in.
Adjusting their thinking and reflexes from the rules of football is key and sometimes players have to actively deprogram themselves. Devin Tremp is returning for his second season of rugby, drawn by the game's physical challenges. A junior at St. Francis High School, Tremp is a lineman on the Gladiators football team and agreed that rugby is new kind of game.
"Rugby is foreign to us and we don't know it," said Tremp, who plays forward in rugby. "Whereas in football we've all grown up with the sport, it's an American sport."
Having such an experienced coaching staff who drilled the rules came in handy last season, Tremp noted.
"When we learn the rules and know them really well, it gives you an advantage because some teams don't know the rules," he said.
A secret weapon for the team this year is Australian player Mick Hodgetts, an exchange student who is a senior at West High School. Hodgetts plays forward and has eight years experience with the game - he knows the rules inside and out.
"Being a forward like Mick is helpful because he can tell me certain thing I didn't know," Tremp said. "It is kind of like having another coach."
After the classroom training, the boys take to the gym floor for a variety of rugby drills, interspersed by 'pay attention' sets of push-ups and sit-ups, the coaches often dropping to give ten with their charges.
The coaches also emphasize safety and the game's strict tradition of sportsmanlike conduct. For a game played without protective padding, there are surprisingly few injuries at all levels of play. This is in part due to the gentleman's spirit of the game, which also includes a post-game socializing between teams to build camaraderie and friendships.
"This is a sport you can play against guys in their 80s and 90s," said Fitzsimons, who has played in rugby tournaments around the world.
Overall, conditioning is the foundation of rugby training.
"Fitness is a huge part of the game," Fitzsimons said. "There are not many games when you run six miles ... and at the end of every run, you have a collision of some sort."
Tremp agreed that rugby is by far the more taxing sport than football.
"The running is harder in rugby," he said. "In football at practice you do a lot of running drills but in rugby it is a lot of cardiovascular conditioning because you are constantly moving and constantly looking for the ball."
High school age boys interested in playing rugby with the Traverse Blues Youth Rugby Football Club this season are invited to contact coaches Chuck Benson at 943-3249 or Paul Fitzsimons at 941-1718.