Between Two Beers Podcast - Pita Taufatofua: After The Opening Ceremony

Publish Date
Monday, 20 September 2021, 8:36AM

Pita Taufatofua broke the internet in 2016! But that was after 20 years of graft to achieve a childhood goal of becoming an Olympian in taekwondo.

When he walked out at the opening ceremony of the Rio Olympic Games covered in coconut oil and shirtless as the Tongan flagbearer he achieved worldwide fame but that’s only scratching the surface of his story.

In this episode we look at the 24 hours after the ceremony, and the hundreds of opportunities that it presented daily after he Games including turning down a million dollar movie offer.

Instead he embarked on an epic journey to qualify for the 2018 Winter Olympics in cross-country skiing, before returning to the Olympics in taekwondo, making history as the person to have qualified and competed in three consecutive Olympics.

In between he’s been interviewed shirtless by Snoop Dogg and Kevin Hart, mingled with Prince Harry and Meghan Markle, and picked up enough stores along the way to be turned into a Hollywood blockbuster.



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