I became an amputee in 2001, aged 7, due to a Ewing Sarcoma cancer in my right foot. It changed the trajectory of my life more than I could have imagined. I bounced back surprisingly well, being young and naive has its perks! Unfortunately by the time I hit high school, mixing the grief of my amputation, my identity crisis with the turbulent teenage years I really struggled with life. 

 I turned nasty, rude and pretty unpleasant. I got in lots of trouble at home, at school and in general. I liked doing the wrong thing. I found myself leaning towards alcohol & drugs to keep me afloat. They did a great job for a while, but eventually they stopped working and actually began to ruin my life.

At age 21, after years of doing the same thing day in, day out, I decided to change one thing, everything! I moved to Sydney, dropped all my bad habits and created new ones. I started to work on myself from the inside out, dealing with my grief and learning to accept my reality, that I was an amputee. It may have taken 15 years but I finally got to that place where i realised, my toughest experience could be the most pivotal one of my life. Making that choice to stop feeling sorry for myself, and to make the most of my circumstances changed everything.

I learnt to swim at 22, and took to it like a duck to water! (maybe not as gracefully, but you get my point) At that point I knew what I wanted, I wanted to be a Paralympian. To prove to myself, my family, friends, strangers, that anything is achievable with a lot of hard work and dedication.

I moved from Multi Class Swimming to Triathlon at the beginning of 2018, just before my 24th birthday. I was definitely out of my depth, never running 5 km's before, owning a bike or doing open water swimming. As it turns out though I'm not as bad as I thought I was!

I absolutely love the sport, and in the past 12 months have had an amazing growth curve in the sport. From my first race in January, fast forward six months and I was representing Australia as a team member of the National Paratriathlon Team in Canada, in my first International races.

Currently I sit at #19 in the World in my classification (PTS4) with the aim to firstly make headway to the top 10 and qualify for the 2020 Tokyo Paralympics.

Those who know me, know I am an all or nothing person. I leave it all out there. Triathlon has granted me so many amazing opportunities and experiences this past year, I've fallen in love with it, and in turn, have become so focused on the goal and future, that everything else is secondary to my sport and training.

I am not a full time athlete. I still work 4-5 days a week to supplement my cost , on top of the training schedule of a full time athlete.

This page and fundraising has been created with the hope that you reading this are able to support me in anyway possible, big or small. I'm hoping to raise circa $17,000 per annum to cover most predominantly a prosthetic upgrade and travelling overseas to international races, and national races throughout Australia, plus the accommodation that comes with that travel.

Any support or contribution is appreciated more than words can express. I may compete as an individual, but it is the team and support I have behind the scenes that help make all this possible, so jump on board! Join the best team in town, Team Twomey.

All the best, thanks for your time! Liam Twomey