Piri Awahou Tihou Weepu (born 7 September 1983) is a retired New Zealand

rugby union Rugby union, commonly known simply as rugby, is a close-contact team sport that originated at Rugby School in the first half of the 19th century. One of the two codes of rugby football, it is based on running with the ball in hand. In its m ...

player. Weepu played most recently for Wairarapa Bush in the

Heartland Championship The Heartland Championship competition, known for sponsorship reasons as the Bunnings Warehouse Heartland Championship, is a domestic rugby union competition in New Zealand. It was founded in 2006 as one of two successor competitions to the countr ...

. Generally Weepu played as a half-back but also played at

first five-eighth In the game of rugby union, there are 15 players on each team, comprising eight forwards (wearing jerseys numbered 1–8) and seven backs (numbered 9–15). In addition, there may be up to eight replacement players "on the bench", numbered 16– ...

on occasion. He has represented the New Zealand national side, the

All Blacks The New Zealand national rugby union team, commonly known as the All Blacks ( mi, Ōpango), represents New Zealand in men's international rugby union, which is considered the country's national sport. The team won the Rugby World Cup in 1987, ...

, between 2004 and 2013. He first won national honours against

Wales Wales ( cy, Cymru ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is bordered by England to the Wales–England border, east, the Irish Sea to the north and west, the Celtic Sea to the south west and the ...

in 2004. In 2005 was called back into the All Blacks squad for the first Tri Nations test against

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the north by the neighbouring countri ...

, having missed selection for the 2005

British & Irish Lions The British & Irish Lions is a rugby union team selected from players eligible for the national teams of England, Ireland, Scotland, and Wales. The Lions are a test side and most often select players who have already played for their national ...

tour. He represented the and in Super Rugby, and

Wellington Wellington ( mi, Te Whanganui-a-Tara or ) is the capital city of New Zealand. It is located at the south-western tip of the North Island, between Cook Strait and the Remutaka Range. Wellington is the second-largest city in New Zealand by me ...

and

Auckland Auckland (pronounced ) ( mi, Tāmaki Makaurau) is a large metropolitan city in the North Island of New Zealand. The List of New Zealand urban areas by population, most populous urban area in the country and the List of cities in Oceania by po ...

in the

Mitre 10 Cup The mitre (Commonwealth English) (; Greek: μίτρα, "headband" or "turban") or miter (American English; see spelling differences), is a type of headgear now known as the traditional, ceremonial headdress of bishops and certain abbots in t ...

. He also had brief spells with several clubs in Europe. In October 2017, Weepu announced his retirement as a rugby player.

Early life

Māori Māori or Maori can refer to: Relating to the Māori people * Māori people of New Zealand, or members of that group * Māori language, the language of the Māori people of New Zealand * Māori culture * Cook Islanders, the Māori people of the C ...

and

Niue Niue (, ; niu, Niuē) is an island country in the South Pacific Ocean, northeast of New Zealand. Niue's land area is about and its population, predominantly Polynesian, was about 1,600 in 2016. Niue is located in a triangle between Tong ...

an descent, Weepu hails from

Wainuiomata Wainuiomata () is a large suburb of Lower Hutt, in the Wellington Region of New Zealand's North Island. Origin of name The word 'Wainui-o-mata' is a Māori name made up of the words Wai = water, Nui = big, O = of, and Mata – which could refer ...

. He attended

Te Aute College Te Aute College (Māori: Te Kura o Te Aute) is a school in the Hawke's Bay region of New Zealand. It opened in 1854 with twelve pupils under Samuel Williams, an Anglican missionary, and nephew and son-in-law of Bishop William Williams. It has a ...

where he was Head Boy in 2001. After leaving school he played senior rugby with Hutt Old Boys Marist, under the tutelage of his mentor Derek Bruce, but returned to his roots and later joined

Wainuiomata RFC {{Unreferenced, date=June 2019, bot=noref (GreenC bot) Wainuiomata Rugby Football Club (WRFC) is a rugby union club based in Wainuiomata, an outlying suburb of Lower Hutt, New Zealand. The club was formed in 1946 during the significant settlement ...

with whom he remained affiliated throughout his professional career.

