SUCCESS is common for Terang track and field athlete Caytlyn Sharp.
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But what the 16-year-old is now doing off the track is driving her to make other athletes with an intellectual disability successful in their sports.
Sharp, who recently won four gold medals at both the School Sport Victoria state championships and the Athletics Victoria all-school championships, is preparing to head to her fourth consecutive national championships in Cairns in December.
But in the meantime, the Hampden Specialist School student will be presenting at the Sport Inclusion Australia AGM in Melbourne on Friday as a part of her INAS (International Sports Federation for Persons with Intellectual Disability) #WeAreSport ambassador role.
Sharp, who uses social media to promote athletes to try sport, will be part of a Q&A at the event and is looking to help others.
“I want to be a teacher’s aide and I love my sport and want to follow it through but I am looking to help kids like me,” she said.
“I was in a mainstream school and I couldn’t handle it so I want to be able to help kids understand and cope with it.”
Sharp, who will compete in long jump, 100 and 200 metres at nationals, wants kids who have an intellectual disability to understand how a love of sport can help.
“I hated sport when I started and I hated athletics and loved swimming,” she said.
“I would yell and I didn’t want to do it and at the end of the year I won a medal for going every week and from there I loved it.”
Sharp has also been training hard for the upcoming Australian All-Schools Championships with her coach Jeremy Dixon, a former New Zealand national champion runner.
The track and field athlete is preparing for a busy year in 2019 with the world championships for athletics in Doha and three days after her return she has the INAS Global Games in Brisbane.
Sharp is trying to qualify in the long jump for the world championships.
At the INAS event, she will compete in her favourite event, high jump, and also in any athletic event she wishes to enter.
Sean Hardeman
I'm a sports journalist for the Warrnambool Standard who covers a number of different sports across the south-west of Victoria. I enjoy watching cycling, surfing, football, soccer and Formula 1.
I'm a sports journalist for the Warrnambool Standard who covers a number of different sports across the south-west of Victoria. I enjoy watching cycling, surfing, football, soccer and Formula 1.
