22 July, 1998
The number on the scale blinked red: 70.1 kg.
Turíbio squinted at the read-out, then wrote something in his clipboard. "Up a bit since June," he said. "How much feijoada did you eat in France, garoto?"
I laughed, embarrassed. "A lot of baguettes. And croissants. And… everything."
He grinned. "Good. You lived. Now we turn it into fuel."
He adjusted his glasses and pointed to the next station. "Body-fat test. Let's see what we're working with."
The calipers pinched skin on my arm, my back, my stomach. Cold, clinical clicks followed by quiet hums from the small printer that spat out numbers.
13.6 percent.
"Not bad," he said. "Little higher than before the trip. We'll get you back under twelve by next month. Don't worry."
It wasn't a bad result, most of the squad hovered around ten or eleven, but I felt the difference every time I ran. My legs felt a little heavier, my lungs slower to open up.
The ten days in France had been heaven for my eyes and stomach but not for my fitness.
I'd eaten like someone trying to taste a whole country.
Butter in everything. Cheese that melted the moment it touched bread. Crêpes by the Seine, ice cream near the Louvre, and too many late-night pastries from cafés that never seemed to close.
Mamãe had laughed when I brought another pain au chocolat to the table. "Enjoy it now," she'd said. "The coaches will take it all away later."
She was right.
Now, in late July, they were taking it all away.
Turíbio's new plan hung on the wall of the training room, printed in neat columns.
Monday / Wednesday / Friday: Strength A
Bench – 4×8
Pull-ups – 4×max
Squats – 4×10
Core – 3×1 min
Bike warm-up 10 min
Stretch 20 min
Tuesday / Thursday: Strength B
Deadlift – 4×6
Step-ups – 3×10
Medicine-ball rotation – 3×20
Push-press – 3×8
Sprint mechanics drills
Saturdays were recovery days. Pool, light jogging, long stretching sessions that hurt worse than weights.
It sounded simple written down. It never felt simple when you were living inside it.
The gym had no air-conditioning back during this time, just two ceiling fans and the smell of metal.
Every session began the same: the rattle of plates sliding onto bars, the squeak of shoes on the rubber floor, the short bursts of Portuguese that meant push, hold, again.
I wasn't the only one under close watch. Even the veterans weighed in every Monday. Raí joked that the scale had a personal grudge against him. "It adds half a kilo every weekend," he said.
He patted my shoulder. "Don't chase the number, Garoto. Chase the feeling."
I nodded, though the number still bothered me.
I wanted to put on weight, true, but not like this. I wanted to become stronger and put on muscle.
70 kilos. Up two since France, up from 66 in April. Not full fat, but softer around the edges.
The trainers said I'd grown taller too, half a centimeter maybe, but what I wanted was strength.
By mid-morning we'd finish the weight room and move onto the turf. The transition was always the worst part. Sweat cooled, muscles stiffened, and suddenly you had to sprint.
Nelsinho stood on the sideline, stopwatch around his neck, voice sharp as a whistle.
"Explode on the third cone! Don't jog, explode!"
The first few days I kept overshooting. My legs weren't used to reacting that fast after heavy squats. Turíbio pulled me aside.
"Relax the upper body. Speed comes from rhythm, not tension."
So I learned to breathe in time with my steps: four strides inhale, four strides exhale. My times dropped by the end of the week. Small progress, invisible to most, but to me it felt like a door cracking open.
We repeated the cycle every day: lift, run, recover, lift again.
After two weeks my notebook filled with numbers, weights, reps, heart-rate averages. But the best sign came without measurement: my shirt started sticking differently, tighter at the shoulders, looser at the waist.
Food changed too. The club cafeteria looked like a science lab now, rows of containers labeled with macros, measured to the gram.
Breakfast:
• Two boiled eggs, papaya, oats, black coffee.
Lunch:
• Grilled chicken breast, rice, beans, salad, avocado.
Dinner:
• Lean beef or fish, sweet potato, vegetables.
Snacks:
• Protein shake after training.
França complained daily. "Where's the taste? I miss salt. Spice"
Turíbio just smiled. "Spice is for Sundays."
