Paralympian Kurt Fearnley shares impact of Paralympics ahead of Brisbane 2032 games
While sharing his story with Queensland students, renowned world champion Kurt Fearnley has revealed how the Paralympics changed his life.
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Despite growing up in regional Australia with a physical disability, Kurt Fearnley said he always felt loved by his family and community.
They lifted him up. Continuously reassuring him that he was enough and capable of greatness.
Fearnley was raised to push his limits and strive for success.
No obstacle, visible or hiding in the shadows, stood a chance in his race to glory.
His parents, family, and local community instilled to him lessons of love, acceptance, understanding, hard work, determination and resilience.
He started wheelchair racing at just 14 years old.
Fearnley was inspired by the Sydney 2000 Paralympic Games that changed his life forever.
Now, he’s one of Australia’s most celebrated athletes.
His career is as impressive as it is extensive.
Fearnley represented Australia at five Paralympic Games, winning three gold, seven silver and three bronze medals, and was co-captain of the 2016 Australian Paralympic Team alongside Para-table tennis player Danni Di Toro.
His family and friends watched him go from pushing his wheelchair as fast as he could down the grass track at school athletics carnivals, to pushing it the last five kilometres of the men’s marathon T54 on a flat tyre to win gold at the Athens 2004 Paralympic Games.
In 2018 Fearnley capped his decorated career with gold in the men’s marathon T54 and silver in the men’s 1500m T54 at the Commonwealth Games.
After setting a Commonwealth record in the marathon, he became the first Para-athlete in history to carry the Australian flag into a Commonwealth Games Closing Ceremony.
After his retirement from Para-athletics, Fearnley was named the 2019 NSW Australian of the Year. He became the first Paralympian to receive the Sport Australia Hall of Fame’s prestigious The Don award, and is a member of Paralympics Australia’s Board of Directors.
The 44-year-old from Carcoar, a small town in regional NSW, lives with Lumbar sacral agenesis.
As part of his role as a Brisbane 2032 Olympic and Paralympic board director Fearnley visited Kawana Waters State College with fellow board member and Olympian Jessica Fox, and the board president Andrew Liveris.
While there on Thursday, April 3, they spoke to students and media.
“When the Paralympic Games were named in Sydney it found me isolated in a little town in the bush,” Fearnley said.
“It changed my life and opened up my world.
“The hope is that there is a kid with a disability in southeast Queensland or here on the Sunshine Coast who saw the announcement of 2032 coming to this space right here and this will be the moment, the catalyst that changes the way they see themselves and the way the community see them.”
Fearnley said the games changed his life and he couldn’t wait for them to do the same for disabled children across the state.
“I can’t wait to hear the stories of change that were sparked by these games coming to this state,” he said.
“It’s an exciting time for the Sunshine Coast and it’s an exciting time for the people with disability bringing a celebration of disabled people through the Paralympic movement here and Brisbane in 2032.”
The Sunshine Coast schoolchildren held on to his every word, captivated by the rare chance to hear from a sporting hero.
“As a disabled person I think it (the Paralympics in Sydney) was a way to shift the way my peers saw me when I was going through a pretty vulnerable time,” Fearnley said.
“When you are a teenager, especially a teenager with a disability, you feel like you’ve got to hide that part of you but when it’s a visible disability you can’t hide that.
“It reframed that.
“Not in my own mind but trying to reframe that in the people around me in the way that they looked at me and the way that they saw me.
“Just to go from this deficit kind of look that I would receive every day, that they may not have realised they were putting on me, but this idea that I was not the same of them and that not the same as them was less; it all got reframed through sport.
“I was able to grab that and then use that to challenge the way my peers saw me for a period of time.
“That really changed my entire schooling experience.”
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Originally published as Paralympian Kurt Fearnley shares impact of Paralympics ahead of Brisbane 2032 games
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