How horror kidney blow can make Dusty a 400-gamerDustin Martin has lost more than 10kg and can’t resume contact training until January. But Richmond’s fitness boss believes the kidney issue will actually help his career.
HeraldSun
29 November 7:00pm Richmond believes Dustin Martin’s enforced absence late in the season could help extend his career well into his 30s despite a kidney issue that will keep him from full contact training until late January.
Richmond’s stars including Martin, Trent Cotchin, Shane Edwards and Dion Prestia returned to official pre-season training at Punt Road determined to right the wrongs of a disappointing 2021 season.
But many of the players have been at the club running for 13-15 weeks given a barren September, with the club’s pre-season likely to double last year’s truncated summer in volume and number of sessions.
Coach Damien Hardwick is on the way back from an American research trip but will have to quarantine for three days under new provisions before returning to Punt Road ahead of Monday’s return for senior players.
Elite performance manager Peter Burge told the Herald Sun Martin was in excellent shape considering the severity of his lacerated kidney in Round 18.
Martin is understood to have lost well in excess of 10kg but Burge said he was exactly where he needed to be and gradually returning to closer to his normal playing weight.
He will progress from running drills to non-contact training to full contact training by late January, but according to Burge is content with his condition.
On his total weight loss, Burge was deliberately vague: “I will say it’s more than 10kg. It wasn’t 20kg, if I can say that. But he’s back pretty close to his playing weight”.
Chatter in Sydney about how Martin might one day want to play in the Harbour City has been discounted by his club and management but Burge sees the silver lining in Martin’s injury after turning 30 in June.
“Dusty will go through a staged process before he gets back to full training. He was running today and it’s really good to see him conditioning and running and he’s happy, which is the main thing,” he said.
“He won’t be in contact before Christmas and he will be kicking and marking and conditioning for another couple of weeks and then post-Christmas he will start non-contact training again and then towards the end of January we will be introducing contact based on specialist advice.
“He is so professional now in his approach to preparation, I have no concerns about Dusty and where he will get to and his body. 12 months go we were talking about how many games he had played in a row and suddenly he’s had a major injury and it was a forced break from the game. I think it can extend the back end of his career by giving his body a chance to recover so he can re-set and go again.“
Martin has three more seasons left on his current deal of just over $1.2 million a season, but after 260 career games with three premierships and three Norm Smith Medals, he should set himself for 400 total games.
“He’s unique and I haven’t seen too many like him in my involvement in footy,” Burge said.
“He is close to the top but what’s important is his preparation. Each year he adds something to his repertoire and when you think about longevity, he is thinking: How can I maintain this level and play this game for as long as I possibly can. He loves footy and he loves playing for Richmond and with his teammates.”
https://www.heraldsun.com.au/sport/afl/news/afl-follow-the-latest-offseason-injury-news-and-updates/news-story/b5a5bf03c94f23b42458717e9196ae36-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
‘He’ll still be a powerful beast’: How the Tigers rebuilt slim DustyBy Michael Gleeson
The Age
November 29, 2021 — 5.39pmDustin Martin’s lacerated kidney prompted a strategy to cleanse, rest, detox and regenerate his body that the champion player and Richmond’s medicos expect will add games to the back end of his career.
The durable Martin had barely missed games with injury before he suffered the serious kidney problem last year that had him hospitalised for a week and caused him to lose about 15 kilograms.
That break from playing, resting his body and the meticulous diet and cleansing program he adhered to is hoped to have a beneficial long-term effect on his body and extend the 30-year-old’s career.
On Monday, he was back running at Punt Road Oval, still looking noticeably leaner, but there has been no grand plan for Martin to keep weight off.
“We are not on a crusade to make Dusty lighter. He will be the same strong and powerful beast. His strength and power is his number one asset and still will be,” Richmond’s physical performance manager Peter Burge said.
The process of rebuilding Martin began after he spent a week in hospital on the Gold Coast after being rushed from Metricon Stadium where he lacerated a kidney in a collision with Brisbane’s Mitch Robinson.
He was told by doctors the severity of the injury was such that he not only had to avoid contact football for at least three months, but had to avoid exerting himself at all. Specialists also advised him to avoid certain foods, leaving him on a diet heavy in fruits.
“He is really meticulous with his diet anyway, he has cut out certain things over the last few years as he tries to get better. He is very professional with his preparation and is quite lean looking anyway,” Burge said.
“That [change in diet] was just short-term for his health and immune system, there are no ongoing restrictions on diet.
“He had an approach of re-setting his body after the injury. He wanted to cleanse it, with clean eating and starting again to come back stronger inside and outside.
“A lot of athletes look at fasting as a means of building the body back to be stronger. I worked with a lot of Russian pole-vaulters, and they would fast for a month every year because the body recovered stronger. So, there has been a plan for Dusty to rejuvenate and cleanse and come back stronger.
“He had missed so few games over his career, and then he missed this big chunk. The hope is this forced break from football will help him regenerate and give him games at the back end of his career.
“He was not due back until next Monday but has been coming in for weeks. He came out today while main training [for the young players] was on and did his running and conditioning program. I thought he looked really good.”
The incident that stopped the Brownlow medallist and three-time Norm Smith medallist looked innocuous.
“You look back on it, and it is hard to work out how he did it. He collided with Mitch Robinson, and it must have been his hip that caught him. Dusty is very resilient, he gets knocked around a lot, he might grimace, but then he just plays on so if he is hurting something is not right,” Burge said.
The Tigers initially thought Martin had just been badly winded and would be ok. That was what Burge told Luke Hodge when the Channel 7 boundary rider asked him at three-quarter time of the Lions game how Martin was.
“I said he is winded [and] will be back on, then 20 seconds later the doctors came out and said we have to send him to hospital now, we think he has lacerated his kidney.”
The initial prognosis was that he would make a full recovery, but it would be slow. Richmond does not plan for Martin to join contact drills at training until the middle of January.
After a week in hospital in Queensland he spent another two weeks in isolation in Victoria. He felt better but had lost a lot of weight and was under strict instructions to do nothing and be careful of what he ate.
Getting to the point of running again this past week has been slow and painstaking.
“He lost quite a bit more than 10 kilos; it wasn’t 20 kilos as was reported somewhere, but it was a lot more than 10 kilos. He has put on more than 12 [kilos] and he is probably about two kilos under his playing weight.” Martin normally plays at 92-93 kilograms.
“Players had an exemption to come in and use the gym here, but he was not allowed to get a sweat up. Even doing five calf raises, we had to check with the doctors, is that OK? How many can he do? He was allowed to walk, but we had to ask, how fast can he walk? How long for?
“It was not so much about sweating but if you are sweating you are working your abdomen and putting yourself under some stress, and we didn’t want that. It was a slow process, but we wanted to be very conservative with it and Dusty was very patient.
“He feels great. He is very happy to be back running again. He is still down a few kilos so running is a bit easier. He will get that run in his legs and the strength power and muscle will come.”
https://www.theage.com.au/sport/afl/he-ll-still-be-a-powerful-beast-how-the-tigers-rebuilt-slim-dusty-20211129-p59d4v.html
