In which a wrist strap, a German tactician and the Estadio Azteca conspire to ruin my week.
Thomas Tuchel has a problem. England play Mexico in the last 16 on Monday morning at the Azteca, which sits 2,240 metres above sea level, and he says it’s “impossible” for his players to adapt to the altitude in four days. He sounds genuinely worried about it.
Thomas, mate. Come and sit down. I have data.
From watching rugby union, cricket and football - I watch live, I watch on TV, I listen to BBC 5 Live, I engage with You Tube. I love my sport.
I wear a WHOOP. For the uninitiated, this is a fitness strap that monitors your heart rate, your sleep, your recovery and your strain, then delivers its findings each morning with the warmth of a school report written by someone who caught you smoking behind the bike sheds. And according to my WHOOP, my single worst metric; the runt of my physiological litter, is my VO2 max.
VO2 max, for those who don’t have a small plastic Stasi officer strapped to their wrist, measures how efficiently your body uses oxygen. It is, essentially, the altitude stat. It’s the number that decides whether you can gallop about at 7,400 feet like a Mexican winger or whether you stand at the halfway line making the international gesture for “just give me a minute.”
So when Tuchel says England can’t adapt to thin air, I feel this in my soul. I can’t adapt to the air in Rufford, and that’s at sea level. West Lancashire is famously flat; we grow potatoes here precisely because nothing has to walk uphill, and my VO2 max still looks at the canal towpath like it’s the north face of the Eiger. If the FA rang me tomorrow and said “Mark, we need you in Mexico City,” my WHOOP would file for divorce.
But here’s where it gets serious. Because Tuchel isn’t just worried about the altitude. He’s worried about the sleep. “I’m not sure if the travel will be smooth, if the sleep will be smooth, if there’s noise outside the hotel,” he said, presumably while a WHOOP rep nodded solemnly in the background.
And this is where Tuchel and I part ways, because his sleep problem is Mexican fireworks outside a hotel. Mine is him. The game kicks off in the small hours of Monday morning; 2am where I’ll be watching it, in Alcossebre on the Spanish coast, at a bar called El Clan. Which means that somewhere in California, a WHOOP server is already bracing itself for what I’m about to do to it.
My WHOOP already tells me off about my sleep, you understand. This is a device that has opinions about my bedtime the way my mother had opinions about my haircuts. “You got 71% of your sleep need.” “Your sleep consistency is poor.” “Consider winding down earlier.” It once suggested I was carrying accumulated sleep debt with the tone of a bailiff’s letter.
I have suggested that the words of England Rugby Union coach, Sir Kevin Sinfield would be worth sharping with Tichel, his players, the fans and the creators of WHOOP.
Now imagine Monday. There will be no going to bed at a respectable hour like a good boy, because I will be at El Clan with a cold Alhambra, surrounded by expats, holidaymakers and at least one confused local, watching eleven Englishmen discover what oxygen deprivation feels like while experiencing several cardiac events of my own every time Mexico cross the ball. Kane scores: heart rate spikes. VAR check: heart rate spikes. Penalties, dear God, penalties at the Azteca at 4am Spanish time, and my strain score will resemble someone who’s done the Three Peaks carrying a fridge; with deference to Princess of Wales and my nephew, Jack Nickson.
Then Monday morning proper arrives, and my WHOOP delivers its verdict. Recovery: red.
Sleep performance: insulting. Resting heart rate: elevated. Alcohol detected: yes, obviously, I was in a bar in Spain watching England at the Azteca, what did you expect. Suggested activity: “rest.” And somewhere in its little algorithmic heart, a note is made that on the night of the 6th of July, the wearer did something inexplicable and possibly medical.
There is no setting for this. There’s no toggle marked “England knockout game, abroad, in a bar.” WHOOP can tell when I’ve had a pint; it cannot tell when Maradona’s ghost is hovering over a stadium where England haven’t played since 1986 and it ended in larceny.
So good luck, Thomas. You worry about the altitude. Your players have been heat-training in Florida since May; they’ll cope. Spare a thought instead for the rest of us at sea level; a Lancashire lad on the Spanish coast, in a bar at 2am, quietly destroying a month of carefully accumulated recovery data for the privilege. And remember on Saturday its the first round of rugby's Nations Championship - I will make sure to check in with WHOOP. Ironically both rugby and football being played at altitude where VO2 max means so much more.
My VO2 max couldn’t survive Mexico City. But my WHOOP might not survive Monday.
Seniormash Reflections