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This week Andrew's on the Gold Coast for the Kangaroos pre-season training camp.

I woke up to Warren Benjamin snoring this morning, had a shower and then went and grabbed some breakfast.

Scrambled eggs, baked beans, a couple of pieces of toast was the order of the day. I was originally going to have porridge but the menu was too good to be true. I also ate some fruit with yoghurt just to top it off.

After breakfast I kicked back and watched some television while waiting for a core session to begin. Lachie Hansen came past looking for his water bottle - I had it but I didn’t tell him.

At the core session we walked around on an oval just stretching and using gym sticks which is all in preparation for training at 10am.

It was a pretty quiet bus trip out to the Southport Football Club and I was sitting next to Liam Anthony.

When we arrived I began to get ready. The ground was massive at Shark Park, just like the old days at East Fremantle. The goal posts were the tallest of all time. I had my ankles strapped and downed a protein shake.

Today the coaches separated us into two teams and I was on the blue side - which was clearly the better one. It was so hot and I was sweating up in the warm-up.

It was a solid session and the last drill went for about a half an hour without a drink! I got roasted by the sun on the shoulders and am going to have to rethink my sunscreen application. Mum wouldn’t be happy. Then again, someone told me that some sunscreens have a carcinogenic in them which get absorbed into the skin…so you’re damned if you, damned if you don’t apparently!

At the end of the session I met some of the local Gold Coast supporters and signed some autographs. I weighed a kilo and a half lighter than before the session due to sweating so much.

We all had showers and due to the lack of ice baths. I had to share a makeshift ice bath, which is a wheelie bin filled with ice and water, with Marcus White. It was too close for comfort but Whitey didn’t seem to mind.

We then headed upstairs for lunch - great food and the Sharks really looked after us. I watched Punter hit his double ton on the television. Corey Jones, the Mr. Fixit of the club, thought he’d try to adjust the height of the table leg he was sitting at, and in the process everything fell to the floor and broke. Dumbo strikes again!

After lunch, most of the boys headed to the beach while I went with another group for a 25km ride. The ride got off to a good start with Ben Speight running into a pole within 200m of the beginning. A lady saw the whole thing and told us all about it. Later Wellsy’s pedal fell off and he had to ride back with only one foot. Speighty’s ride continued to get better when his chain fell off twice and he was left lagging behind the pack.

We came back to our accommodation at the Sports Super Centre, but instead of jumping in the ice baths again, we headed to the beach. Jonesy brought a cricket bat and ball, and we had a body surf and played cricket. I got stung by a stinger right in my crack.

Dinner was well deserved and it’s going to be low key tonight - a bit of poker, TV and lights out.

Stay tuned to kangaroos.com.au tomorrow for the second edition of Follow Swallow.

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