Malakai Fekitoa Features in ESPN’s Body Issue

New Zealand All Blacks centre Malakai Fekitoa is among 23 athletes featured in ESPN The Magazine’s annual Body Issue, which begins its rollout this week on SportsCenter and ESPN.com, and is on newsstands 7 July.

The 25-year-old Highlanders midfielder, who has played 23 tests for the All Blacks, posed naked in the surf for the ESPN photo shoot, with only a rugby ball.

He is the first New Zealander to feature in the Body Issue since it was launched in 2009, and only the second rugby player.

“I worked really hard with my body to get it right,” Tonga-born Fekitoa said on an ESPN “Behind the Scenes” video about the Body Issue shoot.

“I want to show others that you can achieve anything and you can do what you do if you put your mind into it, and your body.”

Original article by ESPN, June 25, 2017.