Hani Watson has spent the days in the lead-up to her Paralympic powerlifting debut working her muscles and eating mussels.
But when you have to fuel a body to compete in the 86kg+ classification, want to better the world bench press record of 160kg, and grew up idolising Arnold Schwarzenegger, you don’t do things by halves.
"Where we've been staying they're a local delicacy and they come in these giant buckets, there’s like 150 of them," Watson told AAP from the seaside town of Berck sur Mer.
"So I challenged my coach to a competition to eat all the mussels the fastest.
"I think he forgot I’m an Islander. He’s got delicate hands and I’m a coconut and I beat him by about five minutes."
Watson’s mussel consumption is on top of a rigorous diet where she aims to hit a target of close to 200g of protein per day.
The self-styled "Bench Queen" has four boiled eggs and four pieces of toast for breakfast, three protein shakes per day on top of big portions of chicken and sweet potato.
As Watson explains when "every day is bench day" and you train for four hours, you need the fuel.
The 41-year-old’s interest in shifting tin was piqued by her Niuean father Charlie, a natural bodybuilder whose glossy magazines boasting pictures of Schwarzenegger and Joe Weider were Watson's childhood reading.
Watson was born with metaphyseal dysplasia, a condition which left her with bowed legs.
"He had an old school set-up at his place, those bikes with giant fans and I’d sit there creating a fan while he was pumping," Watson said.
"I was just mucking and then he said to me, 'If you’re going to sit there, then you might as well start lifting'."
Charlie died when Watson was in her teens and she lost her mother, Laurita, last year but not before the powerlifter won bronze at the Commonwealth Games in Birmingham in 2022.
"When I sit there and think about dad and mum, I just turn on the waterworks," Watson said.
"Mum said to my brother before she passed that I was born to do this."
Watson’s build-up to her Paralympic debut has not been without its setbacks but she's confident of creating history in Paris when she competes on Sunday.
"I’ve almost died twice from anaphylaxis, in the two months before leaving for Paris I was in ICU," Watson said.
"I’ve taken a massive hit, I keep joking around there’s been an assassination attempt on the (Bench) Queen.
"But I’ve come to Paris with a different mindset and said this isn’t going to beat me.
"(This week) I hit a new PB in training … I won’t tell you what it is but I’m closer to where I want to be."
