Rae is an Australian Dual Summer and Winter Paralympian and plays with the ParaMatildas who won the IFCPF Asia Oceania Championships in 2023. She also spends her time involved in a range of public speaking events and working with various disability organisations.
After all my surgeries and physical therapy, I was finally able to join in local club sport at age 9. Soccer was my first love. I competed in my local club and for my school in the senior team as the only junior for 3 years. In year 6, I went on a school trip to the Australian Institute of Sport and met an Australian Paralympian who taught me about the Paralympics and encouraged me to train at the AIS with his coach in Athletics. I took up athletics the following year and excelled in throws. After competing at a Commonwealth Games, 2 World Championships and the Rio Paralympics, my main event, Javelin, was taken out of the Tokyo 2020 Games. With this, my athletics career ended but a new opportunity opened with another chance meeting with the head Para Alpine Ski coach. I was offered an opportunity to compete at Beijing 2022 and qualified in the top 10. After placing top 10 in Slalom and Giant Slalom, Football Australia; having known I played school representative soccer before athletics, asked me to trial for the Para Matildas team that was heading to the World Cup. Since then, we have placed Runners Up at the World Cup, won the Asian-Oceania Championships and are heading to the 2024 World Cup ranked 1st internationally.
Top 7 in Slalom and Runners up in Football World Cup
My skiing highlight is looking up the hill, in the media area after my final run, realising that after everything my team and myself had been through – I not only made the Paralympics, I made top 7. I wasn’t expected to qualify and if I did, I was told I would be aiming to make top 20, not top 7!
My football highlight is running onto the pitch in my first game (a childhood dream) with my name on the back of my Australian jersey.
The next 5 years, we will be World Champions, Paralympic Champions and looking forward to Brisbane 2032 – Where I plan to retire from High Performance sports!
Keep doing what you’re doing – continue to find the next opportunity and embrace it.
Para Sports is not yet a professional sport! But I fell into Para Sports/High Performance Sports through chance meetings with other Paralympians and incredible coaches – I wouldn’t be the athlete I am today without them and everyone who has supported me along the way.
BALANCE! I say this all the time, my academics have supported my sport and my sport have been an outlet from my academics. INVEST! Create an empowering family, community and team around yourself and invest your time and energy in them. A great team can achieve beautiful things, find your team.
I think the above question sort of answered this, but to add to this – find a niche that is entirely yours, that you love – the more you are passionate about it, the easier the balance becomes.
Both recovery and game prep. Recovery sleep is sooo important, so I love jumping in bed with my Thermoair wave leg compression wraps, hidow pro pads and recovery pillow under my paidpod ultralite infrared blanket. Game prep is also great, I love putting my wireless painpods on my calves as I warm up to ensure no game cramping!
One reason I was drawn to Painpod over other brands was the accessibility and freedom they offered with the Hidow Pro and PainPod Heat. The cords with other brands make moving around and training hard, especially with limited fine motor skill. The coreless option is a quicker and practical option to keep me moving free – plus the heat is such an awesome addition!
Every. Single. Para Tillies Training Camp! One of my teammates is a hoot, she is always coming up with the best timed one liners.
Head to Rae's Instagram profile to keep up to date.