I am a junior taekwondo athlete who has represented Australia twice at Taekwondo Cadet World Championships. In 2023 I was able to win a silver medal for Australia at the Taekwondo Cadet World Championships in Sarajevo. This year I have just been selected to represent Australia again, this time at the Taekwondo Junior World Championships that will be held in Korea in October. This is my first year in the junior age group where I will put myself to the test against an older age group of athletes.

This year I have been categorised as an emerging athlete by Australian Taekwondo and am part of the Performance Pathway Program. I have also been awarded a South Australian Sports Institute Individual Scholarship. While I can now access small amounts of funding support through SASI , this doesn't cover trips within Australia or the significant cost of overseas trips.

In the remainder of 2024 I will undertake a number of trips including:

• travel to Brisbane in September for the World Taekwondo President's Cup and Australian Open
• travel to the National Performance Centre Melbourne to prepare for the Junior World Championships
• travel in October to Korea to represent Australia at the Junior World Championships
• travel to Brisbane in November for the taekwondo National Championships

So far this year I have already taken a number of other taekwondo trips (mostly at my own expense). These include:

• 1 week training camp at the AIS, Canberra
• 1 week training at National Performance Centre, Melbourne
• 2 week training camp in Korea
• 1 week in Sydney for Junior World Championship selection competition where I was selected for the Australian team
• 2 weeks in Korea for the Chuncheon Korea Open where I won gold

All of these trips require me to pay my own costs from flights, to accommodation, to car hire to get to venues, and entry fees for competitions.

My long term ambitions are to represent Australia at the 2026 Youth Olympics in Senegal, and then hopefully the 2028 Olympics in LA and the 2032 Olympics in Brisbane. But this will need many overseas trips to competitions to accrue the points and experience necessary to qualify for the Olympics.

If you are in a position to help me with a small contribution towards these expenses it would be greatly appreciated as I continue to represent Australia and keep working towards my aspirations of one day representing Australia at the Olympics.