I tried to follow the plan at home, though Mamãe's cooking made it impossible to resist.
One night she brought out stroganoff.
"You need energy," she said.
"Protein, Mamãe, not cream."
She raised an eyebrow. "Do you think Raí refuses stroganoff when he goes home?"
I laughed and filled my plate. Balance, I told myself.
Maybe that was what Raí meant about chasing the feeling.
"Bench, squats, pull-ups, start light," said Turíbio. "Always build from form. Speed is strength applied efficiently."
I didn't argue. The veterans teased but helped when it mattered.
Raí corrected my posture during squats: "Knees out, chest proud, don't lean."
Zetti threw me a towel mid-set. "You'll thank me later."
França shouted from across the room, "If you're not sweating, you're not here!"
By the third week, I could lift ten kilos more than when I started. It didn't sound like much, but every rep mattered. My shoulders filled out a little, my balance stopped wobbling.
Even my stride changed, less bouncing, more control.
"Body fat, hydration, muscle density, let's go."
We had a test every Monday.
The numbers moved slowly: 13.6 → 13.3 → 13.0.
Turíbio nodded approvingly. "Keep this up. Your power-to-weight ratio is improving."
He adjusted his glasses and smiled. "When you're eighteen or nineteen, you'll be near 185 or 186 if you grow like this, maybe eighty kilos. Long frame. Don't rush it. If you gain too soon, you'll lose mobility."
I nodded. It made sense. Everyone in the first team talked about strength, but no one meant size. França and Raí weren't bodybuilders — they were elastic, balanced. Their power was quiet and coiled.
That's what I wanted.
I didn't fully understand the math, but I could feel it.
My acceleration off the mark was sharper. I could shield the ball longer before getting knocked off balance. When I checked the mirror again, the softness had gone. The edges had returned.
Still, there were days when my body refused to cooperate.
One Thursday I dropped the bar mid-set. It clanged against the rack and nearly crushed my thumb.
"Enough," Turíbio said, pulling me back.
"You're training tired. That's worse than not training."
He made me lie on the mat, eyes closed. "Listen to your breathing. it sounds like a fight, you rest tomorrow."
I didn't argue. He was right. Strength wasn't built from pushing until you break; it came from knowing when to stop. That lesson took longer to learn than any drill.
Outside the gym, life blurred into repetition.
Wake at six. Stretch. Eat. Drive to training.
Weights. Tactics. Shower. Lunch. Nap.
Evening jog.
Dinner. Prayer. Sleep.
The monotony was oddly peaceful. I knew what I had to do each day, and that certainty built its own comfort.
I am going to be homeschooled this upcoming year. I will graduate, but I am going to invest my full time now into the team. Training with the first team doesn't leave room for school.
Sometimes during cooldowns, I'd talk with Raí or Denílson about little things, music, old matches, who had the worst haircut in the squad. They treated me kindly, teasing but respectful. Maybe they saw their younger selves in me.
One afternoon, while we sat on the bench tying our boots, Raí looked over. "You're looking strong, Garoto. How much do you weigh now?"
"70.8 this morning."
He nodded. "Perfect. You don't need more. Just keep the engine roaring."
That stuck with me. Keep the engine roaring.
Strength was efficiency, force applied at the right moment, not bulk.
The club doctor ran periodic assessments.
We'd line up in shorts while he checked posture, range of motion, joint symmetry. When my turn came, he lifted my arm and rotated it.
"Still some tightness in the shoulder," he said.
"More flexibility work. You're growing fast, don't rush it."
He scribbled on the chart and added another note: Monitor sleep quality.
Sleep did become abattlefield. The adrenaline after training kept me wired, so Mamãe started making chamomile tea at night. "One cup, no arguments."
She'd ask about training while folding laundry. I told her bits and pieces, nothing too detailed, nothing to make her worry, just enough to make her smile.
She nodded, satisfied, though I could tell she still watched me like a hawk for any sign of exhaustion.
By the end of August, the numbers told their story.
We had a conditioning test, 30-meter sprints, beep tests, jump assessments.
I beat my previous best sprint time by 0.15 seconds.
"Explosive," Turíbio said. "You're building elastic power."
