NEW DELHI: Bronco Test has created a lot of buzz in the Indian cricket set-up. The introduction of the rugby-style Bronco Test in the Indian cricketing system, by the current Indian Strength and Conditioning coach Adrian Le Roux, has received mixed reactions.Former India off-spinner R Ashwin and legendary South African cricketer AB de Villiers called it a “big problem” and said it is going to be very “demanding” for the cricketers.“It’s one of the worst you can do,” de Villiers said on his YouTube channel. Former India cricketer R Ashwin, on his Ash Ki Baat podcast on YouTube, shed light on the challenges and intricacies of Indian cricket transitioning from one training system to another.He said: “When a trainer changes, the testing mechanism changes, the training schema changes. This is a big problem for a player. In fact, in many cases, this could lead to injuries also. And it has. Because I went through a cycle from 2017 to 2019, I was searching for my training schema because I was constantly injured.”What is Bronco Test?The Bronco Test, mainly adopted by rugby teams, consists of repeated shuttle runs over distances of 20, 40, and 60 metres. In the test, the runner sprints from 0 to 60 metres and back, then to 40 metres and back, followed by 20 metres and back — completing 240 metres in one set. The full test comprises five such sets, adding up to 1,200 metres of continuous running without rest.Ramji Srinivasan, who was India’s Strength and Conditioning coach during the 2011 World Cup, feels the Bronco Test was much needed in the Indian cricketing system.“Bronco is a running-based fitness test, basically,” Ramji tells TimesofIndia.com in an exclusive interview.“(It has) Been used for a long time by the rugby teams and mostly rugby teams because it’s a continuous, fast, endurance work, which is of good intensity. And you need to cover a distance in a particular time frame. It’s a time-trial-based protocol, which is one of the best things to be introduced for cricket, especially for fast bowlers and also for the batters.“It gives you your aerobic fitness value and your fatigue index value, your anaerobic threshold value. But at the same time, it doesn’t give you a reading on agility, a reading on your explosive power or reading on your reactive strength, or your flexibility or your balance or stability or your acceleration. It doesn’t give you those readings.“And there is no way to cheat in this. You cannot cut corners here. It’s all time-bound. Within a certain time period, you have to finish. If you want to be at an elite level of athlete or what a lot of players claim to be at an elite level, you have to finish under 4 minutes 30 seconds, the entire distance, which then you can be calibrated as an elite-level athlete. So, it clearly demarcates your fitness levels, where you need to be, and gives you a very realistic picture of what one player needs to improve on,” he explains.New S&C coach, new methods
File photo of Soham Desai. (Video grab)
Former India Strength and Conditioning coach Soham Desai, who was part of the Team India set-up for five years before Adrian Le Roux replaced him, says it is just another fitness test.“In India, there is no set structure or there is no set norm,” he tells TimesofIndia.com.“Adrian has come in. Now, we cannot blame him or we cannot say that why Adrian has brought a new test. It has been introduced because Adrian is comfortable with that test. In Yo-Yo or Bronco or in a two-kilometre run or in a beep test, all these things are tools.“Bronco is something which is predominantly used in a rugby setting or rugby environment because their game is such, their system is such that they have been doing it for years. And that is something you don’t need audio, you don’t need any apparatus to conduct that test. You can just put two cones, you have a stopwatch, you are good to go.“So, I have also done that with the boys or even Adrian would have done it with the boys without telling them that it is a Bronco Test, as just a conditioning training session for them,” he adds.“Adrian is familiar with the test. And he wants to use the test to assess the fitness of a player. There is nothing right or wrong about it.“It is just a question of a coach being comfortable with a particular kind of way. There is nothing to read between the lines or nothing that is leading us somewhere.”End of the road for Rohit and Shami?
File photo of Rohit Sharma in a practice session. (Getty Images)
Ramji Srinivasan strongly believes the Bronco Test is going to be tough for ageing superstars like Mohammed Shami and Rohit Sharma.“A 19-year-old boy’s reading on Bronco will be completely different from a 37-year-old man’s (reading),” he says.“Players who are 35-and-above need to have a different cut-off point, different standardisation. Because over the years they have been playing, they may be carrying niggles, their body may not respond. We have to have a separate standardisation for those people, those who are above 30.“I think it’s a good thing to have for a 20-year-old youth, but you cannot compare him to a 40-year-old player,” he warns.Is Bronco a selection criteria?
Adrian Le Roux during the England tour with India. (Instagram)
Desai believes the Bronco Test is not going to be a selection parameter, nor was the Yo-Yo test after the 2019 ODI World Cup.“Bronco is not a test in which a player will be selected or not selected. Nor is it the case with Yo-Yo at the moment,” he says.“During Virat Kohli, Ravi Shastri’s time, they directed Shankar Basu to get fitness to a level leading into the 2019 World Cup.“Those numbers were agreed with all the stakeholders involved and they wanted to keep it a serious affair so that people leading into the 2019 World Cup come to a particular level and then we play the World Cup. That was the whole vision. That’s why those numbers were agreed upon and shared and it became a selection criteria.“But after that, we have done the Yo-Yo test three times a year for almost all contracted players every year. But it was never a selection criteria. It is a fitness assessment parameter where we as coaches, as people working in NCA (BCCI’s CoE), get an idea, a snapshot about their fitness at that particular level,” he explains.Why, unlike the Yo-Yo test, you can’t cheat in Bronco?
Ramji Srinivasan, the former strength and conditioning coach of the Indian team, has lauded the move of bringing in the Bronco Test as part of assessing the fitness levels of senior men’s side players. (IANS)
In a startling revelation, Srinivasan says cricketers won’t be able to cheat in Bronco like they used to cut corners in the Yo-Yo Test.“There are so many variables in Yo-Yo,” says Ramji.“First of all, where you do Yo-Yo, whether you are doing it indoors or outdoors, that is one. Second thing, the ground conditions, which ground, where you are doing. For example, two or three grounds next to each other may have different surfaces. So, what you do in one ground, ground A, next test you go in ground B, the reading may differ. It may be more or it may be less. You cannot standardise that. So, you have to do it on the ground where you have done it to get the standardisation.“Third, the type of surface, whether you are doing it on grass, whether you are doing it on red soil, whether you are doing it on a ground, the basic surface matters.“Fourth is your humidity factor. What is the level of humidity when you are doing the testing? Fifth is your weather, whether you are doing it in the morning, afternoon, evening or late night, those things matter.“And you can steal inches here and there in the Yo-Yo Test. Bronco is really hard-hitting. Unless and until you are at a good level of fitness, when you try to push, you can get injured. You have to be at a good level of fitness to do a Bronco. You know, it is not just a test for weak hearts,” he continued.
