The fifth instalment of the Sport Australia Hall of Fame’s exclusive series, The Untold Story, features 2019 Scholarship Holder, Jaryd Clifford.
Jaryd Clifford, 24, is a visually-impaired two-time Paralympian and former Sport’s Australia Hall of Fame Rising Star. Two years ago in Tokyo, Jaryd entered the Paralympic Games as either World Champion or World Record Holder in all three of his events – the 1500m, 5000m, and Marathon. He left with two silver medals and one bronze medal and as he prepares for his third Paralympic Games, he reflects on some of the lessons learnt from those experiences and the times that followed.
This is Jaryd’s Untold Story…
I fell in love with sport for its stories. The narratives of elation and despair, the teams that rose from the ashes of heartbreak and the lonely individuals cast against backdrops of sheer grit and willpower. Sport has told us an infinite number of stories with many portraying the intricacy of human emotions and others painting us the perfect metaphors for life itself.
Although this summation of sport might appear dreamy and idealistic, for a wide-eyed kid growing up in the leafy outer-suburbs of Melbourne, sport felt like the most powerful resource in the world. I remember reading those sporting stories late into the night, hiding the books and pausing the audio tapes whenever Mum and Dad came to check if I’d fallen asleep. For me, the stories of my heroes – Cathy Freeman, Rob de Castella, and Sir Donald Bradman – were everything to me. This love for sporting folklore soon translated into the present. I remember as if it was yesterday, waking in the early hours of the morning to witness the Socceroos World Cup heroics, Kerryn McCann run onto the hallowed MCG leading the Commonwealth Games Marathon, and Cadel Evans riding down the Champs Elysees to be crowned Australia’s first Tour de France champion. As you can imagine, it didn’tt take long for my eight-year-old self to wonder and dream about whether I too could one day live out a story worth inscribing into those very same pages. As a 24-year-old, I still hold the essence of this dream very close to my heart.
And so, in Tokyo as I entered the final straight of my 5000m, I felt myself move into the very moment I had visualised for almost my entire life. At long last, I found myself just ten seconds away from living out that gold medal dream. The beauty of sport, however, is that no matter how hard we dream, we cannot always be the authors of the script and I’ll never forget those seconds, that helpless feeling of a moment slipping through my fingers as Spain’s Yassine Ouhdadi ran those final metres in front of me. As I stumbled across the line, barely conscious, I collapsed under the burden of a moment lost. As I laid in an ice bath, having thrown up only moments before, I looked off into the distance as a shattering realisation crashed down around me. My story hadn’t played out as my childhood self had hoped and dreamed. In all that chaos, I felt everything and nothing.
After more than a year of processing and learning, of talking and crying, I now reflect on this race with so much pride. There have been growing pains and soul searching, but slowly and steadily the lessons of falling short have washed over me with refreshing clarity. I believe that the intensity of my emotions in Tokyo emanate from the human temptation to take snapshots of our lives to assess whether we are allowed to be content yet, as if success is a finish line and we cannot breathe until it is reached. I now know that it’s okay to breathe and that stories are timeless, forever writing and never finished. Just like any piece of writing, our stories evolve with every new draft and every revision. This year, those revisions have focussed on not just running for the story or for a solitary golden purpose, but rather on returning to the roots of why I fell in love with this sport. I remember the feeling of shackles falling away, an insecure kid finding confidence with every step on a track that became home. In Tokyo, I lost that feeling, but sometimes you need to feel loss deeply to understand the importance of what you once had. I did feel deeply and as the Paralympic year beckons, I am a happier and more resilient person because of it.
As we march down the road to Paris, there are some gems of wisdom I want to hold close. At it’s very foundations, this next year will be a success if I can stand on the Stade de France track and have no desire to be anywhere else in the world but there. I imagine this feeling will be the most striking symptom of a year spent living out the mantra: ‘back yourself’. And when I say that I don’t necessarily mean the kinds of backing yourself that emphasise the self-belief of ability and promise, but rather the confidence and assurance to back myself to forge a path based on what feels right and what makes me want to keep being here. Sporting success requires hard work and that will always remain part and parcel of my journey, but when we push our bodies and minds into the vulnerable states inherent in high performance sport, I’ve learnt that it must be done so in communities of trust and personal investment. I’m really happy with my team and all the people I’m choosing to have by my side. They are the constants, the ones that have read every page in the story whether they were there for them or not. And because of that, they are the reason I feel more ready than ever to take on this challenge once again.
In Paris, when I stand on that track with one chance to execute it all, I’ll take a breath and I’ll remember that to breathe is okay. I’m standing there for so much more than a piece of metal and it will be that thought that allows me to pour my heart onto the track like never before.
– End
Image credit: Athletics Australia
