Charnze Nicoll-Klokstad walks through the door and feels like a little kid again.
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It matters little how tough the day on the training track has been as the Canberra Raiders prepare for their NRL season opener against the Gold Coast at Canberra Stadium on Friday.
Because the sight of his boys Rio and Kyrie are a reminder of where one of rugby league's great success stories has come from.
Long before he took a gamble to leave Auckland and join the Raiders, or played in a grand final or represented New Zealand at the top level, he was that little kid wrestling his family in the living room.
"I'm just like wrestling with my kids and it's reliving my childhood memories," Nicoll-Klokstad said.
"There's nine of us in my family. I remember wrestling my brothers and then my old man would come home and give us a growling and say we're not allowed.
"He'd pop off to the shop across the road and we'd just wrestle as hard and fast as we can. He'd come back in, we were just sitting there sweating, red as, trying not to look like we'd been breathing hard.
"I'm starting to do that with my kids now so it's pretty fun. They're growing too fast, I just need to cherish every moment with them."
Just as the 24-year-old fullback wants to cherish every moment he spends in a lime green jersey as the Raiders look to bounce back from a grand final defeat.
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Nicoll-Klokstad admits last year still burns but says it means nothing now. The road starts again and nothing is guaranteed.
Maybe that is the perfect fit for a Canberra custodian determined to avoid second-year syndrome.
"It's a bit surreal. Man, who would have thought?" Nicoll-Klokstad said.
"I was in a position last year when I wasn't too sure what was going to happen, and for it to literally do a full 180, it's crazy. I'm definitely not taking any opportunity I get for granted.
"The pressure for myself is more individual. I've got a lot of pressure on myself. You do want to do better than what you did last year.
"Being able to get a full pre-season at fullback, I've been able to work on my craft and work on some things I wanted to add to my game. The boys around me have been amazing.
"It's just a matter of building off what I did well and adding to it really."