Aian McLennan - Introduction

Well being my first blog as Mass athlete I am proud to join a team of such high calibre. Im hoping to bring a different aspect to the team as being from a different contrast to figure and bodybuilding. Aian Mclennan, 24 year old living on Sydney’s Northern Beaches originally a Sunshine Coast boy but now down in the thick of a city trying to grasp my sport of choice AFL.

Just touching base to give a brief overview before I joined the team. Our rigorous pre season started in November, which consists of plenty of conditioning work on top of strength work. Depending on each player’s goals, we all focus on our weaknesses for the up coming season. Personally my ever-changing weight sees me forever keeping a close eye on my diet, as like many I can quite easily slip on extra kegs when enjoying the weekends. Through my off-season I joined Josh at Benefit gym up on the Sunshine Coast where he really tested my lactic thresholds with many drills. Josh was a great help in prep for a heavy pre-season and as he is a former Australian representative boxer Josh really knows his sports specifics and runs a good gig up there.

Now, as our season has just began and everyone is well into their full flight of running, lifting, kicking and training in all aspects at full capacity I introduce myself as a self diagnosed over trainer, injury liability that has undergone numerous surgery throughout my career as a footballer.

I write this from Perth where I am trying to rehabilitate my left knee in which I have worn away all cartilage from under my knee cap and suffer from extreme tightness through my ITB’s hence a result from overload and overuse with insufficient stretching and massage.

As a hard running midfielder in AFL I aim to cover a bare minimum of 12km a game and having not been able to commit myself to a full pre-season of running that the boys underwent I have found myself on the bike, swimming and a lot of boxing to keep my VO2 capacity at its best without having to cover the distance with my running. Below is a general outlay of a session we would do through our pre-season training and as you can see the game of AFL is becoming more and more athletic year after year.

My last VO2 testing has seen me nearly stay on par with our clubs fittest so a point of this introduction blog is to drill home that although we suffer injuries at one point or another there is no need to throw in the towel no matter what our goals, there are always optional exercises to keep us on track.

Through the past three months I have aimed at trying to train at least twice a day across five days a week including my rehab and recovery sessions to ease my body into an upcoming season that is sure to be testing.

Now, as I am playing for the newly formed Sydney Hills Eagles we are set to take on some of the countries best throughout the Eastern Conference including the Sydney Swans reserves and the new GWS. This year is set to be even more testing as not only do we come up against some of the countries toughest opponents that will be trying to set some standards, we also will tackle the task of greater travel week after week in which I’m sure I will be getting into Luke at the Mass store at Seven Hills to aid me in some of their great recovery supps.

As our season unfolds and as I start to overcome my niggling injuries I will be sure to keep everyone up to date on our Mass blogs. A big shout out to my store at Seven Hills for getting me up and going and to Luke who has steered me in the right direction whilst dieting through injury, as we all know it can be quit easily to let the skinfolds slip to the way side.

See you at Mass Nutrition Seven Hills eating, pulling and pushing comp!! Going to be a great day and im sure ill have Lorena on the ropes in Max’s protein pancake eating contest, unfortunately that’s probably the only person ill beat….