By Nick Powell
From the end of January to the beginning of March, in anticipation of my 20th birthday and acceptance that professional sport is well and truly beyond me, I’m looking back through my 20 years to find the sporting memories that have had the biggest impact on me.
For this article I go back to 2009, a year where I experienced true pain both physically, and emotionally and as I suffered my first sporting injuries and had to contemplate two agonising home defeats for Harlequins.
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2009 - Feeling Pain
I was fortunate enough to go skiing for the first time in 2009, and though I was a beginner, it was the optimum age for learning.
When you are nine or ten, it's incredible how quickly you can absorb information and learn new skills. You are old enough that you can understand what you need to do, but young enough that old skills don't interfere with your thought process.
I got a grip on skiing very quickly, much more quickly than most sports and though I wasn't the most skilled, the speed and freedom of it was exhilarating.
In any given session, I used to be happy if I fell less than 7 times. It's the age where you're basically made out of rubber and magic, so it didn't hurt.
I had literally no fear. The main reason I didn't want to fall was because it reflected badly on me, not because it hurt. Once I knew how to stop, I didn't want or need to learn anything else.
This was helped by my instructor, Michel. An old Frenchman who had no interest in teaching us any technique. He was just waiting for his pension without trying to kill any kids.
He very nearly failed.
When we did wipeout, he would often insulted us. Once he asked me if I knew what an audit was. I said I didn't know. He said: "Look in the mirror."
It was only about half an hour later that I realised his less than fluent grasp of the English language had led him to mispronounce idiot, rather than any accountancy-related insult.
I was surprised he didn't see the same thing in the mirror when he decided to send 10 kids, at least half of which were psychos, over any icy snowpark at full speed.
There were three jumps. Jump one was really high. Jump two was heart-in-mouth high, the highest I'd ever been. Jump three was scary, and then...
Blackout.
The Morning of the incident...fortunately the incident itself wasn't caught on camera
I was the last body to rise from the pileup. I had a ringing in my ears, as if a stun grenade had gone off. I was in tears, felt sick and in so much pain.
I grabbed the first man I saw and clung to his leg. I was disorientated and had never experienced pain like it.
A strecher and ambulance later I was in hospital. I was fine, hadn't broken anything (except my skis), but I had to sit on cushions for a couple of months with the state of my coccyx.
A few months later, and I tripped and fell running ahead of the group on a walk on holiday and impaled a rock into my knee. A few stitches later and I was back on my feet, but it's fair to say lessons were learned.
I'm pleased to say I didn't become a complete coward after this, but it did make realise that when you go all in, sometimes you're going to get hurt.
That lesson doesn't just apply in a physical sense, but in everything in life.
Whether it's working hard on something, supporting something, or anything that you really fight for, the more you put in, the harder it hits you when it doesn't work out.
In the case of the 2009 Heineken Cup quarter final between Harlequins and Leinster, it was the biggest game I'd ever seen to that point.
I had invested a huge amount of emotion into that game. Quins missed two penalties, two drop-kick attempts and a conversion as they were beaten 6-5.
Mike Brown's second half score wasn't enough
There were tears, not helped by the fact that Viva La Vida by Coldplay was ringing out of the tannoy.
Fast forward 2 months and Quins hosted London Irish, now in the Premiership semi-final.
Quins were once again the favourites, and once again their kicking let them down.
FOUR missed penalties in the first half allowed Irish to snatch a 17-0 win, sealed by Mike Catt's interception try.
And once again, Result + Viva La Vida = Crying
Once I recovered I spotted a grandmother and her young grandson in an Irish shirt celebrating victory. I couldn't help but raise a smile, and ultimately reflected that it's better to put your heart and soul into something and it fail, then to not.
I look back on the crushing disappointments with the same feeling as the amazing wins nowadays. Why? Because in all instances, particularly for Harlequins, every man tried their heart out in all of those big knock out games.
When a game is lost through mismanagement on or off the field, cockiness or a lack of effort, that same feeling of pure sadness isn't there. It's clouded by frustration, disgust and sometimes humiliation.
But when you see your troops go into battle and they come off second best, you just have to take it on the chin.
As you mature, you grow to deal with it better, like physical pain. It's rare to see people crying when their team loses at 20, just like it's rare to see someone cry through injury at the same age.
But in both cases, there's a pure, unadulterated pain, albeit in different ways.
Nevertheless, 2009 taught me it's better to go all in, then half-in. When you or your team get it wrong it hurts like hell, when they get it right, nothing is better.
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