Editor's blog...

26 January, 2008 | 13:01

Another busy day at Roehampton….

I know the last blog made it look like Andy’s day is filled with five-a-side football but the reality is a bit different. Hopefully a mixture of pictures and video clips will bring that home. So…

Arrived at around 10:30am, to find Andy and the guys doing their warm-up before the first block of training.. Well Andy doing his warm-up, non-athletes standing around and not getting any fitter….

 

 

Gym has plenty of TV screens, so everyone had one eye on Djokovic versus Federer….

 

 

Andy was convinced it was going to go to five sets…

The early warm-up is pretty short and sweet, so just time to whack the punch bag before heading down to the other end of the gym, minus a coach….

 

 

…yep, coaches get injured too. Miles got his foot looked at by Andy Ireland. Bruised toes basically - stubbed them doing something or other and didn’t want to compromise his movement around the court later….

 

 

Meanwhile, it’s core work for Andy. Nasty stuff - holding various ‘planks’ for a minute at a time. Front….

 

 

….and back…..

 

Seems like they’ve thrown a few newbies into the mix too. I’d never seen this one before. I would have died before I got to this one anyway….

 

 

So from there, out onto the court for two hours, hitting with Miles. Me and Carlos sat by the side of the court, trying our best not to look like the two random hangers on. Two hours is a long time to hit balls, so after a solid stretch of core work upstairs, they get the blood flowing with the tennis/football game.

Check out the point of the day (Andy and Diesel vs. Miles and Treacle) here

Turns out Carlos played Andy at Sanchez-Casal when he was about 17 and Andy was about 15. Asked Carlos if he got smoked, as you do. Apparently he didn’t, but he did admit that it was pretty clear he had no chance of winning. He’d never say that to Andy, so I’ll write it in the blog instead.

He reckons that back then Andy didn’t hit the ball as hard (obviously) but that everything was on the lines, and he’d get to everything. He was almost in pain admitting it.

The guys hit plenty of balls: forehand, backhand, serves, volleys. Check it out here….

And if two hours of that isn’t enough to kill you, Treacle threw in a little bit of nasty fitness afterwards. Fancy doing this after two hours of sweating bullets?

Broke at one o’clock for lunch (very nice as usual), then outside for 30 minutes of five-a-side footy. Me, Andy, Carlos, Max and Luke on one side, Miles, Treacle, Beech and Arv on the other. Played much better and won, like 5-2.

Carlos scored two, set up another. For that, we get to post the photo that he wanted from the other day….

 

 

Apparently the other one wasn’t right, and he wants pictures that do him justice. Personally, I think he looks great when you leave the lens cap on.

So after one session of fitness, another. This time up to the weights room for some chin-ups. There’s plenty of debate amongst these guys as to what constitutes a chin-up (chin over the bar?), but they get it done all the same, including some hanging crunches…

 

 

Don’t fancy this after core work, two hours on court, more fitness drills and five-a-side footy….

 

 

Treacle loves it though, because the weights room is his natural habitat….

 

 

Got to look good when you’re heading into central London with mates. Which he was…

Watched some Dragons’ Den after training, as you do. Want to know what the guys would take into ‘the den’ to impress the Dragons? Carlos suggested his body. Not sure they’d be battling for a 25% stake in that…

Andy was a bit more pragmatic. Asked him the same question and the reply was pretty simple….tennis lessons!