He explained how the body adapts, microtears in muscle fibers rebuild stronger, provided you feed and rest them.
He called it "supercompensation."
For me, it was simpler: hurt today, move easier tomorrow.
Weight: 70.5 kg.
Body fat: 11.8 %.
Vertical jump: +3 cm.
Sprint 30 m: –0.15 s.
Tiny gains, invisible to anyone else, but they felt monumental to me.
Turíbio handed me the updated sheet. "Good work. Your metabolism's balancing out. Don't chase mass anymore, chase strength per kilo."
He smiled. "You're building a foundation. The rest will follow."
I folded the paper and slipped it into my journal. Maybe someday I'd look back and see this as the start of something.
Training wasn't just lifting and running. The conditioning coach added functional work, drills with resistance bands, balance boards, stability balls. He said these built "core intelligence."
The first time I tried standing on a wobble board while passing a medicine ball, I lasted four seconds. The veterans laughed.
By week three, I could hold it for a minute.
"See?" the coach said. "Your body learns faster than your head."
We finished with isometric planks, a full minute, shaking halfway through, feeling every second.
"Strength starts where comfort ends," Turíbio said.
He always said that.
Sometimes I thought he was half-poet, half-sadist.
Sometimes, on the drive home, I'd rest my forehead against the window, watching the city roll by, the same streets I'd known since childhood, now blurred by fatigue. I thought about how different tiredness felt now. It wasn't from running in the park or staying up late doing homework. It was the kind that came with purpose.
Dad noticed too.
"You're quieter these days," he said over dinner.
"Just tired."
He nodded. "Good tired or bad?"
"Good," I said. And I meant it.
The nutritionist called me in one afternoon. Her office smelled faintly of peppermint and disinfectant. She placed two folders on the table, April vs August.
"See here," she said, pointing to a chart. "Lean mass up 1.4 kilos. Fat mass down 2.2. That's excellent."
"So about 70 is my real playing weight?"
"For now, yes. When you're older, maybe seventy five or seventy eight if you continue to grow in height. But strength isn't the scale, it's energy. What you put in, how well you recover."
She handed me a new meal plan. It included two surprising items: avocado smoothies and tapioca pancakes with banana.
"Easier on your stomach than whey powder," she said. "And they taste better."
Calories: 3 000 per day.
Protein: 1.8 g per kg body weight.
Carbs: high on double sessions, low on rest days.
Fat: minimal, "we're building lean engines, not storage tanks."
"Keep it simple," she said. "Fuel for function, not comfort."
I nodded, even as I thought of Mamãe's pasta.
At home, she compromised, less cream, more vegetables. She said, "Outside you can be an athlete, but here you'll still eat like my son."
Some nights, I couldn't resist. A spoonful of brigadeiro after dinner. I'd make up for it with an extra sprint the next day.
That became my quiet rule: earn your sugar.
I started bringing my own snacks to training, nuts, fruit, boiled eggs. França called me "snack boy". I didn't mind. Every small edge mattered.
By late September, the gym no longer terrified me.
Weights had become familiar, like old teammates. The calluses on my palms thickened; the trembling in my legs after squats turned into a steady burn I could trust.
We tested again one Friday.
Weight: 70.8 kg.
Body fat: 11.8 %.
Vertical jump: +5 cm since July.
"Stable," Turíbio said. "Exactly where we want you."
He scribbled a note on his chart: Ready for competitive load.
That phrase echoed in my head the rest of the day. Ready for competitive load. It sounded ominous.
Gym sessions grew more complex. We introduced split routines , upper body on one day, legs the next, core always.
Mornings: weights.
Afternoons: agility ladder, acceleration runs, shuttle sprints.
Evenings: stretching, sometimes pool recovery.
We wore heart-rate monitors that looked like small belts around the chest. The staff logged every beat, every interval. If someone's pulse stayed too high after a session, they'd rest him the next day.
I did not think these existed in 1998. But, they have been around for a while now apparently. You learn something new everyday.
"Data saves careers," Turíbio said.
He showed me graphs once , blue lines for heart rate, red for output.
"See this spike? That's overtraining. You're better off stopping five minutes early than losing a week later."
