AT 32 years of age, Sam Mitchell is still running around the football field like he’s 25 – racking up the touches and best on ground honours.

It’s rare in football these days you see such longevity, particularly in a player who, considering all he’s achieved, wouldn’t be blamed for giving it away.

Mitchell has won three premierships – captained the 2008 premiership side – won four best and fairest awards and been named All Australian twice.

In football terms he has done it all.

Despite all that, the champion Hawk announced on Thursday he’ll play on until at least 2016 and given the level at which he’s playing his footy, could extend his career well beyond that.

So what’s his secret?

How does Sam Mitchell, at 32, continue to produce for his team week in, week out and play starring roles in premiership-winning sides?

“It’s about life balance,” the star midfielder revealed to hawthornfc.com.au

“Part of my goal setting – if you want to play this many games, have this many tackles and all these things… part of my goal setting and many of the Hawthorn guys, we have a life balance component.”

Work-life balance is great in theory but achieving it is a different story.

For Mitchell, it’s about setting aside time for four key areas of his life.

“For me, it’s family is first, then you’ve got your work life with footy, then university and also social gatherings and keeping in touch with your friends,” he said.

“I find that if I have those four things in check, then I feel like I can do all four of them really, really well but if one thing is overriding and if that’s football, then I find I don’t actually do any of them well.”

A husband and father of three, Mitchell is also currently completing his MBA.

But it is his charity work, of which he has a family connection, that he is most proud.

Mitchell watched his mother-in-law suffer with Alzheimer’s and experienced first hand the impact the disease has on both the person and their family.

So now, he helps assist those affected through an affiliation with Alzheimer’s Australia.

“She was only 62 – so very young,” Mitchell said.

“It was a very quick downward spiral.

“It was a disease I didn’t know a lot about but certainly learnt very quickly that it was a horrible disease to have to go through not just for the person who has it but also all the loved ones as well.

“Some of these people don’t remember who their families are and that’s a really hard situation.

“I’ve been really proud to be involved with Alzheimer’s Australia and Victoria to be able to raise awareness and help families and support people.”

Sam Mitchell with his three children after the 2014 premiership.

While he credits his life away from footy for some of his on-field success, Mitchell, of course couldn’t play good footy without training hard and living an elite lifestyle.

He prides himself on his work ethic and it shows on and off the field.

Mitchell has been a role model at Hawthorn for many years, even before he assumed the captaincy in 2008 and well beyond the day he relinquished it to current skipper, Luke Hodge.

He has set the example of how to achieve a balance his life as an elite athlete and many of his teammates have followed in his footsteps.

This week, the AFL Player’s Association released its findings into player development and well-being, which demonstrated improvements in work-life balance across the league.

Mitchell says Hawthorn players have embraced the programs in place to give themselves a mental break from footy and credits this for the team’s on-field success.

“If you have off-field engagement, it’s really well documented now that the better the clubs in terms of ladder positions in general, the more off-field engagement they have,” he said.

“I think we’re in the top two or three for off-field engagement, the players do the most things outside of their footy and that correlates to how well we play on the field.

“Sometimes you think I’m not going to do anything outside of footy because I don’t want to sacrifice my footy but it actually works in reverse.

“The guys that play the best and most consistent football are the guys that are always going out and doing things outside of their footy.

“You don’t want to be so single-minded that you’ve only got football because you can burn out – you don’t want to be burning the candle at both ends.”

Find out more about Alzheimer’s Australia at fightdementia.org.au/vic and find out about one of their causes at thememoryjogger.com.au