Hail, Hail Rock 'n Roll

Confidence is a word that’s often used around Jamie Heaslip. It’s a commodity the Leinster and Ireland No. 8 has never been short of, ever since he made his Leinster debut in 2005 aged 21. Since then, Heaslip has blossomed into one of the finest back rows in world rugby, a fact highlighted by his magnificent displays on the last Lions Tour in 2009 and reinforced by Lions head coach Warren Gatland mentioning him as a potential captain for this summer’s tour to Australia.

Fearless on the field, Heaslip is surprisingly soft-spoken off it. Part of the ‘golden generation’ of Irish rugby, the 29-year-old Naas native isn’t confined to discussing the oval ball game. Heaslip holds a degree in Medical Engineering, has guest DJ’ed on Dublin radio station 98fm, and is co-owner of Dublin steakhouse, Bear, with renowned restaurateur Joe Macken. It is in Bear that we meet, Hot Press arriving early to find the remarkably fresh-faced Heaslip tucking into his lunch. He immediately removes his headphones and invites us to join him, without any of the pomp one might expect from one of the biggest sports stars in the country.
Heaslip is extremely focused. Hot Press gets the impression that every move, be it on the rugby pitch or off it, is thoroughly thought through. When he turns his piercing blue eyes on you, you get the feeling that he’s sizing you up, the same way he has sized up and knocked down some of the biggest men in the world on the rugby pitch. Thankfully, he’s also extremely personable, quick to laugh and not afraid to poke fun at himself.

John Walshe: You grew up playing rugby.
Jamie Heaslip: All the males in my family played. My dad played. I’ve a brother who is 12 years older than me and another one 10 years older... I’m the youngest by eight years. So I was a rugby ball for my brothers when I was young – and it was a case of ‘monkey see, monkey do’. Originally, my dad played rugby in Shannon. Then, with the army, he was all over the place so he hooked up with whatever rugby team was in the barracks he was based in. Initially, my brothers were swimmers, because The Curragh had one of the biggest pools in Ireland. On day, they asked if they could go to the rugby club at The Curragh and started playing. I remember seeing them and wanting to do likewise. I ended up starting in Naas at the age of eight. Some of the guys I played with then are still my best buddies now.
Was there a moment you realised you were good at rugby?
More a moment when I thought I could have a go at it. I swam for years, played soccer – everyone played soccer in the front yard – and GAA. I gave hurling a go but ended up hitting a guy in the face by accident on day one, so that kind of put me off it. When I went to secondary school, I did a lot of athletics, rugby and kept up the GAA. By about 15, I had to make the call. So I ended up going down the rugby route. My oldest brother Graham was in the army when rugby went professional in Ireland, and he ended up being one of the first people to get a full-time contract with Connacht. It wasn’t like I went, ‘that’s what I’m going to do’. But I saw that you can make a living from rugby. That was the light-bulb moment. Then, I got my opportunities along the way, was lucky enough to take them – and here we are.
You were just 21 when you made your Leinster debut in 2005.
I had played for the A Team, the development team, the year before. I got two contracts offered by two different clubs. I turned them down through the guidance of my dad. I would’ve gone for it but I had a year left in college and my dad advised me that there was no rush: “What’s a year? If you’re good enough, you’ll rise to it.” April 2005, the contract talks came around again. I signed on the dotted line, finished college in June and started pre-season training on the first of July. I remember the season very well. Michael Cheika had just come over, so we had that southern hemisphere flavour, and Mike Brewer, an ex-All Black, was involved as well. They both played back row, which is the position I play in. So it was great to have hands-on guidance from those guys. We played two pre-season games, both of which I started, and I thought they went well. Then, he started Eric Miller at eight. I’ll never forget it. I was fired up that he didn’t start me. I remember going into him the day he announced the team and he said, “You’ll get on. You’ll get your shot.” I was furious. But Eric started and I came on at half-time in the Ospreys away game, and I started every subsequent game that season.
You never looked back.
The following week, when I did start, was amazing. Along my rugby journey, there’s always been pinch yourself moments, real Roy of the Rovers stuff. I just feel really lucky. I’d have done it for free, and would do it for free, with the rest of my mates, playing in a Sunday league or playing on Saturday with Naas. I played AIL for four years with trinity and absolutely loved it. Rugby is a game for all shapes and sizes. Unlike some of the other team sports, one outstanding player can’t make a team in rugby, just because everything is so interlinked. That’s the thing I like, that the sum of the parts is greater than the individuals. I know it’s a limited time career-wise but it’s a boyhood dream come true.
You’ve had quite a journey since, including three Heineken Cups, a Grand Slam and a Lions Tour.