I saw the proof, veterans who ignored rest ended up in ice baths, grimacing.
I learned to listen to my body. Fatigue wasn't weakness. It was information.
That night, at dinner, Mamãe noticed the marks on my hands.
"Those look painful."
"They're not," I said, flexing them. "Just proof I'm working."
She smiled. "Your father used to say the same about his calluses."
After we ate, Mamãe brought out fruit instead of dessert. I didn't even protest. Maybe that was the biggest change of all.
On Sunday evening, as I packed my gear for the week, I realized something small but real: my body no longer felt like a stranger. The soreness was part of the rhythm, the hunger controlled, the fatigue predictable.
I still had a long way to go, too light for some duels, too inexperienced for others, but the base was there.
**********G.O.A.T System**********
Stats Missions Training Cards
**********G.O.A.T System**********
Stats
Name: Ricardo Izecson dos Santos Leite (Kaka)
Age: 16
Height: 179cm
Weight: 70.8kg
Position: Attacking Midfielder/ Winger
Preferred Foot: Right
Weak Foot: ****
Skill Moves: ****
Work Rate: ****
Overall Rating: 75
Potential: 94
Pace: 87
#Acceleration: 88(+2)
#Sprint Speed: 86(+2)
Shooting: 75
#Positioning: 78(+5)
#Finishing: 73(+6)(1 stat point used)
#Shot Power: 74(+5)
#Long Shots: 74(+4)
#Volleys: 70(+7)
#Penalties: 78(+10)
Passing: 76
#Vision: 82(+7)
#Crossing: 72(+6)
#Free Kick Accuracy: 74(+6)
#Short Passing: 77(+5)
#Long Passing: 75(+7)(1 stat point used)
#Curve: 75(+6)
Dribbling: 86
#Agility: 87(+3)
#Balance: 82(+2)
#Reactions: 78(+8)
#Ball Control: 85(+5)
#Dribbling: 88(+4)
#Composure: 70(+10)
Defending: 43
#Interceptions: 40(+10)
#Heading: 60(+12)
#Defensive Awareness: 41(+5)
#Stand Tackle: 38(+6)
#Slide Tackle: 38(+10)
Physical: 62
#Jumping: 70(+12)
#Stamina: 72(+12)
#Strength: 64(+18)
#Aggression: 40(+2)
Traits:
#Speed Dribbles
#Playmaker
#Technical Dribbler
#XFactor
Phew! That was a great improvement. I increased my already broken pace stats. The training and tips from Ronaldinho and the pros here worked. My dribbling went up. My physical stats have seen the biggest improvement. 62 now.
Overall 75, 4 star skill moves and 4 star work rate, thank you Ronaldinho for teaching me skills. I have relentlessly practiced them for the past three months and I can do them all now. But, doing it in a match against a quality opponent is a different thing. I will need experience for that. But, theory and how to do it? I have them in the bag.
My passing and shooting needs improvement. My passing has been a bit off since all the growth. I think I will improve it slowly. No pressure. And I am pretty sure that grinding stats once they're above excellent is going to be near impossible.
My strength has been a big drawback for me till now. Even though I had the pace and skill, I was very weak. At youth level, that works. But, at this level, I will be pushed away like a paper. I found out during pre pre-season. I could have moments, but I will not survive a match. The improvement in these past 3 months means that I can now get a shot at playing matches.
Many would think that 75 overall would mean that I should be starting, even I thought so too. But, being here, playing against these men, I learnt it the hard way. Pace and skill alone are not enough. There is a lot more to it. I am happy that I have the time to grind and become stronger and polish my skills. Strength I can improve.
I am absolutely sure that I wouldn't be able to dominate like I did at the youth level. The physicality is very different. What use is my passing, if I am pushed off the ball. At least now, I am a bit confident that I will survive. In a year? I will show them what I can really do.
As I zipped up the bag, I caught my reflection in the window. Same face, same eyes, maybe a little older.
It wasn't pride I felt, more like quiet recognition.
Author's Notes:
I wanted to show the professional side of Kaka. He is not at youth level anymore. So, the schedule is tight and he puts in more effort than the others.