BIG T
Meet the heaviest wing in England (who slimmed down to a mere 19st 5lb!)
HE IS the biggest beast in any Premiership back line — a winger heavier than most forwards — but this is the slimmed- down version of the league’s newest star, ‘Big T’.
Taqele Naiyaravoro, the 19st 5lb Northampton Saint, is set to cause havoc as one of the most destructive runners in the sport.
A Fijian-born Australian who has two Test caps to his name, he comes to Franklin’s Gardens in his best form yet. For the New South Wales Waratahs this year he played 16 games, scored 15 tries, made 42 clean breaks, beat 70 defenders and ran 1,478 metres — often leaving devastation in his wake.
The former rugby league man, 26, had a middling season at Glasgow Warriors two years ago; but it is only since dropping two stone has he realised his potential.
‘I was overweight then!’ Naiyaravoro smiles. ‘Last season was the best I had since I stepped into Super Rugby. It was a lot of hard work. During pre- season I had three straight weeks of not doing any gym and just running.
‘In three weeks I lost two stone. I was at 21st 5lb, then I came down to 19st 5lb. That was just Sundays off and every other day doing cardio or another sort of training.
‘It was tough. That was a true testament of hard work. You put your head down.
‘For me weight was my big priority during pre- season, trying to get it down. That three weeks was torture.
‘Now I’m here, I’m trying to implement the same thing having had a taste of what I can do if my weight goes down. My weight is important to me, sometimes I just get lucky with stuff that I do on the field by being overweight. When I was 21st I could do one run and after a couple of minutes would die down.
‘The past season I can do more repeat efforts, catch the ball, down, up and support and stuff like that. That is my main goal now, getting my body in shape.’
He changed his diet too. Gone are cheat meals of Nando’s and pizza — but as a Pacific Islander, he will still look forward to tucking into a suckling pig every now and then.
‘That’s a really tough one,’ he laughs. ‘I’ve asked the boys when they do that to tell me so I can map out my timetable and it falls on my cheat day!
‘It was less cutting out and more cutting down the portions I ate.
‘I had to change the sizes, which I was gutted about! It does my head in, my wife whenever I try to eat healthily she just goes and cheats! It is really not fair!’
Naiyaravoro has given up on playing for the Wallabies. His move to the East Midlands, bringing wife Ethel and two daughters Ella (five) and Laite (three) with him, means club rugby is his sole focus now — with a debut against Saracens coming this Saturday.
Saints fans will hope he shows the same quick thinking on the field as he did off it back in 2013, by — remarkably — delivering his first child himself.
‘We were living in an apartment in Sydney,’ Naiyaravoro explains.
‘My wife was due. I took a day off from training and in the morning we took a train to the hospital.
‘They said she wasn’t dilated enough. We asked if we could wait there and they said, “No, you have to go back home”.
‘So we got a taxi home and after an hour she started feeling the contractions. I was like, “Man, what do I do?” We were on the 15th floor.
‘I went to get her stuff but she was saying, “I can’t hold it any more. I am going to have to push”. So I put the towels down on the bed and called the ambulance. She probably pushed once or twice and the baby was out.
‘We had a first-aid class back in Fiji and we saw that when you give birth you have to wipe the mouth and smack it to make it cry. I don’t know how but that came back into my mind.’
So it might not just be matchwinning performances ‘ Big T’ delivers in England.
‘If anyone needs a midwife in Northampton then I am here!’ he chuckles.