The highlight for me was in November, captaining Ireland. I was getting my mate an engagement card in Tesco on Baggot Street when I got a phone call off Deccie [Ireland head coach Declan Kidney]. My first thought when I get a phone call off Deccie is, “What have I done? Have I said something in an interview that I shouldn’t or have I done something that’s going to annoy him?” He said that Paul [O’Connell] couldn’t play and he wanted me to captain the side. I was blown away, standing in Tesco, going, “There’s no-one I can hug here!” I’d just met my agent and friend, Damien O’Donoghue from Icon Talent, and I walked back into him. He said I was like a deer caught in the headlights.
It must have been a proud moment for your family?
My dad was a colonel in the army and he said, “Fair play to you being made captain, but I’m a Colonel and I still pull rank on you!” That put me back in my box (laughs). The thing about sport, like in business, is that you hit these milestones. Then you want to kick on again. It’s great to have achieved all these things but some of them have sunk in and some haven’t. When I finish, I’ll look back and I’ll enjoy it all. Right now, winning is like a drug and I just want to win more. I’m always focused on the next thing. I used to have some jerseys up in my house, but I took them all down this year. I’ll put them back up when I’m finished. I’m just going to go hard right now.
What about winning your first Heineken Cup with Leinster in 2009? As a fan who made that pilgrimage to Edinburgh, via Birmingham, followed by a nine hour car journey and two nights in a tent, that one felt special!
Oh, the stories I’ve heard from people who went to that one (laughs). We’d been knocking at the doors throughout the years. In my first season, we got to the semi-final, where we were beaten well by Munster in Lansdowne. We had a particularly hard route to the final in 2009. It was a surreal moment. I’d played with Reggie Corrigan, Denis Hickey, and Eric Miller and Brian played with other players who had been there longer. They had put in a lot of years but never got those kind of returns, so you realise we’re quite lucky. But it reinforced our belief that we can go out and do stuff – and give something back to the supporters, who have endured so much. The fanbase for Leinster has gone from strength to strength, and they’re not fair weather supporters. We went to Edinburgh at the weekend and our plane was full of supporters: they’re there week in, week out. It’s amazing.
There have also been a few disappointments.
Plenty of them, but a phrase I like to use is, “You should never be afraid of your failures because failure leads to success.”
The Rugby World Cups are a case in point. In 2011, you fell to Wales in the quarter-final, having beaten Australia in the group stage.
Some people think we didn’t feel for losing it, but being in that changing room afterwards was like a funeral. Some guys knew they wouldn’t be around come the next World Cup. It was a hard one to take.
All the moreso, given how good the performances had been up to that?
Yeah, the fine line between winning and losing, at international level, is all down to mistakes, basically. Everyone is getting fitter, stronger and faster. Hits are bigger. There is so much analysis done on teams, how they play and where you might be able to exploit different areas, that a lot of tries and scores are coming from people’s mistakes. That game with Wales typified it. We were evenly matched. We had got ourselves back into the game and then bang: two mistakes, two tries. They had a 10 or 12 point lead going into the last 15 minutes and they just controlled the game and didn’t make any mistakes. That’s where the game is at now, internationally.
In our most recent game, against Argentina in Dublin, Ireland made virtually no mistakes and ran out comfortable winners.
There are certain things on the pitch that it’s crucial to control: your game knowledge; your set plays; how you want the team to play; not making mistakes, either attacking or defensively; penalties keeping teams in games. Sometimes, that’s where we’ve let ourselves down. People sometimes ask, “Leinster have won a couple of things, Munster have won a couple of things and Ulster are going really well: how come it doesn’t feed into the Irish team?” It’s just because the margins of error, as you go up, get smaller and smaller and smaller. The opposition might make six mistakes at Heineken Cup level and you might score or make inroads off three or maybe four of them. At international level, you might only score off two, and you get punished more. The guys who aren’t making mistakes, New Zealand, South Africa, Australia and France, are punishing teams who are making mistakes. Leinster played Clermont recently and Morgan Parra was nailing kicks from all over the park. Over those two games, home and away, we gave something like 30 points to them in penalties alone. Those kind of mistakes keep teams in it. I think we actually outscored them on tries.
Tne November international series must have been encouraging.
We took a turn in the right direction. We had a team that was quite inexperienced. Myself, Tommy Bowe and Andrew Trimble were all around the 50-cap mark; Darce [Gordon D’Arcy], Donnchadh O’Callaghan and Rog [Ronan O’Gara] have loads of caps. There were some guys with 20-30 caps but a load of guys with caps in single figures. So it was an inexperienced team. But we sat down and said, “What can we do?” We focused on us – on the good things and bad things we were doing, and on the drills: we trained as we wanted to play and it came through on the pitch. We’ve got to step that up to another level. We all have ambitions of a successful Six Nations campaign. We never go out to come second. We always go out to win. These are a competitive bunch of players with high aspirations.
