Claude Giroux plopped himself down on a couch inside Tony Greco’s gym and answered the first question he was asked in a rather surprising manner.

“I don’t feel good at all,” admitted Giroux.

The 34-year-old was simply asked how he was feeling after a typical summer workout with his personal trainer.

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Just a few minutes earlier, Giroux was shirtless, covered in sweat and completely winded alongside a handful of other NHL players and prospects. He needed a few minutes to catch his breath to conduct an interview.

Now wearing a black Senators workout shirt, with a backward baseball cap and clutching a towel to dry himself off, Giroux was trying to explain that being physically exhausted after a workout was actually a positive thing — even for an elite athlete.

“I mean, that’s a good sign, right?” says Giroux. “You’re just drained a little bit.”

Greco has been pushing Giroux to his outer limits in the summertime throughout his entire NHL career.

“He puts you in an uncomfortable position when you’re really tired. He makes you do things that you didn’t think you’d be able to do,” explains Giroux. “I’ve been doing this training with Tony for about 17 years. So I’m kind of used to it.”

But Giroux concedes it took him “a few years” to get comfortable with Greco’s approach to offseason training. And there was certainly an adjustment period where Giroux was wary of Greco’s methodology around offseason training.

The relationship between Giroux and Greco started with an extremely awkward moment, an anecdote both men now share with a laugh.

In the summer of 2006, Giroux was a first-round draft pick of the Philadelphia Flyers. With expectations suddenly ratcheted up around the 18-year-old, Giroux knew it was time to get serious about his offseason workout routine.

“Now my whole focus in the summer wasn’t to go work at a golf course and try and make some money,” Giroux recalls. “All of my focus was on training. And I wasn’t a big guy.”

So Giroux and his old Cumberland Grads teammate Simon Lacroix connected with Greco, who at that point owned and operated a number of gyms in the Ottawa area. But during their first workout with Greco, Giroux and Lacroix didn’t appreciate their new trainer’s over-the-top approach and philosophy. Because both of the players spoke French, they felt comfortable having a candid conversation with each other in front of Greco, who they assumed only spoke English.

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“We were telling each other, ‘This guy is nuts. What are we doing here?'” Giroux recalls.

What the teenagers didn’t realize is that Greco understood every word they were saying.

“They were speaking French and my wife is French, but I didn’t want to show them that I understood,” Greco says with a laugh.

After a few moments, Greco revealed to the players that he could understand exactly what they were saying to each other. He remembers Giroux’s face suddenly dropping with the realization that Greco could comprehend his complaining.

“He had a look in his eyes like, ‘What the what?'” says Greco. “It was a funny, quick moment. But I think from there, the relationship between all of us got even better.”

Greco addressed the young players’ concerns and vowed they would see tangible results if they embraced his new philosophy. It took some convincing but the players kept seeing Greco for the rest of the summer in 2006. When they returned to the ice with their respective QMJHL teams, they could see a marked improvement.

“We stuck with it. After a month, we saw a difference on the ice,” says Giroux. “I was a little bit faster and a little bit stronger.”

Giroux acknowledges “that whole summer was tough,” but it certainly didn’t deter him, as he has spent every offseason since under the tutelage of Greco.

While the summer of 2006 was tough, it didn’t compare to the adversity and negativity swirling around Giroux in the summer of 2017.

The 29-year-old Giroux was coming off a full 82-game campaign in which he only scored 14 goals and 58 points. Those numbers were not commensurate with a player who had five years left on a contract that was paying him an average of $8.275 million. And he was hearing the whispers that his production was starting to decline as he approached his 30th birthday.

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“I didn’t have a great year. I just came out of hip surgery and a lot of articles came out that I’m getting old and I’m slowing down,” says Giroux. “At that time I was a little angry. But that’s all I needed. A little more motivation.”

Giroux and Greco attacked that summer with a slightly different approach. Since Giroux was recovering from hip surgery and two sports hernias, they decided to alter his regimen to include more heavy weights to get his strength back.

“I remember that summer was one of my best summers,” says Giroux. “We focused on the right things, we made a lot of right decisions and it paid off. And when we did that, I was kind of able to back to the player I knew I could be.”

Giroux responded with a career-high 102 points in 2017-18, leading the NHL with 68 assists in the process. He finished fourth in the voting for the Hart Trophy that season, silencing the critics in the process.

“Any time you get criticism — and criticism in Philly is tough, they’re pretty hardcore — being able to have that season, it was great,” says Giroux.

Giroux had a chip on his shoulder when doubters started questioning his ability five years ago. And as he approaches a new season, in which he will turn 35 in January, Giroux says he can once again hear the murmurs of criticism in the distance.

“Every summer, I find ways to motivate myself. This year, it’s pretty easy to motivate myself coming to play in Ottawa,” says Giroux. “A lot of people say I’m a little too old and I’m on the way down, but you know what? I kind of like hearing that stuff. It keeps me on my toes. And I like that.”

Now in his 17th summer working with Greco, Giroux is no longer the skeptical teenager who was openly complaining about Greco’s unique approach.

“He understands the whole philosophy of the training now,” says Greco. “The game is a lot faster. He’s 34, not 20. He’s able to adapt to the training.”

