The USA Women 7s program has resumed operations at the Chula Vista Elite Athlete Training Center (“center”), although Covid-19 has altered how and when the group interacts. There are still many uncertainties – from the future playing calendar to the rescheduled Olympics – but being together has helped mitigate those derailments.
The women’s 2020 HSBC World Rugby Sevens Series ended with back-to-back tournaments in Hamilton, New Zealand (Jan. 25-26) and then Sydney, Australia (Feb. 1-2). Covid-19 then canceled the remaining stops in Langford, Canada, Hong Kong and Paris.
“We did shut down for about three-and-a-half months, but we didn’t shut down straight away purely because of the changing goal posts, as you say in rugby,” USA Women 7s head coach Chris Brown said of the pandemic’s early stages. “At first we weren’t sure [of the future] so we spent the first 2-3 weeks training remotely and doing a lot of rugby education online.”
In late March, the International Olympic Committee officially postponed the 2020 Summer Games to 2021. After the announcement, attention transitioned to player welfare.
“Our players’ Olympics dream in many ways disappeared and there was a lot of uncertainty around whether it would happen in the future,” Brown said. “For this group of players – obviously in four years’ time, different story – but for this group a number won’t be returning in the next cycle. So once we realized that the Olympics weren’t going to happen [in 2020], we shifted toward connection. We did a few webinar series and a few outreach and service projects, and just slowly reduced it over three weeks. [Given] the emotions that come from the magnitude of what had happened, we didn’t want players to go straight into isolation off the back of that.”
Approximately five months elapsed before the players reunited in person. While staff gave players space, they also checked to make sure families were supported while the country agonized with civil and political unrest. In late July, World Rugby announced that there would be no 7s series tournaments for the rest of 2020, but the USA 7s program decided to bring everyone back to Chula Vista in mid-August.
“A big part of that was to reconnect the group,” Brown said of reconvening before the sport was able to fully resume. “Rugby is not their be-all, end-all, but it’s definitely a big part of what makes up their lives at the moment. There’s definitely been a hunger for it, but also from a psychological state, I think it’s much healthier for the group as a whole to go through the uncertainties of what the next 12 months look like together, rather than in isolation.”
The team now trains three days per week, and despite Covid-19 restrictions – for example, there was no contact until October – a sense of normality has returned. That comfort has allowed the group to persevere as the sporting world morphs.
“By the end of August we found out we wouldn’t have any rugby pretty much right through to April,” Brown said. “The way they carried themselves through that – and a big part of that was we were just back in training after so long away that there was a lot of enjoyment and excitement just being back with each other and training – was really, really good. Since that point, it’s, ‘OK, cool, what are we going to get out of the experience?’ Hopefully by the time we get to the end of the year we’ll have a little more confirmation or a little more certainty around what we’re doing and not doing.”
Brown explained that training has been broken into three- and four-week sets rather than big blocks, and the philosophy of hitting-the-ground-hard prevails as soon as players report to the center. Then there’s nine days to disconnect before going again. The idea is that this routine will set the team up for a hopeful invitational tour in January, maybe a second invitational, and then ramp up for the 2021 series tournaments in April-June.
“For the majority they’ve been able to rest and prioritize what they need to get done over the next three months, and now the training environment is set up to help facilitate that,” Brown said of the players’ mindsets. “It’s been, ‘What do we need to do so that we can actually have rugby back in our lives?’ We have a really good crew in terms of them wanting to put the group first and be a good example to those around them.”
Everyone vying for an Olympics spot has returned to the program, save Eti Haungatau, who reported to Lindenwood University for fall 2020. The Sacramento native had deferred her fall 2019 acceptance to become a full-time USA 7s resident, but wanted to get her first collegiate semester under her belt. Haungatau will return to SoCal in February 2021 and spend the subsequent six months building toward Tokyo.
Under normal circumstances, the team would rely on “the process” to ready it for the next game, tournament, series or stage of the four-year cycle. And while none of those things currently exist on the calendar with any guarantees, the primary focus of “the process” roots the players.
“The ‘process’ is not ultimately just what we do on the pitch,” Brown addressed the concept as a whole. “It’s literally what we do step-by-step and that will include the video analysis, that’s pre- match and post-match. It’s nutritional things and recovery. It can mean learning from the previous game to make sure we can enhance what we do next, or continue doing what we just did in the previous game where we were really pleased.
“But the biggest thing is that you can get really caught up in the past or caught up in the future. That doesn’t really help anyone,” Brown continued. “The emphasis is on the present moment and doing the little things right – which can be different things depending on what day, if you’re in-tournament or if you’re not. And just making good choices really. Are they choices that push you toward the target or the achievement or goal, or are you making ones that may be compromising on the direction you want to go? So it’s more of a philosophy but with a big emphasis on trying to keep the girls in the present moment.”