OLYMPIC track cyclist Anna Meares gave a very honest account of her long career today at Connect 2018 in front of 2500 agents and brokers from Ray White and Loan Market.
In January 2008, just seven months before the Beijing Olympics, she broke her neck in a horrific track accident at the World Cup in Los Angeles.
During the high-speed crash at 65kmh, she broke a vertebra, dislocated her right shoulder, tore ligaments and tendons and scraped off skin from all parts of her body.
The injuries would have ended most careers, let alone a shot at Olympic glory.
Not Anna. She ditched the neck brace and wheelchair to be back in the saddle 10 days later to start training for Beijing. That in itself is a legendary effort.
“I want to share with you some of the challenges I’ve faced, the highs and lows in my 22-year career, and a great deal of success. I was 11 times a world champion,” she said.
“My success has not been defined by my defeats along the way.”
The coal miner’s daughter from Rockhampton who moved to Adelaide for her sport reminded the agents that goals need to be constantly reassessed and re-evaluated.
But “you cannot control illness and injury as an athlete”.
“The last thing I needed was accidents and injuries, and that’s exactly what happened to me in LA. I got out of my seat and accelerated, and the outcome was not what I wanted,” Ms Meares said of the accident.
Track bikes have no brakes, a fixed wheel and only one gear.
“Travelling at high speed you expect accidents, and that day I heavily bruised my right hip and I tore tendons in my arm and shoulder, skin burned on my face and it took two hours to scrub my wounds clean and I also broke my neck. It was the force with which my head bounced off the track that caused the break and I was within 2cm of a total clean snap,” Ms Meares said.
“After I broke my neck you find out how heavy your head is and I couldn’t even hold my head up on the bike."
She lost the sprint race by one-thousandth of a second - the width of a lead pencil line.
“It’s the accumulation of small things that affect your life.”
Just seven months after the accident she won a silver medal.
“I know I am brave and resilient, yet I didn’t know how capable I was to endure pain and discomfort," Ms Meares said.
"Most people do not know the full extent of their potential and in adversity, you ask a few tough questions. Is that worth it? Is it worth the training to get back into the green and gold?
“Everyone has an opinion and the only option that mattered to me was that I saw great value in wearing green and gold.
“My parents and my siblings asked me not to continue but they backed me and my value and my passion, so it helped me to stay motivated, and we pushed through the tough times.”
She said she learned about controlling the controllables during her rehabilitation.
“I had to choose who to surround myself with. I was very reflectful on the energy that people brought to me as I adopted a victimised mentality around negative people. But if I was around people who were driven, happy and motivated in my company, then so was I.”