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The adaptations have come in all aspects of Giroux’s training regimen, including his diet. Giroux admits that if there is one kryptonite on the menu, it’s a certain popular Quebec delicacy.

“If there’s one meal that’s my cheat, I have a soft spot for poutine,” Giroux says with a laugh. “I love my poutine a week.”

When he was in Philadelphia, he would treat himself to the odd cheesesteak when he felt like he earned one — like after the Flyers would play back-to-back games or three games in four nights. In the fierce and ongoing ‘Pat-versus-Geno’s’ cheesesteak debate in Philadelphia, Giroux considers himself a staunch Geno’s disciple.

“I had Geno’s at my wedding. We were able to have a cheesesteak at midnight and enjoy that,” he says.

But as he gets older, Giroux says has a better understanding of what he needs to put into his body to be successful during a long and grueling NHL season.

“I make better decisions off the ice to eat better. With experience, you know what works and what doesn’t. When you’re older you can make those decisions that will make you a better player,” Giroux says. “I kind of listen to my body. You have to be able to know how your body will react to what kind of food.”

Giroux says that in his mid-30s, he has become more meticulous when it comes to planning every aspect of his training and diet.

“When you get older, recovery is probably the most challenging thing. You play back-to-back or three in four nights. Those are the ones where you need to plan a week in advance. How are you going to sleep? When are you going to work out?” says Giroux. “During the season, it’s about listening to your body and knowing what you need. With age, you kind of figure out what’s the best for you.”

Giroux believes that putting in excruciating work with Greco in the summer will allow him to press pause as needed during the course of a full 82-game season. The intense circuit workouts he does with Greco cannot be replicated once training camp is underway in a few weeks.

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“You can’t do these types of workouts during the season,” says Giroux.

Giroux arrives at Greco’s sprawling estate three times per week in the summer, with each session lasting an hour. The workouts take place outside, where Greco has a complete outdoor gym surrounded by trees, making it feel like a slice of Muscle Beach tucked inside a private, forested Manotick neighbourhood. There is also a cold recovery tub and a dry sauna on the premises, which the players are eager to use after every session.

Greco was forced to shift some of his activities outside during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic but has opted to keep the outdoor element since his clients seem to appreciate the uniqueness of the setup.

“Working outside in the woods like this, there just a different feeling to it. You’re in nature,” says Giroux. “Sometimes it rains a little bit, but you just keep going. It’s definitely a unique way to work out.”

Giroux will complete a full circuit of metabolic conditioning, often with Greco barking words of encouragement beside him. They cycle through various stations, in which Giroux works on improving his foot speed and explosiveness.

Hopping on one foot before jumping up onto a riser, and deep knee bends while holding a dumbbell.

A foot speed drill that requires Giroux to move laterally while bending down to touch pylons.

After completing the circuit training, each session ends with a final gruelling component that often leaves participants gasping for air.

Inside the forest, Giroux does a short burst where he jumps and sprints with all the energy he can muster for five yards. After completing several five-yard reps, he then completes a 600-metre conditioning lap that winds through the forest. By the end, Greco says his NHL players “are barely hanging on” and Giroux is often shirtless, exhausted, and covered in sweat when he completes the session.

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But Greco says that after a summer of working out with him, he can notice a difference in player’s conditioning.

“We can see their heart rate is down 10 or 12 beats per minute,” says Greco, adding that is critical for players who want to maximize their effectiveness during intense 45-second shifts in the NHL.

Giroux has spent several summers where he tried to add muscle and weight to his frame — such as he did in 2017. However, his current priority is making sure he doesn’t lose a step against younger competition.

“I’m not 17, I’m 34 now. So the focus is a little different than when I was 17 and I was trying to gain weight and get stronger,” says Giroux. “Now I’m just trying to keep my speed. And that’s basically the focus.”

Giroux may not be 17 anymore, but he’s still working out with teenagers.

16-year-old Henry Mews — who was a first-round pick of the Ottawa 67s in the OHL Priority Selection this year — is thrilled to be working out alongside an NHL star who is more than twice his age this summer.

“He’s a role model for me. I’m lucky enough to be in his group,” Mews says of Giroux. “He pushes everyone else around him. And you can see how dedicated he is and how he wants to be the best.”

Mews saw that dedication firsthand when they were doing a set of hexagon bar deadlifts earlier this summer.

“We were doing something like four or five plates on there and he was getting mad when he couldn’t do it,” recalls Mews. “But the next week, he was back and he was able to pull it off. He’s just really competitive. And he’s a beast out there.”

Buffalo Sabres first-round pick Jack Quinn is also part of the group that routinely works out with Giroux and like Mews, he’s awestruck seeing the competitive fire from an established NHL star.

“He’s always leading the group, finishing first in all the workouts,” says Quinn. “We’re pretty lucky to be able to work out with him and have him as a role model. He still works so hard and we’re just trying to keep up with him. So it makes us better.”

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One could assume Giroux has carte blanche to roll in and out of the sessions as he sees fit, given his long history with Greco. Instead, he’s often the first one to arrive each morning and tries to establish a high bar for the entire group.

