UPDATE: Thank you so much to everyone who has donated so far! Your generosity means the absolute world and has made the world of difference, and will continue to! <3

After a long international competition hiatus due to COVID-19 and with a rough start to the year, 2022 has presented me with more opportunities than any other year has previously, that unfortunately, come with a price tag.

The opportunities presented to me have resulted in the following so far:

• I became the Australian National Champion for Senior Women's DMT for the first time! At the same competition, myself and my teammates also won the Women's DMT team event for Queensland. I also followed up my national title by winning the Senior Women's DMT title at the Australian National Clubs Championships, the first time I have won both titles in the same year.
• I travelled to Coimbra, Portugal for the 2022 Coimbra World Cup, where I came 3rd in Senior Women's DMT - my first international medal as a senior athlete!
• I was selected as the Australian reserve athlete for World Games in Birmingham, USA, to be held in July - and World Games is like the Olympics for the non-Olympic sports and disciplines!
• As of th 27th of September, I have been selected onto the Australian team headed to the 2022 World Championships in Sofia, Bulgaria. This is my third Open World Championships team (and the tenth Aussie team selection of my career!), and I am incredibly excited to compete this November!

Attending these competitions and getting to do my sport on the world stage means the world to me, but unfortunately as a double mini athlete, every competition is self-funded as we are a non-Olympic discipline. My average international competition bill sits around $6000.

I train 5 days a week on the trampolines and 2 days in the gym with strength work, along with working two casual jobs to pay for living and training alongside these competition costs, so any additional funding is incredibly helpful and appreciated.

I am also extremely lucky that one of my two jobs is getting to coach junior athletes at Robertson Gymnastics and help them find their own love of my sport, which I absolutely love to get to do (but unfortunately, again, doesn't have the highest payrate.). I'm also studying an Exercise and Sports Science degree, with intentions of progressing to a masters program next year, to enable me to work within gymnastics and continue to assist the next generation of athletes to get to where I am today.

It's been a rough couple of years for myself and my family, which resulted in losing Dad to cancer in Feburary, but I am incredibly grateful to Mum for continuing to support me through it all, and I would love to be able to give back to her by being able to support my competition and training on my own. This sport has assisted me to become the person I am today, and allowed me to do what I love while exploring the world, and for that, I am incredibly grateful.

Any support means the absolute world to me, and I thank you in advance from the bottom of my heart.

Thank you so much for at least clicking on the page and reading what I had to say, and if you'd like to see more of what I do and my journey, I have linked my Instagram below!

https://www.instagram.com/carinaa_h/