Whanganui-based boxer Niwa Barlow is relishing the potential opportunity to represent New Zealand at the 2026 Commonwealth Games in his first competitive year.
The 103kg, 188cm (6ft 2in), super heavyweight amateur boxer has only lost two fights in 13 matches so far in his boxing career.
Those two losses wereby split decision against the reigning New Zealand champion, 35-year-old Jordan Collins, from Wellington.
He attended New Plymouth Boys’ High School, where he played for the First XV as a winger and went on to be selected for the New Zealand Māori Under-18, Chiefs Under-20 and Taranaki Development teams.
After the 2022 season, Barlow stepped away from rugby to follow his true passion, which was combat sports.
“A big thing that was always said in the [rugby] development camps was around if you don’t love what you are doing, then you’re not going to make it,” he said.
“What I came to understand at the end of that process was that I’d rather be a poor fighter than a rich rugby player.
“I’d rather just be doing what I love to do and I came to that conclusion right as I was knocking on the door with rugby.”
Barlow used to kickbox when he was a child and was an amateur Muay Thai fighter “on the side” for most of his life.
At the start of 2025, he quit his job to focus on boxing.
Barlow has spent the past three years in Whanganui and has been training at the Marton Boxing Club for the past 18 months.
He said he had surprised himself, and the people around him with his first year of competitive boxing.
“One thing I learned in rugby was how to apply myself, and that was for a sport that I didn’t want to do, so now my commitment and intensity of attention is so much greater,” Barlow said.
After he conquered his fear of the ring, it was difficult not to “go the other way” by being too energetic and eager, he said.
His two losses to Collins were “absolutely necessary” to progress to where he was now.
“After I lost, it was a nice reset. It purged away all of my old ego that I was bringing with me,” he said.
Barlow said he wasn't getting the same enjoyment from playing rugby. Photo / Fin Ocheduszko Brown
In early December, the 24-year-old beat Collins in the 2026 New Zealand Commonwealth Games boxing trials.
“I need to live my life and dream; I’ll do it until I die,” he said.
“I’ll never give up on the stuff that I care about, it’s one way or no way for me, and this is the way.”
Representing the country would be the ultimate “thank you” to the people who have supported him and his coaches, Lewis Lye and Collin Smith.
“I couldn’t do it by myself, the performance is done individually but the growth and training that you need, you couldn’t do by yourself,” Barlow said.
“I feel like the best way I can give my thanks is by doing something with myself.
