Asafo Aumua tells a porky, sheds 10kg, now stakes his claim as All Blacks’ top hooker
Monday, 20 July 2026
Asafo Aumua might be on fire on the footy field, but he was rather playing with fire in the summer time.
Coming into the new year on the back of a forgettable 2025 which was blighted by injury and concussions that didn’t allow him the chance to pull on the black jersey at all, the bulldozing hooker was then a little economical with the truth about his body weight in his conversations with All Blacks staff.
“I lied to our nutritionist,” Aumua revealed, soon after his stand-out showing off the bench in Saturday night’s 40-21 Nations Championship win over Ireland at Eden Park. “I said I was 124kg, but I was actually 126kg.”
All’s well that ends well, of course, with the 29-year-old confirming he was now at 116kg after swiftly shedding 10kg in the name of getting himself in shape for this return to test footy and the Dave Rennie regime, which involves a notorious strict line on work-rates and repeat efforts.
Aumua, indeed, is an absolute machine in the gym, with eye-watering numbers such as 195kg for the bench press and 300kg for the squat, but with an All Blacks’ game-plan designed to utilise skill and play up-tempo, it can’t be all muscle and no hustle.
When he first linked with the All Blacks, as an ‘apprentice’ in 2017 ‒ the same year he had been part of the world champion New Zealand Under-20 side along with current national squad team-mates Will Jordan, Caleb Clarke and Luke Jacobson ‒ Aumua weighed in at just 102kg.
He then took a message of required weight-gain from the national coaching staffers rather easily ‒ undertaking weightlifting and not much running, to return the following season a whopping 13kg heavier.
That’s where he’s essentially stayed since, and a mark he knew he had to smartly get back to. After all, he is the equal-shortest (with Kyle Preston) member of the squad, so that 1.77m frame can’t be loaded as much as some others.
The key to getting down again?
“Probably just not eating too much,” he declared. “I was actually eating good food, but just a lot, probably a couple of portions I shouldn’t be, but I’m back to eating properly now.”
Though, Aumua can now add a ‘meat pie’ to the weekend’s diet log, of the healthiest variety, after dining out deluxe with a key five-pointer in New Zealand’s latest victory, with what was a highly-impressive 50-minute stint after being injected early for the injured Codie Taylor.
“I couldn’t remember the last time I scored for the All Blacks,” he noted [it was a double against Italy in Rome some 56 months ago], “but I think I cut someone off to score that try. So, sorry, whoever it was.”
It was Josh Lord, and the lock is likely to forgive him if Aumua keeps sending him the accurate darts which had sometimes proved a weak spot in an often otherwise attractive game.
But after a splendid championship-winning campaign with the runaway Hurricanes, the confidence is high and his all-round skillset is right on point, with the real potential now for a shake-up in the All Blacks hooker pecking order for the looming tour of South Africa.
Taylor’s calf strain is going to necessitate some rotation through the opening week or two of the trip, Rennie already confirmed, but even if the centurion is at full fitness, his July form hasn’t exactly been convincing, and the coach must now be mulling the power-packed prospect that is an Aumua-Samisoni Taukei’aho combination to face the might of the Springboks.
“I thought Asafo was excellent, and had a big impact,” Rennie said of his Saturday night performance which saw him take 10 carries for 25 barging metres, beat a couple of defenders, and make nine tackles, including two ‘dominant’ ones.
“He’s such an athlete and such a beast. We’re pretty fortunate there with Samisoni as well. He played really well last week against the Italians. We’ve got good options.”