Ari
Gesini

When Ari Gesini made his senior World Championships debut last November, his dream of representing Australia at the Paralympic Games had never felt more real.

Representing Australia for the first time at the 2017 World Para-athletics Junior Championships in Nottwil, Switzerland, Ari put the world on notice with a gold medal in the long jump F35-38.

He reaffirmed his status as one to watch in the lead-up to the Tokyo 2020 Paralympic Games in 2019 – first at the Arafura Games in April and May, where he won a gold and bronze medal, and again at November’s World Para-athletics Championships, where he set three personal bests on his way to fourth place in the men’s long jump T38 – his first major final.

However, even after experiencing such success so early in his career, Ari is under no illusion about what it takes to do the same at the Paralympic Games. Training under esteemed Para-athletics coaches Iryna Dvoskina and Sebastian Kuzminski, Ari has the advantage of working daily with Paralympic gold medallists Scott Reardon and Vanessa Low at the Australian Institute of Sport. He sees the preparation that goes into becoming the best in the world and is ready to tackle it head-on.

While selection to the Australian Paralympic Team is something that Ari has wanted for himself for almost as long as he can remember, it is not his end goal. Ultimately, he is looking ahead to the Paris 2024 Paralympic Games, where he hopes to join Scott and Vanessa with entry into the ultra elite club of Paralympic gold medallists.