Leicester Tigers stars come to Melton to try out extreme sport series

Tatafu Polota-Nau, a Rugby World Cup finalist, Valentino Mapapalangi, Greg Bateman and Chris Baumann joined 30 people to try out the extreme sport that involves athletes sawing, slicing and chopping wood at sport, using axes and saws.

Stihl TIMBERSPORTS® is in fact, the second longest running show on ESPN and is watched by more than 20 million people worldwide.

In October, the Stihl TIMBERSPORTS® World Championships will be hosted in the UK for the very first time at the Echo Arena in Liverpool. The competition will see leading athletes, from more than 20 nations around the globe, compete in a series of thrilling woodchopping challenges and the event is expected to be a sell out and attended by over 8,000 people.

Ahead of the World Championships, the Leicester Tigers took part in three out of the six Stihl TIMBERSPORTS® disciplines, the Underhand Chop, one of the three axe disciplines, as well as Stock Saw and Single Buck, two of the three sawing disciplines.

The taster weekend involved expert training from the current head of the Stihl Great Britain training program, former British champion Spike Milton and Glen Penlington, the current British number three athlete.