About four years ago the champion runner was training with her new coach in Newcastle when he noticed some irregularities with her heart-rate measurements during the tempo run drill she was doing.

"He said to me I was running too fast and I ended up walking, and I was like 'no it's not that, it's not that," Quigley recalled.

It turned out to be a fortuitous pick-up.

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Consulting with a cardiologist the Quirindi teenager was found to have an irregular heart beat, and two years ago had a heart operation.

At the time of her diagnosis a multiple national and state champion, and seeming on a path to perhaps one day representing her country, to no longer be able to do what she had dedicated the last five years or so of her life to was tough to swallow, and the now 18-year-old admits that mentally "it was really hard there for a bit".

"Mentally it had a huge strain on me because running was all I did. Every day I was running," she said.

"Once I got told no you can't run it was like what do I do?".

"Obviously my parents really helped me get through it all. And at school I was always just trying to do something else, just seeing what I could do."

Now, fingers crossed, on the other side of it, she has found some salvation with the Lions.

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Around footy pretty much all of her life with her dad Luke playing for the Newcastle Knights and Catalan Dragons, and her three younger brothers all playing league, Quigley said she always "wanted to play" rugby during school.

"But dad was like 'no, no you're running you can't get hurt'," she said.

But the desire to play remained strong, and so this year she decided she'd give it a go. Other than a short-lived netball career when she was about eight, and backyard battles with her brothers, the first contact sport she has ever played, Quigley's rugby career got off to a bit of an auspicious start. Playing Albies in a pre-season trial game she got passed the ball and "squealed and threw the ball to the other team".

She has come a long way from that over the few months since, even stepping up to play for Central North at the Country Championships earlier this month.

One of several debutants for the Kookaburras, she was encouraged to put her hand up by Lions coach Georgia Moore and manager Erin Moore, and didn't look out of place in the representative environment.

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Quigley hasn't ruled out a return to running "one day".

But for now rugby is her main focus. She is "loving it".

"I do love running, I've just lost so much fitness so it's hard to get back to where I was," she said.

After two weeks off, the Lions return to the field on Saturday but face a tough assignment against competition leaders Pirates.

Kicking off the second round, it is shaping up to be a big day at Quirindi with the club hosting their Ladies Day.

Raising money for the Heart Foundation, there will be plenty happening off the field as well as on it, with a passing competition and player auction.

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