What do you do when you need to put on a few kilos?
Move in with a prop, of course.
Eoin McKeon has become a real workhorse in the Connacht back row, and adding a bit of extra timber has certainly helped the 24-year-old develop into one of leading lights of the province’s fantastic season.
But the Galway man admits that bulking up to the size required of a top professional hasn’t been the easiest task, at least until he moved out of his parent’s house and started living with props Finlay Bealham and JP Cooney.
“I would have struggled a lot when I was younger at keeping the weight on,” McKeon admits.
“The first season where I broke into the Connacht team I must have been about 103kg, probably the lightest number eight to ever play in the Pro12! Now I’m up around 110, 111kg, that’s kind of ideal for me and I don’t need to stuff myself – I used to have to force feed myself just to get the calories in.
“I used to go away on holidays worried in the back of my mind that I was going to lose weight – I’d lose three or four kilos while some lads might be the opposite.
“Once I moved out of home and moved in with other rugby lads and you’re eating the same as them it becomes easier. I was living with Finlay Bealham last year, and he was making the move from loose head to tight head and he had to put on ten kilos over the year. Having him eating the same amount as me was pretty handy and he was doing a lot of the cooking as well.”
McKeon and Connacht’s season remains very much alive on two fronts and it’s a measure of the growth of rugby in the west that huge victories over Leinster and Munster earlier in the campaign are being taken fully in stride, even as the excitement continues to build among a growing fanbase.
“They call this the business end of the season and there’s a bit of a buzz around the place,” says McKeon. “We’re taking it game by game and everyone is always looking forward to the next game.
“People keep saying, especially after that Leinster game, ‘Oh you must on cloud nine’, or whatever, but it’s been an ongoing theme all season that we realise we are a good side and we’re one of the top sides in the league.
“I don’t think it’s gone to anyone’s head. We’ll celebrate wins, obviously, don’t get me wrong, but we haven’t won anything, we haven’t technically achieved anything yet. Once we win a game it’s always on to the next one. We’re not getting caught up in one-off victories.
“It was a bit sweet to beat Munster, they’re the only team I hadn’t beaten before, but if anything, after that Leinster game it was more a case of silencing the doubters, people who were saying Leinster were back to full strength and that Connacht had benefited from an easy ride at the start of the year when the internationals were away.
“Beating them proved it to ourselves that we are a good side. Then when you see how much it means to the supporters, that’s when it hits home that what you’re doing is a big achievement.”
Despite their lofty position – they are level on points with Leinster at the top of the Pro12 with just three games remaining – their initial target remains a top-six finish and qualification for next season’s Champions Cup.
But even that ambition is on hold this week as Connacht return to European action with a Challenge Cup quarter-final against Grenoble.
“At the start of the year, Champions Cup was the number one goal, and is until we have that completely nailed on – unlikely as it is I think we can fall out of that – but for now that’s parked as everything is about beating Grenoble and getting on to the semi-final,” McKeon said.
“Then we’ll reassess the following week when we play Munster. If we win that that confirms the top six and we can look forward to a possible semi-final in the Pro12.
“We played Grenoble in preseason here but it was out first game and it was their last one before the season so they were much further along and got a win over us, but we’re not afraid of going over there. We’ll have a gameplan and as long as we stick to our structures I’d be pretty positive of getting a result.”
Eoin McKeon was at The Sportsground, Galway where Good4U were announced as the Official Snack Supplier of Connacht Rugby.
