Richie Norton is the ex-rugby player turned ’yogi adrenaline junkie’. He started his fitness career playing rugby in the UK before moving overseas to New Zealand and the US, but for the past ten years he’s been working alongside sports professionals and some of the most respected pioneers of human performance. Today his day job involves getting actors movie-ready and athletes game-ready, experimenting with meditation, breathwork, callisthenics, capoeira and his beloved yoga.
It’s been quite a transition – and one which was forced upon him. “I was in my mid-20s,” says Norton, “I’d suffered a combination of various injuries throughout my rugby playing years: my sciatica had become quite bad, I dislocated my jaw, suffered from concussion and had an MCL rupture.” Te game had taken its toll on his body and the outcome would hit his mental state, too. “It led to me being told I’d struggle to recover fully. After a few years of battling this mental torment, I found yoga.”