Rugby: Dan Carter reveals Richie McCaw’s pre-match All Blacks test obsession

Dan Carter has revealed fellow All Black great Richie McCaw’s pre-match obsession during his remarkable 148-test career.

Carter and Scotland journalist Lee McKenzie interviewed McCaw in a live chat on Facebook and Instagram last night in a new series which kicked off last week by talking to Springboks great Bryan Habana.

In the latest episode the long-time friends and teammates talked about how McCaw made his mark as a young captain of the All Blacks, him being in awe of England’s Martin Johnson and a certain pre-match tradition.

“I’ve never seen a man eat so much ice cream before. I’m struggling to think of a test match you played where you didn’t have ice cream the night before a game,” Carter said about McCaw.

“You’re spot on,” McCaw admitted. “The best man at my wedding, when he got up, the first thing he said was ‘we’re going to start the speech with Richie’s first love’. And everyone thought ‘where’s he going here?’ … And then he said ‘ice cream’.

“I love my ice cream. I always found on a Friday night you’d earned it for the week. It got me ready to go.”

So which flavor was the obvious follow-up question.

“I quite enjoy mint-choc chip. But with an apple crumble the night before a game a bit of vanilla used to be pretty perfect,” McCaw added.

Carter said the All Blacks flanker and captain could get quite pent up if there was no ice cream available the night before a test.

“I did find it quite amusing when you’d absolutely tear off at the dietician or the hotel staff because there wasn’t ice cream,” Carter joked.

“It would completely ruin your preparation and as every professional athlete knows – preparation is the key. And that was a big part of Richie’s preparation and you did not want to mess with that.”

Part two of the McCaw interview will be released on Dan Carter’s official Facebook page on Thursday. Next week he will chat with South African World Cup winning captain Siya Kolisi.