New Zealand career

Domestic career

During the 2006 Super 14 Final, Weepu was knocked unconscious during an attempted tackle. However, due to the bizarrely thick fog during the match, the team doctors were unable to see that he had been unconscious. Weepu continued playing and went on to miss a tackle on

Casey Laulala Casey Daniel Eti Laulala (born 3 May 1982) is a Samoan-born New Zealand former rugby union player. Career Born and raised in Samoa, Laulala started boarding at Wesley College when he was 15. Laulala made his test debut for New Zealand during ...

, conceding the match-winning try. Later Weepu admitted that he could not remember the game at all.

International career

Weepu was not selected for the 2007 Rugby World Cup squad, announced on 22 July 2007, with Crusaders halfback Andrew Ellis preferred. During the 2011 Rugby World Cup Weepu played out of position in the last pool match against Canada, coming off the bench during the second half to play fullback as a replacement for

Mils Muliaina Junior Malili "Mils" Muliaina (born 31 July 1980) is a former professional rugby union player who most recently played for San Francisco Rush in the US PRO Rugby competition. He played primarily as a fullback, though he has also played as a ...

. There was great pressure on the

to win the Cup, not having won it since 1987. This time round it looked to be New Zealand's year, but All Blacks playmaker

Dan Carter Daniel William Carter (born 5 March 1982) is a retired New Zealand rugby union player. Carter played for Crusaders (Super Rugby) in New Zealand and played for New Zealand's national team, the All Blacks. He is the highest point scorer in ...

was struck with a season-ending groin injury. This caused much media attention, and betting odds in favor of the All Blacks began to decrease. In the All Blacks vs Argentina quarter-final match, Weepu took on Carter's goal kicking duties. Landing seven penalties, with only a missed conversion, Weepu was named Man of the Match, helping guide New Zealand to victory, as well as earning him the nicknames "Mr Fixit" and "saviour". In the

final Final, Finals or The Final may refer to: *Final (competition), the last or championship round of a sporting competition, match, game, or other contest which decides a winner for an event ** Another term for playoffs, describing a sequence of cont ...

against France he missed two penalties and a conversion; however, New Zealand emerged victorious due to a Tony Woodcock try and a Stephen Donald penalty. Weepu was left out of the All Blacks squad for the June tests in 2013, being told he needed to work on his speed and defensive ability. He was named in the squad for the late autumn tour of Argentina, but received little playing time.

Leading of the haka

Weepu was an integral part of the

when it came to performing the

haka Haka (; plural ''haka'', in both Māori and English) are a variety of ceremonial performance art in Māori culture. It is often performed by a group, with vigorous movements and stamping of the feet with rhythmically shouted or chanted accompani ...

before each game. Of the 71 tests he played in he was the haka leader in 51 of them (12 November 2005 – 22 June 2013); this is the most for any player since the introduction of Kapa o Pango in 2005. 26 times he led the

Ka Mate "Ka Mate" () is a Māori haka composed by Te Rauparaha, war leader of the Ngāti Toa tribe of the North Island of New Zealand. Composition Te Rauparaha composed "Ka Mate" circa 1820 as a celebration of life over death after his lucky escape fro ...

version of the haka as well as 25 times the newer Kapa o Pango haka. Rugby world cup 2011 NEW ZEALAND ARGENTINA (7309674860)

European career

England

Weepu signed to join

London Welsh London Welsh Rugby Football Club ( cy, Clwb Rygbi Cymry Llundain) was a rugby union club formed in 1885. Based in Old Deer Park, Richmond-upon-Thames, London Welsh RFC played in the English Premiership in the 2012–13 and 2014–15 seaso ...

in July 2014 and left the Auckland

Blues Blues is a music genre and musical form which originated in the Deep South of the United States around the 1860s. Blues incorporated spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts, chants, and rhymed simple narrative ballads from the Afr ...

at the end of the 2014 Super Rugby season. On 27 February 2015, it was announced Weepu had been released early from

and would join fellow Aviva Premiership side

Wasps A wasp is any insect of the narrow-waisted suborder Apocrita of the order Hymenoptera which is neither a bee nor an ant; this excludes the broad-waisted sawflies (Symphyta), which look somewhat like wasps, but are in a separate suborder. ...

on a short-term deal until the end of the 2014–15 season.

