The road to Paris Olympics 2024 started in 2018 for Reba.

As a high school student studying VCE Reba was performing on the international stage producing results that made her a strong contender for Tokyo 2020.

A year later in 2019 she was balancing final assessments with 11 weeks of international travel consolidating her opportunity for one of the positions on the 4 member Australian Taekwondo Olympic team. Reba's hard work was paying off as she also secured a Sports Hall of Fame Tier 2 Scholarship as well as being awarded the prestigious Victorian School Sports Awards Outstanding Sporting Achievement for 2019.

In early 2020 Reba won the Oceania Selection event for her division and as part of the Australian team travelled to Europe a tour that was suddenly ended as the pandemic spread across the world and Australia closed its borders.

COVID was devastating on many levels and brought many challenges From a competitive training perspective, athletes in Victoria mostly trained at home in isolation or in very controlled, time managed environments. For Australian Taekwondo athletes’ competition stopped completely. The closed borders prevented suitable international training partners from travelling to Australia for training camps, athlete development or competition preparation.

Despite these challenges, in July 2021, Reba with three other Taekwondo athletes travelled to Tokyo to represent Australia at the 2020 Olympics. While parts of the Olympic journey were an incredible adventure, her performance on the mat was reflective of her not having suitable training environments for over a year and that the Olympics was her first competition in 18 months.

Disappointed and dejected Reba returned to Australia to spend two weeks in isolation in a hotel room away from the support of friends and family. Her performance deeply hurt mentally and emotionally. Full of self-doubt and low in confidence - negative energy dominated her thoughts. Reba returned to training still battling to heal the scars of Tokyo. A serious bout of COVID early in 2022 followed by an injury reduced her taekwondo last year to only a handful of months training and the Australian Taekwondo National Championships where she won Gold on fight night.

Cue 2023… Tokyo, COVID illness and 2022 are very much faded, distant in the rear-view mirror. Reinvigorated and back with the burning passion for taekwondo... Paris 2024 is the focus.

Reba is mostly self-funded. Studying part time a double degree in Sports Science and Psychology she also works four different casual/part time jobs between her fulltime training and travel commitments. While she has very supportive employers, the work is often seasonal or the times clash with travel commitments.

For Reba to continue her journey toward Paris 2024 and focus on making the team she needs additional financial support so she can concentrate on training, competition and preparation. Funds raised go directly to training, travel, equipment and competition costs. All contributions are greatly appreciated