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Marine biology’s loss has proved to be rugby’s gain in the case of Luke Charteris.
As a teenager contemplating his career path, he had no inkling that a life in professional rugby lay ahead of him.
“Natural sciences and geology was the route I was looking to go down – marine biology, that sort of thing,” he reveals.
“It’s just something that always really interested me. As a youngster, I was quite into surfing. I would spend all of my summers in St Davids on the coast down there.
“So God knows where I would have ended up – a tropical island somewhere!”
As it turned out, he wasn’t to end up anywhere quite that exotic, but he has certainly seen the world through rugby having been his job for the past 25 years.
There was a playing career which brought him 74 globe-trotting caps for Wales – sharing in a Grand Slam and two World Cups along the way – plus spells with clubs in France and England following a long stay with the Dragons.
Since hanging up his boots, the 6ft 9ins former second row has moved into coaching and now works with the up and coming talent at Bath.
None of it was expected, but it’s all been very gratefully received.
Charteris was born in the Cornish town of Camborne, but relocated to west Wales when he was just a couple of months old, growing up in and around Llandeilo.
“Both of my parents are English, but moved to Wales and loved it and wanted to stay down there. So that was it really,” he explains.
“They are still down there and it will always be home for me. It was such a great place to be brought up and to live. I have so many fond memories of there and I’ve still got friends from school who live in the area, so it’s nice to go back and see everyone.”
After first taking up rugby at primary school and with his home-town club in Llandeilo, he moved on to Llandovery RFC while at Ysgol Tre-Gib.
“I always used to be one of the fast ones, so I was in the backs, at outside-half or centre, until I was 13 or 14.
“But then this one year, they just said ‘You are too tall to play there’.
“I didn’t even get to go in the back row, I went straight from the centre into the second row and never really moved from there again.
“Once I went there, I preferred the action. I just always loved tackling and getting stuck in, so it suited me perfectly.”
It was also a move which made sense given his increasing height.
“I just remember coming back to school after one summer and suddenly knocking my head on the doors and stuff,” he says.
“So I must have had a pretty good growth spurt over that summer! Doors are like 6ft 6ins, so I reckon I must have just hit 6ft 7ins at that point. I would have been about 16.”
In his final year in school, he was called up by Wales U18s and then came the move to Bath University to study Sport and Exercise Science.
That’s where he reached a fork in the road.
“I did a pre-season with Bath and they offered me what at the time was a very good contract.
“But the WRU found out and they were adamant I had to sign for a Welsh team.
“Because I was English qualified, they were worried about me playing for England.
“But I definitely wouldn’t have done that. The thought never even crossed my mind.
“I consider myself completely Welsh. It was never going to be an option.
“But, from the political side of it, they wanted to make sure.
“So, being pretty naive and without an agent, I ended up turning down a very good financial offer to go to Bath and joining Newport for a fraction of the salary.
“I got ridiculed for that for quite a few years!
“It made life a bit harder in the first few years. I was travelling back and forth from University to Newport every day to train.
“But it did mean I was playing senior rugby and whether that would have come around so soon at Bath is impossible to say.
“So it all turned out well in the end.”
Indeed it did, as Charteris was fast-tracked into the international set-up.
After making his Newport debut in April 2003, having only just turned 20, he then linked up with the newly formed Dragons under Mike Ruddock.
“Mike was brilliant in what was quite a tough gig getting different clubs to merge into one and all the off the field stuff that went with it.
“He was really good. He gave me opportunities and I always got on really well with him.”
When Ruddock was appointed Wales coach in 2004, one of his early moves was to call up the young second row he had worked with at the Dragons.
So it was that in November of that year, the 21-year-old Charteris found himself making his Test debut against South Africa before he had started a single game of regional rugby, with all of his 10 or so outings having come off the bench up to that point.
“I was straight in there, so I didn’t have much time to worry about it,” he says.
“I remember it was against Victor Matfield and Bakkies Botha. They were two pretty awesome, well-established second rows to go up against in your first game.
“But I just remember the whole experience being outstanding. I loved it. It was a really close game. We ended up losing by just a couple of points in the end.”
Having taken his bow versus the ‘Boks as a sub, he started the next game against Romania, being partnered in the second row by Gareth Llewellyn, some 14 years his senior.
But injury then ruled him out of the meeting with New Zealand a week later and that was to become something of a theme for the next few years as he was sidelined during the 2005 and 2008 Grand Slams, with his caps coming only intermittently.
“That was a frustrating period. I can remember it still now,” he says.
“I was just on a real rubbish run of injuries.
“I was always getting picked in the squad, but then I would get a few niggles and I never really got a run of games.”
It wasn’t until 2009 that he made his Six Nations debut, but that was to prove something of a turning point, ushering in a lengthy spell of consistent involvement in the match day squad.
“I went from a frustrated few years of being injured a lot to going on a good run of four or five years of not having anything major.
