Shane Mumford has unlocked the secret to shouldering the majority of the Giants' ruck load this season despite his 31st birthday looming large next month.
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The GWS enforcer and wife Eva welcomed their first child, Oliver, into the world in November and the youngster has quickly become a key component of Mumford's elongated weekly recovery, which has again worked wonders ahead of Saturday's home clash with Essendon.
"Carrying the little man around the house seems to keep me moving," Mumford said.
"I used to get home and lay on the couch and watch a bit of TV but there's no doing that any more. As soon as you get home I walk through the door and my wife's got him there at the front door and says, 'he's yours'.
"I start cutting laps around the lounge room so I'm always moving at home, which is probably helping I reckon."
Recovery is everything for Mumford.
Given his rucking responsibility each weekend, exacerbated even more at the moment with Rory Lobb still battling a groin injury, Mumford's ageing body is one of the most prized commodities in Giants land.
It's not uncommon for the 197-centimetre star to miss the main training session each week, just to give his bumps and bruises that extra time to heal.
By the much lighter captain's run the day before a game he's usually back on the track, and then he fronts up at the opening centre bounce fresh as a daisy and ready to tear into any opponent that gets in his way.
"We just found a really good balance now, me and the sports science guys on how much I do throughout the week," Mumford said.
"They're very good at monitoring my loads and they know if I've pulled up really sore after I game I've got to take it easier throughout the week. I just do a lot of recovery; [it] is the biggest thing. I'm always in the water, getting moving.
"There's generally not too many weeks where you don't pull up with knocks and bumps and bruises and corkies … but I guess that's just a part of being a ruckman. When you're jumping into someone at a centre bounce 20 times a game sometimes, there's no doubt you're always going to end up a bit sore.
"It's just about getting moving and flushing out some of the stiffness and soreness."
A history of knee injuries adds another layer of complexity to keeping the Mumford machine ticking over each week.
If he misses a training session, he'll often spend some of the time running on an anti-gravity treadmill at 80 per cent of his body weight.
Massage and Pilates are also key to smoothing out the week-to-week pain endured by an AFL ruckman.
But it's perhaps back at home where he receives the ultimate chop out from Eva.
"At the moment, [Oliver's] got a couple of teeth coming through; two bottom teeth have come through and I reckon he's getting a few more," Mumford said.
"For the last week my wife Eva's been really struggling with sleep because he's been getting up at one and two and three.
"We had the dream baby; he'd sleep from 9 or 10 at night to 5.30 or 7.30 in the morning. To go from having that ... to not getting any sleep has obviously been tough.
"When I get the day off I'll get up the night before and look after him just to give her that little bit of a break. I know she's starting to go a bit insane with him at times.
"She's brilliant; the night before main training or games I'll go sleep in our spare room, so she's really good like that.
"She just says 'you need the sleep, you've got to prepare for your game and prepare for training'. I got very lucky there; my wife looks after me and let's me go and get some sleep when she's doing it tough, I'm pretty thankful for it."
Long may Oliver extend Mumford's career.
The former Geelong Cat and Sydney Swan is contracted until the end of 2018, and says he'll start dropping subtle hints soon enough that he's keen for an extension.
"I just want to be able to play footy for as long as possible," Mumford said. "I've seen what it's like in the real world and I don't want to go back to working 10, 12-hour days like I used to before footy."
"The longer I can be doing this, something I love and having such a flexible schedule, being able to get home and spend time with Ollie and Eva, there's no better job in the world for me.
"AFL's pretty bloody good. They'll have to kick me out the door in three or four years time."
