Midfielder Darcy Tucker relished Fremantle’s return to the gym on Tuesday as the club continued its return to training ahead of the season resumption in mid-June.

After a non-contact training session on Monday, the Freo squad hit the weights in their separate groups on Tuesday.

Tucker is in group one with fellow midfielders Nat Fyfe, David Mundy, Michael Walters, Blake Acres, Brett Bewley and Connor Blakely.

The powerfully-built midfielder admitted he had lost a little bit of strength after eight weeks of strength training using only resistance bans and body-weight training during the shutdown.

He was thrilled to hit the weights again on Tuesday.

“It was the first time in the gym lifting full weights and a few boys will be a bit sore tomorrow,” Tucker said.

“It’s finally good to be in the gym again and, hopefully, we can keep that up and get some strength back before we get going again.

“(In the shutdown) we had to make use of what we had at home, for me, I made the most of a home gym set up with a few resistance bands and a few dumbbells.”

Tucker said he and his teammates would soon be back to full strength.

“It won’t take long before we get that back for the boys,” Tucker said.

“We got a good weights session in. The boys were set up with a very good program from the strength and conditioning staff when we were off.

“We didn’t lose much and we were able to keep our strength in other ways. We’re all ready to go and get back into it.”

Tucker said he was delighted to see the midfield group at full strength with both Acres and Mundy making their returns from injury and impressing at Monday’s training session. 

“They were awesome. Everyone was full strength yesterday so (the break has been) a bit of a blessing to have them back and fully fit and ready to go,” Tucker said.

“It put some smiles on our faces to have them back and now we can build for when we head over to the Gold Coast.”