HAWTHORN has not lost any of its hunger for success during the pre-season, according to veteran Shaun Burgoyne.
While it would be easy to take the foot off the pedal after a three-peat of premierships in 2013, 2014 and 2015, Burgoyne says the Hawks’ attitude from day one of pre-season training has been faultless.
“It’s always challenging, because you know you’re going to head into a tough period of training,” the 33-year-old told hawthornfc.com.au.
“But once you get around the boys and see the determination and the hunger in their eyes, it’s pretty contagious.
“It spreads and you want to work hard with everyone else – in the end it becomes quite easy because you want to be a part of the group.
“It’s been quite enjoyable to be honest.”
Burgoyne has undertaken a heavy running program to get ready for 2016, and is building towards the Hawks’ NAB Challenge fixtures.
The first of those is only a fortnight away, against Carlton at Aurora Stadium on February 18.
Now into his 16th AFL pre-season, Burgoyne is confident he’s put in the work required to be ready to go.
“As the years go on, you do find it a bit more challenging, but the medical staff and the fitness staff do a good job of keeping me motivated,” he said.
“I’m relatively fresh at the moment because I haven’t done all of the training, which is a good thing. The games are coming up in a couple of weeks’ time and I’ll head into them pretty fresh.
“I’ve had a lot of running in my program… January was pretty much a full on running month for me with a little bit of ball work.”
The star Hawk - who is just five games away from playing his 300th AFL game –believes the modified program has been beneficial for him.
“When you’re not in the (main) group it’s always tough, but it was something different just to predominantly run, and heading into the games I feel like I’ve done a lot of work,” he said.
With the success of 2015 now firmly in the past, there’s plenty of excitement looking forward to the season ahead.
And there’s more than a few young players pushing for selection, which Burgoyne says is a major positive for the side - and for Hawks’ fans.
“I think we’re going to see a few of these young guys playing in the NAB Challenge, which is going to be exciting,” he said.
“The reward for training hard over pre-season is playing those games.
“I’m just like every other Hawthorn fan out there as well, waiting to see these young guys and how much they’ve developed over pre-season.”
