Australian representative athletes
Wesley College is thrilled to announce that two of our Year 11 students have been selected to represent Australia at the 2015 International Association of Athletics Federations World Youth Championships, to be held in Cali, Columbia later this year. After a gruelling selection process, Jemima Montag and Danielle Shaw will travel to Columbia to compete in the 5,000 metre racewalk and the 100 metre hurdles, respectively.
Both students have been involved in athletics from a young age, and the road to selection for the championships has been a long one. In order to be selected Jemima and Danielle had to be placed first or second at the national championships and secondly, achieve a qualifying time set by Athletics Australia.
It’s clear that Jemima loves athletics, whether that be representing Australia or Wesley. While there is no racewalking team in the APS athletics competition, she still loves participating, “It has been incredible to be a part of the Wesley Firsts’ Athletics team in recent years, because we have had such strong and motivated teams that consistently win APS premierships. Often athletics can be a lonely sport, however the ‘team’ nature that comes with Wesley’s athletics and cross country program is fantastic, and no amount of purple face paint, war cries or team huddles will ever be too many.”
Jemima considers her greatest sporting achievement to date was winning a bronze medal representing Australia at the World Racewalking Cup in China, 2014. She says, “It was the first time an Australian junior female team had won a medal which was incredibly exciting. The feeling of standing up on the podium on a world stage as they raised the Australian flag and presented us with our medals was incredible.”
In the coming weeks, both students will focus on their training on top of their Victorian Certificate of Education commitments.
For Danielle this involves a jam-packed schedule of technique, interval and plyometric training. She says having a great squad to train with makes it all the more fun, however what she really loves about athletics is competing. Danielle loves the feeling of “being on the start line, and the excitement of achieving a personal best or winning. It’s all worth it when you can see your hard work pay off.”
Achieving her first qualifying time was one of these moments for Danielle. After coming close many times, and missing out by only .01 seconds on two occasions, she took the chance to travel to Canberra for the opportunity to compete again and qualify. She considers her win in Canberra to be one of her greatest sporting moments.
Danielle can’t wait to travel to Columbia, saying “to be running at an international level for the first time is so exciting, knowing I that I am competing against the best in the world.
I’ve never been overseas before, so I am very excited to experience a different country for the first time. I’m also looking forward to meeting some of the other athletes from different countries.”
Looking ahead, both Jemima and Danielle hope to be able to represent Australia again. Danielle is already thinking about the World Junior Championships in 2015, and Jemima says she would “love to be an Olympic gold medallist for Australia and hopefully one day inspire others to pursue their dreams in whatever area of life that may be”.
Wesley congratulates both students on an outstanding athletic achievement. We will be cheering for you in Columbia!
