Never give up

Posted on 1 June 2016

Beloved former Springbok rugby star Chester Williams knows a thing or two about dealing with setbacks. After a playing career dogged by injuries, he reinvented himself as a coach. We chat to him about the mental – and physical – stamina required to stay on the winning team.

It was 21 years ago, but for many South African rugby fans the winter of 1995 feels like just yesterday. In mid-May, tournament hosts South Africa opened the Rugby World Cup with a stunning victory over Australia before blitzing their way past their other Pool A opponents – Romania and Canada.

It’s easy to forget that Chester Williams – the strong, speedy 24-year-old winger who would emerge as one of the stars of the tournament – was, at that stage, nowhere to be seen.

Chester, now 45, laughs at the memory. ‘I’d pulled my hamstring in a practice game against Samoa just before the tournament – in the act of scoring a try! – and had to leave the field,’ he remembers. That 60-8 pre-tournament victory over Samoa is
now a footnote in the Springbok rugby history books, but for Chester it’s a painful reminder of a playing career punctuated by a string of injuries.

‘Of course the coaches tried to get me back to full fitness before the start of the tournament,’ he says. ‘Unfortunately I wasn’t ready to play in that opening game against Australia, and I had to withdraw from the team.’

But Chester knuckled down, following the instructions of the team doctors, and recovered – just in time to take the field for the Rugby World Cup quarterfinal.

‘Ironically enough, I ended up playing my first World Cup match against Samoa,’ he says. ‘And I scored four tries, which at the time was the most scored by a Springbok in a World Cup match.’

Of course, even if you’re not a rugby fan, you probably know the rest of the story: Lomu, Mandela, Pienaar, Stransky, dropgoal, Invictus… But while all of South Africa celebrated that historic 1995 Rugby World Cup championship, Chester Williams limped into yet another injury setback.

In 1996 he snapped the anterior cruciate ligaments in his right knee and missed the entire season. In 1997 he scored a hat-trick of tries in his comeback game, only to suffer the same painful ACL injury – this time in his left knee – in his second game. Injury and recovery became fixtures of his playing career.

‘There may have been a way of preventing all those injuries, in the sense that I could have controlled my training more,’ he says. ‘But back in those days things weren’t as scientific as they are now. Today you have doctors and trainers who can tell you how many minutes you should train for, how many minutes you should play for… In my playing days, you’d just run and train in the gym, without even thinking you could be overtraining!’

Looking back, Chester believes that overtraining – and the (avoidable) strains and sprains that come with it – was probably the cause of many of his injury woes.

‘But I see it as a positive,’ he shrugs. ‘Back then I wanted to be part of a team that would make history, and I thought training hard was the right thing to do. Unfortunately it wasn’t. But the science has changed, and nowadays we have doctors who can use that science to enable you to prevent overtraining and injuries.’

During his playing career Chester learnt a few tough lessons about preventing and recovering from injuries and illnesses. He believes the mental aspect – staying positive, setting goals – goes hand in hand with solid medical care.

‘You need to listen to your physicians,’ he says. ‘Your trainers, your doctors, your physios… You have to listen to them, do what they tell you and take the medication they give you to help you recover.’

When his playing career ended, Chester moved into team management with the Springbok Sevens side before becoming a coach. After stints in Super Rugby (with the Cats) and overseas (with the Ugandan and Tunisian national teams, as well as top Romanian side Timis,oara Saracens RCM), he now coaches the University of the Western Cape’s Varsity Shield side.

Chester has enjoyed success as a coach, guiding the Sevens Boks to bronze at the 2002 Commonwealth Games and second place in the 2002 World Sevens Series, and leading Timis,oara Saracens RCM to back-to-back national titles in 2012 and 2013. But he admits that the career shift – from scoring tries on the field to yelling instructions from the sidelines, took some getting used to. ‘Initially, and definitely in the first year or so, it was frustrating,’ he says. ‘I’d see things about to happen on the field and I’d want to go out there and fix it myself. The big challenge for a coach is figuring out how to translate that message to your players.’

Part of that message is about preventing injuries before they happen. ‘It’s funny you should mention that,’ he says, speaking to us towards the end of the Varsity Shield competition, in late March. ‘Just this morning I was talking to my players about the change of season from summer to autumn. This is the time of year when people usually get sick. I’ve learnt that prevention is always better than cure, so I told them – and the team’s medical staff – to get those vitamins
and flu tablets ready so that we don’t suffer from bugs and illnesses as much as the other teams do!’

Solid advice – and something your own Mediclinic doctor would recommend as well.

Make your comeback
Dr Herman Kotzé, a doctor of sports medicine at Mediclinic Stellenbosch and the Stellenbosch Academy of Sport, has advice for any athlete – whether a pro or a weekend warrior – who’s recovering from a sports-related injury.

‘When you suffer an injury, the muscles around that injury will soon start to become weaker. You can “feed” those muscles and keep them strong by supplementing your protein intake. Proteins consist of amino acids, which are the building blocks for muscles.

‘Use this rule of thumb: take your weight in pounds, and that figure – in grams – is the amount of protein you’ll need per day. The best way is to take it in small portions of not more than 30g to 35g at a time. ‘Take, for example, someone who weighs 100kg. That’s 220 in pounds, divided by 6 (for six intakes a day), which equals just over 35g per portion. Six small portions per day will definitely make a difference. As far as muscle recovery is concerned, the best time for protein intake is just before you go to bed, on an empty stomach. Your body will process it overnight, while you’re asleep.’

Where it hurts
A Canadian study found that over 40% of rugby-related injuries are muscular strains or contusions, while 30% are sprains. The balance is made up of dislocations, fractures, lacerations and overuse injuries. More injuries occur during matches than during training.