Episode 47: 1 team 1 Family Laelae Amituanai & Hannah Hall, Ysu rugby

What a treat to talk to two rugby teammates at once! This is the first episode with more than one guest, so I’d love to hear your impressions of our conversation and the format.

Rugby is all about working together on and off the field. The game seems to be about aggression, which we do talk about and yet every rugby player I’ve ever met emotes about love of team, love of sport, love of competitors. Team President Hannah Hall and Freshman recruit Laelae Amituanai are no exception. They play for the young Youngstown State University women’s rugby team, currently a club sport with big goals and great success this first year of real competition. Despite all the extra responsibilities (fundraising, for example) put on the players because they are a club sport, they each feel so strongly about what they’ve learned from being on the YSU Rugby team, playing rugby, and from spending time with the team and coaches on and off the field.

In this weeks episode Hannah & Laelae talk about rugby, training, what it means to be aggressive, nutrition (or lack of), their two coaches who have done exceptional jobs building and training the team. You will hear in the episode how important team bonding has been and how that bond has led to such incredible hard work and dedication to the sport.

A big, big shout out to Hannah and Laelae for lots of back and forth to make this episode successful. We ended up recording at the YSU library in a special podcast room. I’m so appreciative of the time they have put into the audio and visual components of this week’s podcast. Thanks to the library for having a podcast room and to Coach Jeff Horton for connecting me with his players.

YSU Women’s Rugby Facebook
Rian Brown’s Documentary Film, Into The Scrum
Black Ferns

If you like this episode, you will also enjoy:
🎤 Episode 15 with Rugby Player of the Decade Phaidra Knight. Listen Here.
🎤 Episode 18 with Junior Cyclist Megan Jastrab. Listen Here.
🎤 Episode 43 with 1st African American female coach in NFL, Collette Smith. Listen Here
🎤 Episode 8 of Hear Her Sports Glenville with High School Basketball player Shavell talks about getting aggression out on the court. Listen Here.