“As soon as you do that, you put yourself in the selection frame and I was lucky enough to play in quite a few games.”
In terms of the highlight of his Test career, he picks out the 2011 World Cup in New Zealand where he started six games, forging a highly effective second row partnership with Alun Wyn Jones.
“That campaign will always stand out as the most enjoyable, the most memorable,” he says.
“We had a bit of a transition in terms of a lot of younger boys coming through, the likes of Taulupe Faletau, Dan Lydiate and Warby.
“We had some really tough training camps over the summer and we were a very tight group after going through all that. We were in such a good place by the time we got to the World Cup.
“We then had the incredible high of the quarter-final victory over Ireland and the low of everything that happened in the semi-final against France.”
That French game in Auckland is, of course, remembered for the early sending off of skipper Sam Warburton for a tip tackle on Vincent Clerc.
“The thing was just no-one thought it was a red card,” says Charteris.
“It was a new rule and I don’t remember anyone ever being sent off for anything other than punching or something like that previously. It was a very different one.
“But, after that, I just remember the game being so close. Even with a man down, we didn’t ever feel like we weren’t in the game or not going to win it. Then it comes down to a kick in the end and another day it goes over the posts and we hang on and win. But it wasn’t to be.
“We honestly believed if we had won that France game we could have gone on and done something in the final. All the momentum was there with us. I think that was probably the best Welsh team I was involved with.
“The whole experience was incredible and that’s the one campaign that definitely stands out among all the others.”
A few months later, Charteris was to share in the 2012 Six Nations Grand Slam, coming on as a replacement in the clincher against France in Cardiff.
“It was good because of everything that happened in the World Cup,” he says.
“That was the pleasing thing, that we kept that momentum going. It was pretty much the same squad.
“The experiences of that World Cup, the conditioning levels we had from the year before, all of it kept us going on a really good trajectory into the following couple of years.”
Moving forward, 2015 was to prove another big year for the big lock.
In March, he set a new record for the most tackles in a Six Nations fixture, making 31 in a 23-16 victory over Ireland at the Millennium Stadium.
It’s a tally which was only finally surpassed this year, with Wales flanker Alex Mann putting in 33 against the same opposition in Dublin.
“The way Ireland play the game, I reckon if you had my top five matches for the most tackles I made, they would all be against them,” said Charteris.
“I think I made something like 37 against them in a friendly one year.
“It’s just because of the way they play, their style. They keep the ball and they always attack round the fringes with the forwards. So, whenever you play Ireland, you are in for a tough day.
“With Alex getting the record against them recently, you can see they haven’t changed. They still play that same style of rugby.”
He continued: “We had some really good games against Ireland over the years. They were always so hard, such physical games, with the way they play and the way they keep the ball.
“Whether it was against Paul O’Connell or Donncha O’Callaghan, there were always some real tough battles in the second row. Some of those games really stood out.”
As for his serial tackling which particularly came to the fore against the Irish, Charteris says: “Defence is always something I enjoyed.
“That was half the reason I loved playing second row. You are always in the middle of it, you’ve got a chance to make loads of tackles and to get involved. That was probably my strength, my fitness and my workrate. It was something I loved from an early age.”
THAT England moment
Later on in 2015 came another memorable match for Charteris, as he took a key role in injury-ravaged Wales beating England 28-25 at Twickenham during that autumn’s World Cup.
With just three minutes to go, the hosts were awarded a kickable penalty, but rather than going for goal to tie things up they opted to go for the corner and the win.
That was the cue for Charteris to make arguably the most significant intervention of his whole career.
First he drove Chris Robshaw back after the England skipper had claimed the lineout at the front and he then wrapped himself around Joe Launchbury, forcing the opposing lock into touch with the ball.
Just to add the icing to the cake, he won the resulting defensive lineout as he helped Warren Gatland’s Wales see out time for a famous victory.
“We all thought they would go for the draw because there were still a couple of games left in the pool,” he says.
“But they went for it, which was a challenge and we took it on, which was quite good!
“In terms of feeling, the dressing room after that game was something I’d not really experienced before. That was incredible.”
The lineout maul defence which Charteris demonstrated in the decisive dying minutes of that win over England was one of his great strengths, with his telescopic reach making him such an effective disruptor.
“I learned a huge amount from Gats when it came to maul defence,” he says.
“He was really good at that side of things, with just some of the little technical things you can do, ways of manipulating opposition and all that sort of stuff.”
Charteris won the vast majority of his caps under Kiwi coach Gatland.
“His super strength was the way he organised the squad, how he set up all the things off the field to make sure you had the best of the best. He put all those things together. “He also instilled incredible confidence in you. He made you work incredibly hard, but it was for a reason.
“You would feel incredible when you came out of one of those training camps and you were ready to fly into things. “That’s what Gats and the backroom staff were so good at. They just got us in such a good place physically, but also mentally in terms of our confidence and togetherness.
“As a result, we kind of went above where we were expected to be going.”
