My Life in Rugby: Jon Pendlebury – former Leeds, Gloucester and Rotherham lock

As a 20-year-old lad who had only been playing rugby for four years, it was a dream come true when I got a contract with Rotherham in the Premiership in 2003.
It was a great time as I was living back home, playing for my home side and I was a young kid learning. We didn’t have a very good season but for me it was brilliant because it was my first taste of senior competitive rugby.
I loved it every week, even though some of the boys were thinking: “Bloody hell we’re getting battered every week.” After Rotherham, I moved to Gloucester which was another big step up.
I had a year training with the first team and playing a lot with them. It went well and I was awarded a full contract and then, the season after, I broke into the team and had a couple of good years.
Winning the European Challenge Cup with Gloucester in 2006 has to be one of my highlights at the club. There was always a good team down there, regularly challenging for top four, which was also great to be around.
I signed another two-year deal, but by the end of the first one I wasn’t happy as I wasn’t playing as much. I spoke to Dean Ryan, who I always got on with, and said if another club comes in for me am I allowed to speak to them and he said that was fine.
I just wanted to play and he said he couldn’t guarantee me games, which was fair enough.
Leeds came in for me in 2008 and it was ideal as it was near home and I wanted to be a part of Leeds trying to win promotion back to the Premiership.
Although I developed as a player everywhere I went – at Rotherham I went from being a boy to playing a man’s sport, while at Gloucester I was playing with a lot of internationals and fantastic players and getting a quality level of coaching – it was at Leeds where I really came on as a player.
Unfortunately, I had a couple of serious injuries, which meant I played less than I’d have liked. I had a few concussions throughout my career and I lost the 2010-11 season entirely to a shoulder injury, which was frustrating. But that’s just the nature of rugby.
The medical support that you get especially at Leeds is second to none, but unfortunately there’s nothing they could really do or fix, it’s just unlucky.
It was a difficult decision to retire, but at the same time there wasn’t much of a decision to be made.
I had a few more concussions last season and Jon Greenwell, the doctor at Leeds, had a few really good chats with me at the end of the season. When he said that any more bad knocks could be detrimental to me later on in life then the decision to be made was pretty clear.
But when one door closes another one opens and Leeds have stood by me and offered me a fantastic role working as an assistant academy coach under Mark Luffman. I’m really looking forward to starting and gaining my coaching qualifications.
I’ve also been doing a lot of preparation with the Rugby Players Association to get ready for life outside of rugby. That’s what I’ve been doing these last few years, getting ready to go on to coaching. I would have loved for it to have been at 32, but it’s come at 29 and I’m ready for it.