So what are your aspirations?
It’s tough to get into the international squad. So your first aspiration is to go well in the Heineken Cup and get into Deccie’s squad. We all come from our own little clubs and instead of calling it a team, we want to make it feel like a club. There’s a difference between a team and a club. We want to be a club that’s tight-knit. That’s what we’ve been pushing over the last few months and it’s really been coming together, and we’ve been getting some rewards off the back of it. So, to go well with Leinster and get into the squad is about as far as I look into the future.
There’s a Lions tour coming up this summer and Warren Gatland has been mentioning your name as a potential captain.
A funny story about Gatty... I met him when my brother Graham was captain of Connacht and Gatty was the coach. He says very nice things about me but I’d say he still doesn’t like me, because when I was about 10 or 11, I used to sit in the back of the car and kick him in the shins and ask him 20 questions – so probably deep down, he hates me a little bit (laughs). Nice things in the media are great. But a long time ago, I stopped reading the rugby segments in the papers. It’s no reflection on anyone. It’s just that I’m focused on I can control. People have to write what they have to write. But I always said that if you believe all the good stuff, you have to believe all the bad stuff, so I just park it. Some people took that the wrong way, when I initially said it, but I’m really looking forward to a time when I’m not playing rugby professionally, when I can be a fan and really get involved in the debate, the opinions and all that sort of thing. That’s half the reason why I don’t watch much rugby – because I’m too involved in it right now.
So you don’t watch any rugby, not even Super 14?
No, because I’m too involved. I made that decision a long time ago and I look forward to the time when I can catch up on a Sunday, reading about all the games that weekend. But right now, I’m focused on being the best I can be for Leinster, Ireland and whatever might come after that.
You turn 30 at the end of this year. Are there any ambitions you haven’t achieved?
The only thing I haven’t won is the World Cup – and a Schools Cup medal with Newbridge College (laughs). But I’ve no regrets. I always say you learn from everything you’ve done, good or bad. All the experiences I’ve had have made me the person I am.
I read that you’ve flown planes, swam with sharks – are you an adrenaline junkie?
We were meant to go cage diving with sharks in South Africa, last time we were there on the Lions Tour, but the weather ruined that on us. But, in Durban, we swam in a shark tank. I think they were reef sharks, and we were told not to pet them or put your hands out. They’re unbelievably graceful in the water, but they just look at you like, “I could have you and there’s nothing you can do about it.” But I do like the thrills, which is probably why I play rugby. I’ve done bungee jumps, sky jumps, flown planes – I’ve got 14 hours of flying Cessnas. But there’s a lot of stuff I can’t do for insurance purposes.”
Like skiing?
I’m not allowed. I skied once when I was very young, but when I finish rugby, it’s on my list of things to do. My first holiday will be snowboarding or skiing. I’d love to do downhill mountain biking, which would be kinda cool. I’ve done white-water rafting, which was very cool, but it was only grade four. I’d love rally driving. I sat in the passenger seat once and their control of the car is incredible: I don’t know how they do it. So, I suppose I’m always seeking a high, yeah.
Do you still watch other sports?
Yeah, I’m a big NFL fan.
Who’s your team?
I could say the Patriots but that’s only because they were awesome when I started following NFL. But I don’t really have a team. I do like American sports. I love basketball. I went to the Olympic final in London, so it was great to see the top players in the NBA.
You’re not a soccer fan?
I’ve never been a soccer guy: don’t have a team. I go to the odd GAA match. I’m pally with Conor Mortimer from Mayo. But I wouldn’t have a massive interest in it, because I was always so focused on rugby.
The rugby lads seem able to go out and socialise without getting themselves into the papers, yet where soccer players can’t. Any idea why?
I don’t know. In the UK, it seems that there is so much money involved in soccer, that the players are a bigger interest for the tabloids. The guys can’t go on holidays without getting their pictures in the paper. With us, we’re left to our own devices. The odd time, there’d be a photographer around town when you’re going out but – be it with sport or actors or musicians who come to Ireland – for the most part, they leave you alone. I think it’s amazing and I hope it doesn’t change. You see actors and musicians walking down the street here, care-free. I remember seeing [Facebook supremo] Mark Zuckerberg walking around when he was here, not a bother on him. People have that kind of respect: “When they’re off, leave them off.’”
Have you ever got much hassle off the pitch?
No. Sometimes you’ll get lads who have a bit of Dutch courage and want to voice their opinion, but you just brush it off and move on. You might get the typical Irish slagging but nothing menacing anyway.
So there’s no danger of our rugby stars turning out like pampered Premiership footballers?
We don’t really have the option (smiles).
Why? Because you’re not paid enough?
I would say they’re paid too much. They’re paid, at times, crazy amounts, but that’s the business of their sport. But the way rugby is, a rugby team changing-room is a unique place to be: there’d just be too much abuse and slagging.
