Based out of Wellington I am a 21-year-old middle distance runner, aiming to reach the highest level of the sport. Throughout my childhood sport was a massive part of my life whether it was hockey, cycling or running. During college I always played several sports, but It wasn’t until 2016 that I realised I wanted to pursue athletics at the highest level and turned all my attention to it
In 2016 I had my breakthrough year, I won my first national title and represented New Zealand at the IAAF world u20 championships. At these championships I placed 13th and in the process set a new national U20 record and ranked myself 18th on the NZ all time rankings. While this was a good result it wasn’t one that I wasn’t satisfied with and I was left striving for more. Competing at the championships opened my eyes to international competition this ignited my desire to pursue a career in athletics with the goal of reaching the top of the sport.
Upon return from these championships I settled back into training only to become injured and spend the majority of 2017 recovering. While this was a massive setback it has proven to set a solid platform for the coming years. The injuries forced us to implement and refine a support network of people all striving for the same goal of success.
This team of people includes: my family, athletics NZ, a strength and conditioning coach, a team of physio/ massage therapist and sports doctors and importantly my coach Evan Cooper. For the coming years I am basing myself in NZ under his guidance, this is currently an irregular choice with most moving to the NCAA programme. Although this is a choice I believe will ultimately give myself the best chance of success.
Following 2017 we battled form due to the limited build up, although in the process we recorded PB’s in both the 400 and 1500. This was accompanied by silver medals in both the open men’s 1500 and 800m at the New Zealand Track and Field Championships.
Now that I have a solid build up in place, I am setting my sights on a European campaign with the goal to set myself up to qualify for next year’s world championships in Doha. During June and July of this year I will be based in Leuven Belgium, here I will race 6 times throughout Europe competing and training around the best in athletics. This will give myself the best chance to knock significant time off my PB and get close to a qualifier.
I am extremely grateful for the support from the trust as it enables me to strive for my dream and give myself the best chance of success, it also supports my goal of achieving this goal while based in New Zealand.