“At this point in his career, he can establish how hard he goes and when he goes. But he’s the first guy here and he does more than everybody else,” adds Greco. “And he finishes first all the time. I think it’s a mental thing in his head.”

Being surrounded by young players in the gym this summer should be a nice preview for Giroux when he gets to Senators training camp next month. Ottawa’s roster is bursting with youthful exuberance, with the core of the roster in their early 20s.

“These guys are young and they have a lot of energy,” adds Giroux. “When you have young guys pushing you, I always try to be the best in the gym.”

Quinn, who turns 21 in a few weeks, is on the precipice of what should be a long and successful career with the Sabres. With only two games of NHL experience under his belt, Quinn is hoping to be close to the 1,018 games Giroux has on his resume when he gets to that stage of his own career.

“I think it’s pretty special, the shape he’s in for 34,” says Quinn. “We’d all be lucky if we could be doing that at that age.”

While working out with Mews and Quinn three times a week can be tough, there are two other young boys who test Giroux’s endurance on a completely different level.

Giroux and his wife Ryanne have two sons, three-year-old Gavin and one-year-old Palmer, who each just celebrated their most recent birthdays in August.

“It’s go time, all the time,” Giroux says of parenthood. “There’s no chilling time where we can take 15 minutes and watch TV. It’s always, ‘Let’s go play baseball.’ And when you’re done playing baseball, ‘Let’s go play hockey.’ And then you’re going to play golf. But you know what? I’m young at heart and I can probably say I can keep up to those kids.”

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Before having kids, Giroux’s summer calendar would be filled with softball, golf outings and social events. For years, he was a fixture in a slow-pitch league in Orleans, playing alongside many of his childhood friends from Hearst, Ontario who came to Ottawa to attend university.

“I was a second baseman and I loved my double plays,” laughs Giroux. “But it wasn’t about winning, it was about going out with the guys and having a barbecue afterward.”

But he stopped playing in that league about five years ago and even though he’s an avid golfer, he estimates he’s only been out on the course four or five times this summer. Instead, Giroux has reshuffled his priorities, trying to spend as much time with Ryanne, Gavin and Palmer as possible.

When he broke into the NHL himself as a 21-year-old in 2008, Giroux lived with Flyers teammate Danny Briere. At the time, Briere was raising three young sons and Giroux got a first-hand look at an NHL player trying to juggle a work-life balance.

“For me to be able to see how he balanced his family and hockey, it was great to see at the time. And now I can probably take more of what he was doing because I have two young boys at home,” says Giroux. “So I know how he did it and how he took care of himself. I was able to learn a lot from him in that one year.”

While he was a young and single hockey player just trying to get acclimated to the NHL lifestyle, Giroux would also accept some invitations for dinner at Brian Boucher’s home in Philadelphia. Giroux would eat dinner and play with the goaltender’s young son Tyler, who was about six years old at the time. Fast forward more than a decade later and Tyler was a first-round draft pick of Ottawa in 2021, a fact that was mind-blowing for Giroux.

“When I saw he was drafted by Ottawa, I was like, ‘Oh my God. He used to be a baby and now he’s drafted in the NHL,'” laughs Giroux.

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So when Giroux decided to sign a free agent contract with Ottawa this summer, one of the first phone calls he received was from his old goaltender in Philadelphia. And Giroux certainly appreciates the uniqueness of having the chance to play with both a father and son as teammates.

“When I signed with Ottawa, Brian called me right away and he was pretty excited about it,” says Giroux. “To have a chance to maybe play with his son, it’s hilarious and great.”

There is a good chance Boucher will make his NHL debut at some point in the duration of Giroux’s current three-year contract with the Senators. Giroux will turn 37 in the final year of this deal in 2025, but he doesn’t necessarily plan to stop there. He remembers valuable lessons from yet another former Flyers teammate — Jaromir Jagr — when they played together in the 2011-12 season.

At that point, Jagr was 39 years old and returning to the NHL after a three-year hiatus in the KHL. Many wondered if his game would still translate to the NHL, but Jagr responded by finishing third in team scoring with 54 points.

“Obviously he was talented, but he was one of the hardest working guys I’ve ever seen,” Giroux says of Jagr. “Off the ice, he was always in the gym. He was always doing whatever he could to be a better player. You don’t play in the league until you’re 40 by chance anymore.”

Jagr went on to play another six seasons in the NHL, before finally retiring from the league at the age of 45 in the 2017-18 season.

Giroux hasn’t made any plans beyond this current contract, but Greco firmly believes he can follow in Jagr’s footsteps and be one of the rare NHL players who stick around past his 40th birthday.

When asked how long he can envision Giroux playing in the NHL, his longtime trainer does not see the finish line anywhere in sight.

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“With that attitude and that mindset and his physical well-being?” asks Greco. “I would say, he could play easily past 40.”

Giroux does not get bogged down with his age, dismissing it as merely a number that isn’t reflective of the way he feels right now.

“You’re as old as you feel. And I feel strongly about that,” Giroux says. “I feel great. I feel the same way I used to when I was 24 or 25.”

(Top photo: Jasen Vinlove / USA Today)