Bleeding knees, burning abs: I spent a week living like David Pocock. It nearly killed me

It’s daybreak, and I am lying on the banks of the Murrumbidgee River in subzero temperatures. My knees are bleeding, my back has been scoured by river sand and my abs burn from 100 crunches as I am being hazed by David Pocock: former Wallabies great, climate activist, crossbench senator – and strongman of the parliamentary circus.

“Fresh meat!” he yells.

I am here for a dare: to live like Australia’s most shredded senator for a week, and when the Spartan drills are done among a shirtless tribe of health fanatics, it will mark my fifth and last day of trying to replicate how the former elite athlete spends his days.

Canberra has its fitness freaks: marathoners and gym bunnies and Pilates virtuosos. But if you scroll Pocock’s Instagram, you quickly realise that being ripped is a part of Pocock’s brand, like the climate activism he was once arrested for, or the housing fight that takes up much of his bandwidth.

And, while more than two years as the Senate’s kingmaker has only accelerated his workload, it’s evident he hasn’t let it eat too far into his gym time.

So how does he do it? My odyssey begins the Sunday before the final sitting fortnight ahead of parliament’s winter break, in the Pococks’ inner-northern Canberra home, where David’s wife, Emma, is extolling the importance of protein, and a meal that can be eaten on the run.

“The food options in parliament, they’re less than ideal,” she says, chopping celery, parsley and mint that will go into a tuna salad with some mayo, lemon and olive oil. A hunk of venison is baking in the oven, and large chicken fillets will later cook in a broth on the stove.

“Especially when you’re making decisions – big important decisions – you don’t want to be making bad choices when you’re hungry or badly fed.”

A former adviser to Greens senator Sarah Hanson-Young, and now the head of a climate advocacy group for athletes, Emma considers cooking for her husband and his team a pleasurable civic duty.

She has graciously cooked extra so I leave their house with nine containers: tuna salads, each with a slice of sourdough; chicken with an Asian slaw, rice and pickled ginger; and venison with air-fryer potatoes, broccolini and salsa verde.

“We eat a lot of venison,” she says. “It’s an invasive species … so it’s good to get rid of it.”

Out of self-interest more than intrigue, I ask what David eats as a cheeky treat. “He just doesn’t. I’ve never known someone who’s so disciplined,” Emma says. He later reveals he will sometimes snack on frozen blueberries.

“What about a Woolworths cookie?” I ask Emma. “Absolutely not,” she says.

But before I go, she hands me a ziplock bag of homemade tahini fudge, with choc chips and maple syrup, which I will cling to like a life raft.

Major changes are afoot for the Pococks. With their small border collie, mini poodle-cross Bronte, the pair playfully declare themselves DILDOs (double-income little dog owners).

But soon they will add one more, with the arrival of a child in November. Accepting the congratulations, David jokes: “Thanks, we had unprotected sex.”

It was a surprise for the couple, who in 2019 declared they wouldn’t have children due to the climate crisis facing the planet. “It’s not a sign that things are great, the climate’s fine,” Emma says.

“Heaps of our friends, lots of people in our generation are grappling with this question. I don’t think there’s a right or wrong answer. When we found ourselves in this situation, we kind of ended up deciding that we were pretty excited about it.”

“It feels good,” David confirms, acknowledging he’ll soon have to fit a lot more into his routine.

Five days of pain

As I said, this project was something of an office dare. Ahead of me are five days of weightlifting, touch football, soccer, more weightlifting, a stretch class, and a notorious riverside boot camp known as granimals. All to report back what a week in Pocock’s shoes does to a normal man.

“If I don’t at least do some sort of exercise in the morning, I just never do it,” says Pocock. “You can spend the entire day inside [parliament]. You get there, the sun isn’t up; you’re leaving, sun’s down.”

While some homeowners have granny flats, Pocock has a mini-Club Lime built out of converted containers, just past the chicken pen. Sunday seems to be lower-back day, which means six nordic hamstrings, six seated good-mornings, and 20 back extensions on a Roman chair while holding a weighted plate.

He gives me a demo, kneeling and hooking his feet behind padded bars, then leaning forward in a controlled drop so that his calves bulge, letting his fists stop the fall.

The next exercise involves straddling a workout bench and leaning forward beneath the weight of a loaded barbell, then the back extensions. We do these exercises three times, repeatedly swapping out his preferred weight for mine. “It’s a pretty good burn,” he says, beaming. My legs are quivering like they’ve been called to the hangman.

Monday: Weights are just the beginning

Question time is traditionally billed as a time for MPs to grill government actions and policies, but unless he has something to ask, it’s when Pocock presses iron. He texts me the new routine: chest presses, chest flies, reverse flies.

While I go with 10 kilos or less, the dumbbells he alternates between look like the axle and tyres of a sedan. The previous day, he told me he no longer needs to lift heavy, marvelling at the loads his former ACT Brumbies teammates are training with.

“I think I’ve become a lot kinder to myself. As an athlete, you rely on your body but you’re also punishing it, like it’s kind of a tool of your trade almost, and so you’re constantly sort of pushing it to the edge. And that certainly takes its toll,” he says.