Alongside Gatland throughout his first spell in charge of Wales was defence guru Shaun Edwards.
“Shaun was one of the best coaches I have had over the years,” says Charteris.
“It takes a while to get to know him and break him down. In the first two or three campaigns, he probably only muttered two or three words to me.
“But once you get to know him, then he’s so open.
“His technical understanding of the defensive stuff, which is an area I really enjoyed, is so good.
“People see him and just think he is such a brash guy who goes on emotion, but actually his technical detail behind the scenes, how he breaks down opposition teams and players and how he coaches you around that is outstanding. That’s why he has been so successful.
“Neither him nor Gats are coaches who will speak a huge amount or have massive amounts of interaction with players. But what you do get from them is quality.
“Once they get to know you, they will see what motivates you, what makes you tick, what you need and they certainly brought out the best in the people around them.
“They were two brilliant coaches and I would chuck Robin McBryde in there as well because he was my forwards coach for pretty much all of that time.”
The best of the best
As for the best player he played with for Wales, he has no hesitation in his response.
“Taulupe Faletau – he was just another level.
“He had all the skillset, with his handling ability, so he had all the flashy stuff that you see on the highlight reels, but why I put him above everyone else is he also does all the little things so, so well.
“Like the quality of his lineout jump, the quality of his lifting, how he defends the maul, his scrummaging, his breakdown. He just had every facet of the game, he could do it all so well. And then, on top of that, he had an incredible workrate.
“He would be top carrier every game, he would be in the top two or three for tackles, he would be hitting a load of rucks. So, on top of all his skillset, he had an outstanding work ethic as well and I think that’s why he’s been such a good player.”
On the club front, Charteris spent nine years with the Dragons, making 142 appearances, and then had spells at French clubs Perpignan and Racing 92.
“I had two years in Perpignan that were incredible off the field.
“It was my first time moving outside of Wales and experiencing the Top14. I absolutely loved it. Lifestyle-wise, it was amazing.
“But, from a pure rugby point of view, the two years at Racing (2014-16) were the best of my career.
“I was playing in a Galactico team with so many superstars. We went from Johnny Sexton at 10 one year and then the next year Dan Carter came in. So that wasn’t a bad replacement!
“We were playing really well and winning things. We won the Top 14 and got to the Champions Cup final one year and the semi-final the other.
“You were just surrounded by quality coaches and quality players. We had a good little Welsh contingent there, with Jamie Roberts, Dan Lydiate and Mike Phillips, plus all these other internationals.
“Even though it came at the back end of my career, I reckon I had more growth as a player in those two years than anywhere else.
“I learned so much from the technical side of it about the lineout and forward play in general.
“I think I played my best rugby during that period. I was fit and I was playing well. I was in a good space.”
He adds: “I used to be bad. I used to relive every little decision and think about what’s gone wrong.
“But then, as you get older, you start to realise you are going to win some and you are going to lose some.
“As long as you are out there giving 100 per cent, just giving everything you have got, you can’t really have too many regrets.”
Life after playing
Charteris rounded off his playing days with a three year stint at Bath before hanging up his boots in 2019 and moving into a coaching role with the west country club.
“Towards the back end of my playing career, I got more interested in coaching and started thinking it’s something I’d like to do,” he explains.
“I don’t miss the playing side of it. I was definitely done after 18 years as a professional!
“I am a transition coach now, looking after all the younger boys coming through.
“It’s a busy role, but I enjoy it. It’s long days, there is a lot of time that goes into it, but it’s very rewarding, with the impacts you can have day to day. I am still loving it.”
Now 43, Charteris has two sons – aged 10 and 13 – both of whom were born in France, while Bath remains home, as it has for much of his adult life.
“It’s a great place to live. You have got good schools, good friends. It’s a pretty good part of the world. It’s not bad.”
Finally, looking back on it all, he says: “When I was leaving school, I didn’t even think I would be a professional rugby player, let alone play for Wales.
“But you just kind of get on this journey. One door opens and you just keep fighting and pushing to go through another one.
“Once you are in it, it’s a whirlwind and then suddenly it’s 13, 14 years later and it’s finished.
“As I say, I left school, going to university, thinking I was never going to be working in rugby. I was planning my career outside of it.
“But I have been employed from day one in rugby. I have never been employed in anything other than rugby, so I’m very fortunate.
“You have to give a lot of yourself to the game. There are a lot of sacrifices in any professional sport, in terms of time and sacrifices with family.
“But it’s an incredibly rewarding route to go down and I am very grateful to have had some pretty awesome experiences over the years. I feel very proud and lucky.
“You form some really strong bonds along the way. That’s the biggest thing when you look back, some quality friendships and people who I still speak to every week. That sort of thing is class.”
So, no regrets about missing out on a life in marine biology then?
“It’s a slight change, isn’t it?” he replies.
“Maybe I will get back to it one day as my second career, we will see! But I am happy at the moment.”
