KILEKNNY FORWARD KATIE Power is confined to fitness training as the start of the 2020 season draws near.
While the rest of her Cats team-mates are engaging in all the contact drills and adapting to new playing rules, she’s clocking up the miles as she tries to work through a persistent finger injury.
The Piltown star suffered a broken bone after receiving a bang from a hurl last July. It was decided at the time, that given Kilkeny’s advanced stage in the All-Ireland championship, Power would wait until her campaign was over before seeking treatment.
Injections were administered to numb the pain before Kilkenny’s All-Ireland semi-final victory over Tipperary as well as their Croke Park decider against Galway, where they lost out by six points.
Her injury was further complicated by repeatedly dislocating the finger.
After losing the county final with Piltown later in the year, Power finally had a chance to properly address the issues with her finger.
But with Kilkenny’s 2020 league opener against Waterford coming up on 9 February, Power is still nowhere close to being match ready.
Her finger has been examined once and she’s now in the process of getting a second opinion before she can think about the next step in her recovery.
“Literally we’ve been waiting ever since just to get into places because they said there’s supposedly like 20-week waiting lists,” Power begins.
“I was up Monday so I’m looking for a second opinion now to see what the story is.”
As Power continues explaining the nature of her injury, she curls her finger to demonstrate the kind of damage she could be facing if she doesn’t get the treatment she needs.
“It’s a finger injury, it’s broken and if they fuse it, it’s going to be like this forever, so I don’t want that obviously.
“I was wearing a splint. It’s not really that sore now day to day because I’m used to it. But if I hit it off anything… I can’t bend or make a fist or anything. It’s not ideal.
“I probably didn’t realise it was as bad as it was. And then just kept dislocating it and dislocating it so that made it worse.
Two injections either side and then strap it and then glove and hope for the best. It obviously didn’t do a great job, we didn’t win but it could be worse.”
Power confesses that she’s “not great” at playing the role of a patient, and is understandably frustrated that she can’t participate in full training with Kilkenny.
She doesn’t have a timeframe for when she can expect to get back on the pitch either, and has been informed that her finger injury is similar to the one that former Kilkenny player Michael Rice suffered during his career.
“We’re trying to get into the person that he [Rice] went to see, his specialist,” Power adds.
“We’ll hopefully get in there because he was happy with it how that helped him and he did get back a lot quicker. They were saying it was going to finish him, that injury. He obviously got back for a good few years after.
“It’d be nice to be hurling again but it could be worse. It could be a foot injury and you wouldn’t be able to do anything so it’s frustrating but as I said, it could be worse.
I did try to rest it and I haven’t picked up a hurl since October but it’s still the same. It’s not going to go away, it’s not to get better with rest.”
Away from camogie, Power is embarking on an exciting chapter through her work as a nutritional coach.
The 2016 All-Ireland winner linked up with fellow Kilkenny star TJ Reid last year, and is offering her services to clients at his health and fitness facility.
Together, they are building a successful business for athletes of all abilities.
“We started that in the first weekend of November. We’re going well, we’re really, really busy and we’re happy with where things are. We probably didn’t expect it to kick-off as well as it did.
We’re looking to grow it; we have 45 in the books at the moment, which is huge just for the two of us.
“He had this idea of Calorie Club. He knew that I had gone [through education] and done a few courses myself. I have a huge interest in it. He approached me and I loved the idea straight away.”
The pair don’t talk about hurling much but Power smiles as she reveals the kind of lessons she’s taking from her business associate.
“I’d get so caught up in the hurling and he’d be like, ‘Don’t even think about it. You’re going to enjoy it way more when you don’t stress about winning or playing well’.
Who better to listen to? He’s the best in the country the last five or ten years; he’s so consistent and he’s only getting better.
“It’s just small little nuggets like that. We wouldn’t even talk about hurling that much. It’s just about lifestyle, trying to live your life as well, not have it 24/7 about hurling because it’s not going to be there forever.”
Littlewoods Ireland and the Camogie Association were today joined by top Camogie players; 2019 All-Ireland winner Heather Cooney from Galway and Kilkenny superstar Katie Power, to launch the 2020 Littlewoods Ireland Camogie Leagues.
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