Scotty Stevenson: Start of Super Rugby season proves stuff of nightmares

Keven Mealamu of the Blues warms up before an Auckland Blues Super Rugby training session. Photo / Getty Images.

I had a terrible dream this week. It involved endless shuttle runs and wind sprints and down ups and tractor tyres and resistance bands and stocky men with shaved legs carrying stop watches and clip boards, and women with callipers taking measurements of my midriff. In my case, they were big callipers; they came at me like the jaws of a rabid alsatian.

It was sweaty and painful. There were barbells and skipping ropes, and the endless sticky swelter of Auckland (though it could have been Hamilton or Christchurch, or Wellington, or even Dunedin). There were watt bikes and rowing ergs and grinders and bear crawls.

I woke with a shudder and a whimper.

Was I going crazy? Had I been emotionally damaged by another eleven-month rugby season? How could I possibly have been on a watt bike? So many questions. So few answers. Here in the dark, without my glasses.

Then it hit me, this wasn't my nightmare at all, and it certainly wasn't my reality.

"My God!" I wailed into the darkness, waking the family and setting the neighbour's Shi Tzu yapping, "It's the start of Super Rugby pre-season."

And so it begins, tomorrow in fact, at a training-ground near you: dear salt-stained grimace of pain, the foul mistress of fitness testing. Imagine them there in their new-season kit on the start line of the yo-yo, the veterans and the rookies and even some that don't even have a contract yet, but who will sweat the same bullets and drink from the great water bottle of hope. It's not too late, young man. Stop now before you tear an adductor.

Look. There's Sir John Kirwan and his band of Blues. What fairground amusement will provide the perfect metaphor for season 2015? Another rollercoaster? Perhaps a Bumper Car? The Log-flume ride? Tea Cups? It's too early to tell, but tickets please! To semifinals or bust, or infinity and beyond, or something like that, but Auckland-flavoured.

Hark! There's Dave Rennie and the Chiefs! Well, most of them, except for the ones that won't be there yet, but don't worry about that. They'll pull in a few promising schoolboys to cover for them. It's springtime in Hamilton. The eternal spring. The fog is lifting. 'Twas once the Fountain City before it became the 'Tron, much to the lament of fellow Herald columnist and Cow Town raconteur Steve Braunius. The Chiefs, the fountain of youth. Wayne Smith, the fountain of knowledge. He'll be there, somewhere, gazing at a spreadsheet.

Stop. Hammertime. Oh, no that was last year. Ahoy. There's Chris Boyd and the Hurricanes. What's he doing over there, by that dumpster? Just throwing away the last of the Lions season, of course - not much use in recycling that. Is that who we think it is? Could that really be Ma'a? A Hurricane again! Hope and glory and pride. Damn it, no more Lions references.

Wait! Where is that Todd Blackadder? Oh there he is, behind all those first fives. Just look at this Crusaders team. Look at the talent. Look at the consistency. Look at all this heavy machinery. But where are all the Whitelocks? These are dangerously low Whitelock levels.

Hey. There's Jamie Joseph and 16 new Highlanders. 16. The Highlanders are doing their bit for Dunedin's net migration numbers. They're coming from everywhere. It's a Tony Brown backline move. It's the tartan of the rugby nation. Sweet second favourite team of everyone.

Yes, there they all are, and there they all will be, lining up tomorrow for the start of the great pre-season slog ahead of the Super Rugby season. I don't envy them. The thought of it makes me tired. I'm going back to sleep. I don't want to think about skinfolds and beep tests.

Hell, that sounds like the most terrible dream of all.

3 of the best tries of Super Rugby 2014

Caned them
Beauden Barrett's effort to finish the length-of-the-field try started by Andre Taylor against the Highlanders.

I'll score it
Alapati Leiua's individual effort against the Crusaders in Christchurch. At last count he ran through six defenders and dodged the hot-dog vendor.

Going solo
Malakai Fekitoa's solo run against the Sharks in Durban - considering he started it all by running towards his own goal line, it was certainly one to remember.