Aus. Paracanoe team prepares for Games on the Gold Coast

ABC NEWS (Australia)

The countdown is on for the 2024 paralympic games in Paris, with four months to go. Australia's paracanoe team has been busy training on the Gold Coast canals and they've got gold in their sights.

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00:00 A force to be reckoned with.

00:06 And with two Paralympic Games behind her, Susan Seipel is training harder than ever.

00:12 We race paracanoe over 200 metres and it's like a flat out sprint.

00:17 On the water six days a week, she's got just one colour in her sights.

00:22 Since I've got a bronze and a silver, I've just got one more medal to kind of achieve.

00:28 Also going for gold, Dylan Littlehouse has been paddling since he was 15.

00:33 He's won back-to-back world championships.

00:36 The 24-year-old says he's living his dream.

00:40 It was always my dream to travel the world through sport.

00:41 I started off swimming growing up and then through kayaking it's given me something to

00:46 do, something to a higher purpose you'd say, to strive towards, to be able to become a

00:51 world champion, be the best in the world at something.

00:53 Being a para-athlete isn't easy.

00:56 Adapting equipment is expensive and there are additional challenges involved in travelling

01:01 to competitions.

01:03 Despite spending hours building their physical power, they say being prepared mentally and

01:09 having a strong support system is vital for success.

01:13 Yeah, look there's a lot of variance because people obviously have impairments and you

01:18 need to take it into account, especially when you design a program and you calculate the

01:23 load that you can put on someone's body.

01:25 They say the program sets them up to be the best they can be.

01:29 Yeah, it's definitely worth the hours and the training that we go through.

01:34 [BLANK_AUDIO]

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