'Everything we are doing is to make us the best rugby players we can be': England captain Tom Mitchell takes Sportsmail through a day in the life of a sevens professional

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England Rugby Sevens captain Tom Mitchell can't help but smile as bodies lie in agony on the Twickenham turf. For once, he is not the one suffering.

Tom and two of his team-mates have agreed to give Sportsmail and a host of others an insight into the life of a professional sevens star. It becomes apparent very quickly that it not for the faint hearted.

A 9am start in the gym at Red Rose HQ is how it usually starts for the skipper and his colleagues, especially in the weeks leading up to their home tournament.

Sportsmail headed along to Twickenham for the day for a training session with England Sevens

Captain Tom Mitchell leads the warm up drills under the stands at the home of rugby

'The way our schedule works with the tournaments and stuff. We do a block of training here in England for three to four weeks and then we go away to do back-to-back tournaments,' he says.  

'When we’re here, Monday will be our biggest day. We’ll start with speed, so that’s our biggest designated speed session. It will be 45 minutes of speed drills, accelerations, or top speed work. Having that top end speed is so important in Rugby 7s.'

Thankfully for those taking part, it's not a Monday. But that doesn't mean the schedule is any less gruelling. 

After a thorough warm up, it is out into the stadium for a yo-yo test. A test of endurance, it is similar to that school PE lesson nightmare known as the beep test.

After overcoming the terrifying flashbacks this reporter made a decent stab at it, reaching level 16 - only to learn that no player would get anywhere near the England squad without hitting at least level 20.

Mitchell talks participants through the yo-yo test, used to gauge an individual's stamina

It shows just how key endurance is to a sevens athlete, but Tom insists that a strong rugby skillset is still the single most important attribute for a player.  

'When you get down to it, and you’re playing a game, first and foremost your rugby playing ability and your tactical and technical ability are always going to be a massive part,' he explains. 

'We’re not weightlifters we’re not crossfitters, we’re not training for the gym. Everything we are doing is to make us the best rugby players we can be.

'But In sevens in order to be the best on the field, the athlete element of it is massive and you can’t be one dimensional with it. 

'You can’t just be strong at pushing in one direction, you can’t just be quick, you need to have the ability to be quick and also strong in the contact area, and also be able to run a long way in that 14-minute period.' 

It consists of running between two points, at an ever-increasing pace until your body gives up

Next, it was back into the gym, and a set of circuits. While the ramshackle group of journalists taking part were struggling with three different stations - core exercises, free weights and upper-body - it was only the tip of the ice berg compared to what the professionals go through. 

Their day can last up to seven hours, with plenty more drills to power through as they look to hit their peak ahead of a tournament. 

It is the next tournament, the HSBC London Sevens, that means the most to Tom.

'There are occasions, even though we train here all the time, we’re walking through round the stadium we’re thinking as kids how special this place is,' he admits. 'It was for us then it still is now.

Failing to reach the last marker before the beep results in a warning. One more and you're out

'When we really only have this one opportunity to play in front of our home fans, our friends and family on the world series here, that really adds something special for us.

'It’s an exciting place to try and create some memories for sure, and I remember every single one of the times I’ve played here at Twickenham and I’m excited to try add to that.' 

Crawling up the stairs to the wattbike machines to complete a draining session, sevens rugby's all-time leading try-scorer Dan Norton was on hand to give encouragement through the final stage of the day - a 60 second sprint that felt more like 60 minutes for a set of legs that already been put through the wringer.

It begs the question how the pros can do it for 40 minutes at a time.  

'Hopefully it shows how hard we work and what effort we have to put in to perform on the pitch,' says Norton. 

Back inside the gym, Mitchell talks the group through several circuit drills they will be doing

With highlights on the calendar such as Hong Kong and fancy dress and drinking often going hand-in-hand around World Series circuit, the professional aspect can sometime get lost in the noise. 

Tom believes the profile of the game, rather than the occasions, that should be the focus of attempts to boost the sport's popularity. 

'You speak to a lot of people and a lot of people still aren’t aware that Sevens is a career in itself,' he says. 

'We have a squad of 20-odd full-time Sevens players and we are contracted to RFU and we just play Sevens.

'Every time someone goes to watch for the first time the feedback is amazing, they love it, and why wouldn’t you?'   

'I think we still need to keep striving to improve in this area because it’s such an amazing game, there’s so much value in it it seems a shame not to keep on building on it and spread the word.' 

Danny Norton helps out with the last session, which involved a gruelling watt bike challenge

The HSBC London Sevens takes place at Twickenham Stadium on Saturday and Sunday 3 June. Get your tickets here.