Sydney Swans forward Kurt Tippett says he can’t wait to run onto AAMI Stadium alongside his new team mates this Saturday.

It’s been more than eight months since the 202cm forward set foot on a football field on match day and after a strong pre-season and a gruelling 12-week training program, Tippett said he was itching to get amongst the action again this weekend against Port Adelaide.

“It’s going to be very exciting obviously,” Tippett told SwansTV this week.

“I’m looking forward to running out again and I can’t wait to run through the banner and to be out there with 21 of my best mates.”

There has been no rest for the Swans’ newest recruit over the last three months, with the forward undertaking an intense personal training program under the guidance of Head Conditioning Coach, Rob Spurrs.

After training with the team throughout the pre-season, Spurrs said Tippett moved onto an individual program ahead of the Swans’ round one match.

“Kurt actually had a good pre-season with our senior squad and he was able to get used to the game plan as well as a general pre-season preparation,” Spurrs told SwansTV.

“What then happened was when the other players started playing games, we had to supplement his training to compensate for missing the games.”

Spurrs said Tippett’s program stepped up a notch leading up to his debut match, with GPS profiling used to mirror the work rate of a key forward on game day.

“Over the course of time his training progressed to almost GPS-like profiling,” he said.

“Basically we looked at what some of the key forwards and what their GPS looks like in a game and progress his training over the weeks to meet that.

“Going into the game on the weekend, we’re confident that he can meet those targets.

“In terms of the specifics, it was getting up his high intensity repeat efforts and that was done both within training through drills and also above and beyond each training session.”

After months on the track, Tippett said he considered himself to be in peak physical condition leading into this weekend’s clash.

“I’m very happy with my preparation and now I’m ready to play, so we’ll see how I go,” he said.

“I trained as hard as I could and I’ve tried to train at a game-like intensity, and I think that’s the best I can do.

“Nothing can replicate what it is like on game day, but I’ve done my best.

“I consider myself to be in good shape and I’m just really excited about playing and I think I’ll build into the match fitness over the next couple of weeks.”

In addition to working hard on the training track over the last 11 weeks, Tippett said he had also focused on learning as much as he could about the club both on and off the field ahead of his debut.

“My time off was a bit of an education and I got to see how the boys prepared. I went down into the rooms before the games and then sat in the stands and watched them play,” he said.

“I got to see how hard they worked and how hard they played for each other and it was really good.

“I love playing football so not being able to play was hard but I’ve had great support here at the footy club and I’m excited to run out with the boys this weekend.”