Hogan is happy to put career on hold in pursuit of glory with Kilkenny
GAA Pages 50-51
FOR roughly 16 months now, Richie Hogan has effectively been living the life of a full-time hurler, dedicated to the Kilkenny cause.
Even after seven All-Irelands, four All Stars, a 2014 Hurler of the Year Award and holder of nearly every honour the game has to offer, winning with Kilkenny consumes him. Enough that when it came to a choice between a body that was breaking down due to wear and tear and that has left him with three prolapsed discs in his back, he stepped away from his primary teaching job at Belgrove Boys National School in Clontarf. All to try and get himself right to line out in a Kilkenny shirt for as long as he can.
‘I remember saying to one of these life coaches that if I play to the age of 35 and get absolutely everything out of myself I will gladly sweep the streets for the next 50 years. It wouldn’t bother me in the slightest,’ he insisted. Hogan joins a list of modern players who have parked their careers to squeeze the most out of their time in a county jersey, among them Donegal footballer Karl Lacey and Kerry pair Darran O’Sullivan and Kieran Donaghy.
‘I’m lucky in the sense that I’m a teacher, I’m qualified,’ he added. ‘I can go and get a job whenever I want so it shouldn’t be that difficult if I ever decide to go back.’
This is no short-term thing. Speaking at the launch of Sure deodorant as Official Statistics Partners of the GAA in Croke Park yesterday, Hogan’s story offers a fascinating insight into what drives a player at the highest level, one who could retire in the morning with his legacy intact. Instead, he tells a tale of cortisone injections, epidurals and careers being put on hold. Of dipping in to his savings to pay his way. All for Kilkenny who face Limerick in Saturday’s season-defining qualifier.
‘I finished [teaching] the Easter break last year so I’m gone about 16 or 17 months. I’m incredibly lucky that I’m very good with money. I also have a Masters in Business and Finance. I worked for seven years, I saved a huge amount of money.
‘I do a bit with [eFrontiers] a recruitment company. We recruit teachers to go to the Middle East. That’s in its infancy so I do a couple of hours a week and that keeps me going. ‘At the minute, I’m going on savings alone but I’ve seven years savings behind me whereas all my friends were going on holidays and all sorts of stuff like buying new cars.
‘I don’t have the worry because I’ve a sponsored car. It’s mostly savings, and I’m just very careful.’
His plan is to park the teaching indefinitely. ‘One hundred per cent, yeah. Since I stepped away it’s just been absolutely brilliant. I like to be able to do hurling every day.
‘I used to do the gym sessions in the morning so I’d go to DCU and I’d do the gym session at maybe 6.15 and then go to work. And I’d do my hurling in the evening and then on a training day I’d travel home. Now I’m able to recover properly so I don’t have to go to the gym at 6.0 in the morning, I can go to the gym at 9.0 and take that break in the afternoon and then do my bit of hurling and then do a bit of yoga, core-work and work like that.
‘It just makes a huge difference. And I’m at the age — 28 — I have to look after myself properly. That’s my highest priority.’
In terms of logistics, he is still based in Dublin and lives within a stone’s throw of DCU and his former school Belgrove in Clontarf. ‘My girlfriend teaches in Ballymun so the two of us live on Collins Avenue. I’m there a bit; I’ll be at home for the summer.
‘When it suits me then I don’t have to travel back up to Dublin for training sessions. I can just go home, a 10-minute journey, as opposed to an hour and a half.’
It’s the wear and tear on his back that prompted him to take a career break. Replaced in the sec- ond half of Kilkenny’s defeat by Wexford in the Leinster semifinal, he was clearly in discomfort. A recent epidural, he feels, has put him back on track for the big game against Limerick.
‘Tried a couple of things. Got a few cortisone injections into the joints. It didn’t really work as well as I would have liked. Got an epidural in the discs themselves about a week ago. Woke up the following day like a new man.
‘I’ve three at the base of my back. Two of them are very worn from years of playing. I played a lot of hurling as a kid but I also played a lot of handball where there is huge pressure on the back, a lot of twisting and turning and movement.
‘It flares up every now and again. It was really bad when I played Waterford in 2015. I just get a back spasm. As long as it doesn’t bother me before Championship, I’m fine.
‘Travelling was a big thing as well around that time. It was tough. Getting out of the car and you’re so broke up after it. I love to train. I’d walk from Dublin to training I just love it so much.’
Waterford hurling manager Derek McGrath revealed how he took parental leave from his teaching job at De La Salle College in the spring to focus his energies on the county team, pointing to the 50 hours a week that can be taken up with such a post. Teachers and students increasingly populate the ranks of inter-county teams, such are the modern demands.
So does Hogan see the game ever going down a semi-professional route? ‘I honestly don’t know. I can see maybe an element of people doing half-hours. I flirted with the idea of job-sharing so you have a small bit of income coming in.
‘For me, it’s not even about money at all. There are some people who need money, who like to be able to live that lifestyle, who like to be able to focus on their careers. That’s hugely important. And the GPA do a huge amount of work on that. But it’s just not that important to me.’
After back-to-back defeats by Wexford, first in the league quarter-final and then in Leinster championship, Hogan said winning a back-door All-Ireland with the extra games involved would eclipse anything previously in a Kilkenny jersey. ‘If this goes well for us, it will be the greatest year we’ve ever had.’