COOLANGATTA GOLD

Luke's Story

My dream for some time now has been to compete in the Coolangatta Gold, racing against the athletes I have always looked up too. The Coolangatta Gold is the toughest Ironman race in the world and consists of a 23km ski paddle, a 3.6km swim, a 5.5km board paddle and finishing with a 10km sand run. The motivation and drive I have to complete in the Coolangatta Gold came from the past president of my AFL club. Last year he asked me if I would be playing football this year and my reply was “I not sure yet I am thinking of competing in the surf life saving season or the Coolangatta Gold.” He then asked “What would you prefer to do?” and I said “I have always dreamed of competing in the Coolangatta Gold.” His reply was “Well what is stopping you?” After searching for a reply I realized that there wasn’t anything stopping me and the only barriers were the ones that I had created.

There were 3 barriers that I created that stopped me from living this dream until now:
1. My work commitments didn’t allow the training time I needed.
2. My commitments to other sporting disciplines such as AFL
3. I thought I had a weakness in one aspect of the competition, that being ski paddling.
This year I have prioritized my work and other sporting commitments which has allowed me to balance my life and free up time for extra training; so that I could focused on improving my ski paddling skills.

My previous 12km paddle from Bondi to Maroubra and back would take on average 85 minutes. By focusing my energy and efforts into improving my technique and performance I can now complete the same route in 56 minutes. That’s the result of 3 months of consistent training. I now paddle 23km with confidence and I am closing the gap on those in the lead.

The conversation I had with my AFL president made me realize that I had put obstacles in front of my goals and I was not working hard enough to achieve my personal best and this is no different to the conversations I have with everyone I train. To achieve your goals and live your dream you need to remove the obstacles. No matter your age, your fitness level or your ability - everyone should have a fitness goal to achieve your personal best.