France

On 23 February 2015, it was announced Weepu would be joining

Top 14 The Top 14 () is a professional rugby union club competition that is played in France. Created in 1892, the Top 14 is at the top of the national league system operated by the French National Rugby League, also known by its French initialism o ...

side

Oyonnax Oyonnax () is the second most populated commune in the Ain department in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region in eastern France. Oyonnax lies in a valley of the Jura Mountains in the far north of Ain. It is near the Parc naturel régional du Ha ...

on a two-year deal from the 2015–16 season. On 15 January 2016 Oyonnax announced th
termination
of Weepu's contract with immediate effect, without giving any reason. Instead, on 28 November 2016, Weepu signed with

Pro D2 Rugby Pro D2, also known as Pro D2 is the second tier of rugby union club competition division in France. It is operated by Ligue Nationale de Rugby (LNR) which also runs the division directly above, the first division Top 14. Rugby Pro D2 was in ...

club

RC Narbonne R&C, RC, R/C, Rc, or rc may refer to: Science and technology Computing * rc, the default Command line interface in Version 10 Unix and Plan 9 from Bell Labs * .rc (for "run commands"), a filename extension for configuration files in UNIX-like ...

with immediate effect during the 2016–17 season.

NRL speculation

In 2007 the

Gold Coast Titans The Gold Coast Titans are a professional rugby league football club, based on the Gold Coast, Queensland, Australia. The club competes in the National Rugby League (NRL), Australia and New Zealand's national rugby league club competition. The ...

approached Weepu to play

rugby league Rugby league football, commonly known as just rugby league and sometimes football, footy, rugby or league, is a full-contact sport played by two teams of thirteen players on a rectangular field measuring 68 metres (75 yards) wide and 112 ...

. Titans CEO Michael Searle said "He's a good player with plenty of experience at the top level in rugby union, and it would be good to get him back to rugby league if we can."

TV Presenting

Since 2018 Weepu has presented the Television documentary series Piri's Tiki Tour on

Whakaata Māori Whakaata Māori is a New Zealand television channel that broadcasts programmes that make a significant contribution to the revitalisation of the Māori language and culture. Funded by the New Zealand Government, it commenced broadcasting as M� ...

and YouTube.

Personal life

He is the brother of former

professional

Billy Weepu Billy Weepu is a New Zealand former rugby league footballer who played for the Manly Sea Eagles in the NRL, and is now a news camera operator. He is the brother of rugby union player Piri Weepu. Playing career Early years Weepu started his ...

. He revealed in 2020 that he still resides in

, Lower Hutt, and that he suffered a stroke in 2014 while playing for London Welsh, where scans found blood clots in his

Broca's area Broca's area, or the Broca area (, also , ), is a region in the frontal lobe of the dominant Cerebral hemisphere, hemisphere, usually the left, of the Human brain, brain with functions linked to speech production. Language processing in the brai ...

, which made him talk nonsensically like a baby for a while. He also suffered from weight issues, alcoholism, depression and self harm tendencies throughout his playing career, as well as

sleep apnoea Sleep apnea, also spelled sleep apnoea, is a sleep disorder in which pauses in breathing or periods of shallow breathing during sleep occur more often than normal. Each pause can last for a few seconds to a few minutes and they happen many tim ...

. He also has no cartilage in either of his knees. In 2020 and 2021/22, he completed two seasons of ''Match Fit.'' He started season one with a biometric age of 59 as a 37-year-old, was the only member who is petrified of heights in season 1, and he had a new son between the two seasons. He tried intermittent fasting, but it didn't work because he cut carbs completely out of his diet, although he also turned his diet rich in seafood-based protein as a presenter of an outdoor hunting and fishing show.

References

External links

Blues profileHurricanes profile
*
Maori Television - Piri's Tiki TourYouTube - @PirisTikiTour
{{DEFAULTSORT:Weepu, Piri 1983 births New Zealand rugby union players New Zealand Māori rugby union players New Zealand people of Niuean descent New Zealand international rugby union players Rugby union scrum-halves Māori All Blacks players Wainuiomata Lions players Hurricanes (rugby union) players Blues (Super Rugby) players Wellington rugby union players Auckland rugby union players Ngāi Tahu people Rugby union players from Lower Hutt People educated at Te Aute College Living people New Zealand expatriate rugby union players New Zealand expatriate sportspeople in England Expatriate rugby union players in England London Welsh RFC players New Zealand expatriate sportspeople in Wales