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Cape Town - A torn bicep, a neck vertebrae injury, a shoulder injury and a serious concussion ... that has been the story of Pat Lambie over the last three years.
There has been some rugby in between, but his time on the field and his growth in a Springbok jersey has been severely limited by those spells on the sidelines.
To put things into perspective, Lambie has played just 16 Super Rugby matches for the Sharks in three full seasons between 2014-2016.
In 2013 he played 15 Super Rugby matches for the Durbanites.
Now, after three months out last year with a concussion, Lambie is fully fit as the Sharks prepare for Super Rugby in 2017.
"I've missed the majority of the last three Super Rugby tournaments with one injury or another. That can't go on forever so hopefully 2017 is the year I can play a lot of rugby," Lambie said on an XVR.co.za podcast.
LISTEN TO THE FULL LAMBIE INTERVIEW HERE
The concussion in 2016 was particularly concerning for Lambie as it ruined an opportunity to make the Bok No 10 jersey his own.
Having missed most of Super Rugby with a shoulder injury, Lambie then returned to action and was given the flyhalf duties in Allister Coetzee's first Test as Springbok coach against Ireland in Cape Town on June 11.
When Lambie was stretchered off after CJ Stander went clattering into his head, he could not have known how long his recovery would take.
"I think the frustrating thing was that nobody could really tell me how long I would be out for," Lambie explained.
As long as I was experiencing symptoms I couldn't return to training and unfortunately for me it was a good three months where I was suffering from some low-grade migraines pretty constantly. I saw a few doctors and had some medication and once we got on top of the symptoms I could start training again."
Now, though, those injuries are a thing of the past and the Sharks captain will be hoping to get through the whole of 2017 unscathed.
"Things have been going very well. It's a young and exciting group with a few experienced faces around," he said.
"I'm just excited to be playing rugby again."