The session’s taken its toll on me. I return to the office to retrieve the venison, mouthwateringly rich, even more so mixed with the whipped feta and salsa. I’m happy to do my part to keep Bambi’s numbers down.

Next, I extract one cube of tahini fudge. It’s an explosion of earthy sweetness, and I refrain from emptying the bag in one go. At dinner, I wolf down the chicken without pause. As the week edges on, I will reach for Emma’s masterful meals earlier and earlier as I turn to them for solace.

Tuesday, Wednesday: Goal! A small victory

Both days begin on the Senate-side sports oval in subzero conditions, with apparent temperatures ranging between -2 and -5 degrees ahead of the 7am start.

For Pocock, weekly touch football and soccer matches are child’s play. Within moments, my heart is beating at top speed as political opposites team up, facing off against friends.

Labor backbenchers pass down the line to Liberals. Former Nationals leader Barnaby Joyce runs the ball with a confident step.

Fantasising about putting a hit on a world-class athlete, I face off against Pocock. But I’m barely able to scrape my fingers past his shoulder blade as he squeezes through the line. The following morning I fare better, scoring a goal, but the photo evidence shows I’m no match in defence for his agility.

Question time. No sign of Pocock on the crossbench. “Am I missing gym time?” I text. “Heading down for a quick session now,” he replies.

I ask if it’s okay to join, to which he responds, “You’re soft if you don’t,” then, “Kidding. See you soon.” It’s leg day.

Later, his chief of staff texts me that his suit pants have split for the second time that day. “I think you need a photo of them for the story,” she says. The photo appears of Pocock, laughing and holding pants that are beyond repair.

Thursday: Tension released – for now

David Pocock has his foot in my back, and it feels … amazing. My arms are behind me, gripping a wooden pole he uses to pull back, my muscles stretching.

We are in the suburb of Campbell, in the studio of his former political adviser Tom Emerson – a philosophy major and the son of former Labor minister Craig Emerson – who is running in the ACT election as an independent later this year.

Now he is more the yogi, though it is not yoga, but a stretch class focused on strength and mobility. With one knee flush against the wall, he tells the class he was once a man quick to anger, that we can be our own worst enemies.

As he tells us to scan our bodies for tension, his soothing message arrives as a pep talk when I most need it. Push past the pain, I tell myself, finding tension in too many places. The pain focuses, then radiates, dispersing in a sort of God moment the day before I’m due to face the final task.

Friday: Shirtless, cheating and praising the ’Bidgee

It’s 5.25am, -1.9 degrees and feels like -4.2. I drive north-west. Fog blankets the way and my phone reception dips with the descent into Casuarina Sands, a bushland reserve hugging the Murrumbidgee.

While glancing at a map annotated by Pocock’s adviser, Lincoln, I follow a path through the scrub and spot the senator’s head in a pinprick of torchlight somewhere down the bank.

“Linc” is already there, handing me a pair of toed water shoes, while Pocock gives me a pair of gardening gloves. Large rocks, mostly oval-shaped and a foot long – like a giant’s skipping stones – are lined horizontally at the top of the beach. There are minimal greetings in the pitch dark, no grand introduction for the newbie, just 100 star jumps.

It all happens mercilessly fast: 10 sprints to the water’s edge, five 10-metre bear crawls downhill to the river, then in reverse. I cheat – of course, I have to – but Pocock is a machine. I am the only man in the 10-strong gathering who is not shirtless, so I relent, peeling off my top to join the spectacle.

This invites the question: why are gloves and booties necessary, but tops are not?

We perform 20 squats with a rock, then 10 pushups, then select a new weight and do it again. Someone yells for the group to raid a section of the beach with smaller rocks. Our earthen dumbbells.

Grabbing two each, we return to our original positions, progressing through a series of weighted drills, raising our arms straight to the side, then out in front, over and over. Here, the communal delirium delivers a full-throated – though strained – rendition of I Believe I Can Fly, while Pocock yells “praise the ’Bidgee!” as dawn touches the red cliffside beyond the river.

What comes next seals the suspicion I may have chanced upon a cult.

Each of us shoulders a boulder the size of a toddler on a 300-metre march, the tail of the human chain constantly running to its front. World-ending fatigue sets in. Then, it’s an abs circuit of 100 flutter kicks, 100 ankle taps, 100 high-plank shoulder taps, and 100 row-boat sit-ups (my choice) to get us to the end. Each motion scrapes my back against the coarse sand like I’m being hauled against a cheese grater.

Then the torture ends.

It’s half-hugs and back slaps before piling into the freezing river, just to sit and chat a bit. I ask Pocock what the benefit is and he shrugs, saying it’s nicer in summer.

When it’s all done, my boss asks whether I feel any different, if there’s any degree of change. I’m scanning for an epiphany. My head is light, my quads need a foam roll, and I raid the rest of Emma’s tahini fudge before asking for an early mark so I can go home and sleep.

And Pocock? After having exited the water, dried and slipped on his King Stingray jumper and shorts, he launches into what is no doubt another full-on day.

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