Jakara Anthony’s stunning path to Beijing Olympic Gold

The Olympics seemed a world away for a tearful Jakara Anthony at a gruelling training session in Geelong in 2012. But it proved the turning point to gold thanks to the help of a world champion.

A timid teenager overawed in her first strength and conditioning session, 14-year-old Jakara Anthony was in tears as she prepared to take her first steps in the Barwon Sports Academy.

A decade on, the ice-cool Barwon Heads mogul skier is a legend of Australian sport after securing the nation’s sixth Winter Olympics gold medal.

Jakara Anthony in 2012, after she shrugged off tears.

A shy and nervous Anthony showed her courage to dry her eyes and step into the breach in that first training session in 2012, where she was taken the wing of five-time water ski world champion Jacinta Carroll.

“I would say the first session she was this timid, shy, young girl from Barwon Heads who walked into a training session with 20-30 people and she looked really overwhelmed,” academy chief executive Cameron Loftus said.

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“I grabbed mum (Sue) and went over the road and had a coffee and left (Anthony) with (coaches Steve Lewery and Chelsey Cameron) and she didn’t look back from there.

“I also credit that initial making her feel comfortable to Jacinta Carroll. That is a really important one to be in an environment where you are seeing people training really well.”

Jakara Anthony sees her gold medal winning score. Picture: Getty Images

Always determined, once Anthony got into her work she gave it everything.

That nervous teen was a far cry from the mentally strong 23-year-old who took a deep breath in Beijing on Sunday night knowing that another excellent run down the mogul course would net her gold.

Watching at the bottom of the course in her role as a Channel 7 commentator Lydia Lassila – who was at the time Australia’s most recent Winter Olympics gold medallist – could only see a world-beating athlete.

“She was a star and I could definitely tell she was ‘on’ throughout the whole contest” Lassila told the Geelong Addy from Beijing.

“She dominated from day one of training and carried the momentum all the way though to the super final and that final run. What a champ, we are so proud.”

Anthony punches the air as she passes the finish line on her winning run. Picture: Getty Images

Lassila shared tears with another fellow gold winner Alisa Camplin, who is the Australian assistant chef de mission in Beijing.

“Jakara’s really come into her own over the last four years,” Camplin told 7.

“The resolve she showed under pressure, that is what we focused on.”

Still baby-faced, Anthony grew up quickly after that first academy session.

She would spend years traversing the globe as a teen, sometimes stranded in a foreign airport forced to find her way to the next stop on a ski tour.

Jakara Anthony with mum Sue when she was named the Geelong Advertiser Junior Sport Star of the year in 2012

“She was sitting there as a 14-15-year-old trying to negotiate flights, she had to become a little travel agent,” Loftus said.

“That’s a really important element, the sacrifice of her family and sitting in lonely airports. She is not just some rich kid who’s mum and dad skied and she got everything handed to her, she has worked her arse off.”

Anthony learned the basics of what it takes to become a champion in the academy and has never stopped giving back though attending luncheons and mentoring Geelong’s next wave of budding stars.

“She will inspire the next run of kids in our region, that is for sure,” Loftus said.

“She epitomises all that is possible.”

Originally published as Jakara Anthony’s stunning path to Beijing Olympic Gold