Attwood: “Every rugby player should be willing to donate their brains to research.”
This article is based on one from www.talkingrugbyunion.co.uk
Dave Attwood would love to take to the field for Bristol Bears against Bath tonight in what is usually a full-blooded collision but there are few in the game so aware of their own bodies.
Attwood has spent more than 15 years at the top level and, apart from a brief enjoyable stint at Toulon, spent his entire career in the South West with Bristol, Bath and Gloucester.
A classic abrasive second row and arguably one of the finest scrummagers in the Premiership, Attwood has earned 24 England caps – a tally that still feels few for a man of his talents.
But Attwood, blessed with a 6ft 5” 119kg frame, is also extremely intelligent and aware not only that his career is limited (he is training in law), but that he has only one body.
Now 34, he pays as much attention to food, nutrition and recovery as performance and is positive on how the Bristol Bears train, suggesting they are already ahead of the curve in terms of the recent contact training guidelines introduced by World Rugby.
“I have been subject to the brutality of the sport, not just at the coalface in between the matchday whistles, but also on the training field as well,” Attwood told Talking Rugby Union.
“It is very important that as a sport, we are coming to terms with recognising the impact that training has on players, not just the physical demands, but also the emotional demands and the impact it has on health.
“I think it is really sensible that World Rugby are taking a bit more of an active stance on this. I don’t think in real terms it will actually affect a huge amount.
“I think a lot of organisations, certainly here at Bristol – the management, the coaches, the S&C staff – are very aware of the impact that rugby has.”
There has been significant publicity around RWC 2003 winner Steve Thompson’s diagnosis of early onset dementia, subsequent legal case and more recently the news that he has pledged his brain to the Concussion Legacy Project for research.
Interestingly, Attwood, who for much of his career has raised money to help fund research into degenerative brain disease, pledged his brain for research to the South West Dementia Brain Bank in Bristol - the biggest brain bank in the UK and one of the leaders in cognitive diseases research.
With that knowledge, you would think it must be hard for Attwood to lace up his boots fully aware of the risks he takes every time he takes to the field or training paddock.
“You definitely need to have a degree of separation in rugby because you can’t do this game when you are worried about contact,” Attwood said.
“If you are worried about running into someone, then ultimately you are not someone who is going to be able to deliver from the performance aspect. That is part of what you sign up to when you become a rugby player.
“Rugby players are subject to brain trauma all of the time; micro-traumas, major traumas all the time. We have got interesting brains and our brains will be able to enlighten generations of scientists to come. In helping to understand the degeneration of the brain, our brains will elicit information what a normal person doesn’t have.
“I think that every rugby player should be willing to donate their brains to research, but also organs in general.”
Steve Thompson
“Rugby players are subject to brain trauma all of the time; micro-traumas, major traumas all the time.”