Speaking of musicians, you named your dog after Jay-Z, right?
Yeah! I remember seeing Jay-Z at Oxegen and being blown away by him. He’s one of the few R&B artists that’s really, really good live. He can mix it up and he knows how to put on a good show. I always get a little bit tongue-tied around artists or actors. Their creativity just blows me away. We went to the Mumford & Sons gig in the O2 on December 16, the day after my birthday, and we were all hanging out afterwards and I had Marcus Mumford singing ‘Happy Birthday’ to me. That was one of those blow-my-mind moments. I’ve met Marcus a good few times since he’s been over, and had a few drinks with him and the rest of the lads.
So what are you listening to now?
I’m on a massive Quentin Tarantino buzz right now, with the new movie coming out. I have the Django Unchained soundtrack on, and The Man With The Iron Fists. I love music. I had a chance to host the morning show on 98FM twice and I loved it. Club DJing, I don’t know if it’s for me, because I’d just want to play my songs and not necessarily what the crowd wants to hear (laughs). But I like the idea of radio DJing, interacting with people, especially the light-hearted stuff on the morning show. I had a lot of fun doing that.
Have you thought about what you’ll do when you hang up the boots?
Where you are right now [Bear] is part of that. The opportunity to do Bear, and the food and the vibe that it is, is a food reflection of both myself and Joe Macken. This is part of planning for what we call ‘the afterlife’. Rugby players tend to be in this kind of bubble. Everything is scheduled for you and you live by this schedule. Your weekends are ruled by games. 11 months of the year, you’re told what you’re doing: you have a nutritionist telling you what to eat; a strength and conditioning coach telling you what to do fitness-wise; then you have your coach telling you what to do on the pitch. I suppose guys get a little bit used to that and fail to prepare. Rugby opens up so many opportunities to try different things. I would never have got the opportunity to try hosting a radio show otherwise. To do all sorts of things like that – – allows me to find out what I like and what I don’t like. After this, I’m going over to intern at a creative agency called Modern Green on Camden St. Digital media, and digital marketing is something I’ve a big passion for. Radio is something I like. I also like clothes, as well, and music...
You’re also into your gadgetsl...
What middle-aged man isn’t (laughs)? But I’m trying all these different angles. This [Bear] is the one that most people would know about. It’s great. We’re learning all the time. I’ve another couple of things that will be popping up soon enough and now’s the time to try. I’ve no wife, no kids and I don’t have to worry about anyone else except myself, so I can make mistakes. When I started talking about things like this before, I got a bit of slagging from people about, “Why would you have things like Bear going while you’re an Irish rugby player?” Rugby is first and foremost for me. I plough all the time I can into it. I’m a professional. I’m there at seven or eight o’clock in the morning ‘til whenever we have to finish. I have a great team – Damien O’Donoghue from Icon, Joanne Byrne, who deals with media – and because of that support network, I’m able to go flat out at rugby and if opportunities come along that suit and fit, then I will go with them. You can never prepare too early.
You’re quite active on Twitter and in the blogosphere. Any literary ambitions?
Writing? Oh, God (laughs). My English teacher would give out loads about that. Maybe down the road... The only thing I have thought about was maybe doing an e-book for cooking.
Do you cook a lot?
Oh Jesus, yeah. And people are always asking, “What do you guys eat?” Even here in Bear, I’m trying to influence Sebastian, the head chef, trying to talk to them about healthy options. So, an e-book is the only thing I’ve contemplated, but contemplation is as far as it’s gone.
It would seem, talking to you, that confidence isn’t an issue for Jamie Heaslip.
You have to have confidence. When you’re going out to run into a guy, you’ve got to think that you’re going to run over him. Sometimes you do, sometimes you don’t, but you can’t be afraid of failure. You’ve got to keep going, knocking on the door.
Do you ever have sleepless nights before games?
I never really get sleepless nights before games, but I do after games. If a game is at seven o’clock, good luck to you: you’re not sleeping ‘til about two or three o’clock anyway. We take caffeine before games, and between that and adrenaline, you ain’t sleeping before two o’clock. That’s why you might see some of the guys out. We always sa:, if you want to have a few beers, we never have a problem with that, but you’re big enough and bad enough, so just be ready to train, come Monday. A couple of beers can help guys blow off a bit of steam. But sometimes after games, you’re mulling shit over in your mind. “Should I have done this? Should I have done that?” Even with games that you win. You think about the mistakes you’ve made, which run through your head.
Any superstitions? Have you a pre-match ritual?
I don’t have a ritual, as such. I have a little book, where I write down things I want to do in a game. I like to listen to a couple of tunes, but I don’t have a playlist: I stick it on shuffle. Nothing is set in stone.