For Isaac Maynard, it was graduation meets perfect career opportunity.
The 24-year-old Bond University Bachelor of Exercise and Sport Science alumnus is out to make sure as many Indigenous Queensland sporting talents as possible take and make their marks at the Brisbane 2032 Olympic and Paralympic Games.
And for Isaac timing was everything.
“As I was preparing to graduate last year, I heard the Queensland Academy of Sport (QAS) was ramping up a statewide athlete talent search and I wanted to work with them on that,” the proud Wiradjuri Worimi man born and raised Mudgee in central New South Wales said.
“The program takes aspiring athletes aged between 13 and 23 through a series of physical fitness tests and other challenges and those selected go through a 12-month development phase to become a QAS supported athlete.
“For the past year it’s been running in partnership with Deadly Choices which empowers Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples to make healthy life choices for themselves and their families, and that for me is a huge attraction.
“I get to see how the Academy is working to unearth sporting talent wherever it is in the state,” he said.
Over 4800 young athletes have taken part in state-wide trials with over 250 athletes currently taking part in the yearlong QAS supported sports programs.
Of these, nine have been fast tracked into a new QAS Talent Support Program, designed to develop athletes considered genuine medal prospects in Los Angeles 2028 and leading into Brisbane 2032.
Isaac says the main priority is improving cultural accessibility of these opportunities for the Indigenous cohort.
“Retention is a problem partly because once the young people go back to community, many are uncontactable and that’s something that needs more attention.
“What I want to do is look at those sorts of barriers and how we can bring about change.
“I’d really like to get into communities in the more remote areas that are struggling with the greatest barriers, whether they be technological or otherwise, and see where we can do things better,” he said.
Isaac says it’s a delicate balance between improving sport opportunity for kids in the most distant areas and what can realistically be provided as sporting pathways.
He says for him it’s all about face-to-face and asking Indigenous youth what they need and want to see happen with their sporting futures.
“In the past a lot of research has been done on them and not with them and that’s an important distinction that we’re looking to flip to have things work a lot more collaboratively and much more their way.
“And that might include everything from providing access to equipment and facilities to coaching and other forms of mentoring,” he said.
And there’s a reverent hark back to the distant past.
“When remote communities are visited a lot of yarning techniques, reciprocal storytelling, are used where we listen closely to what they say and encourage them to tell us about the change they want.
“Storytelling is something our mobs have done for thousands of years, and it is how we communicate, understand and respect each other.
“And having that collaborative process from start to finish gives the athletes ownership and control over their own knowledges and destinies, and that’s vitally important,” he said.
This year sees Isaac starting his Masters, and he says his immediate aim is for everyone buy into what can be achieved through the wider QAS program.
“The AFL and NRL pour hours upon hours and plenty of money into fostering Indigenous talent and I want to be that person that puts the effort into making sure all opportunities presented between now and the Brisbane Olympic and Paralympic Games are achievable and taken up.
“I’m hoping it all manifests in as many Indigenous athletes as possible representing their culture and country on the world stage in eight years’ time,” he said.
Isaac understands the important thing is that change is brought in areas of importance and significance to Indigenous people.
“It’s about absolute self-determination and what sport can provide people culturally.
“Sport for us is about having a modern-day corroboree where people can get together, share their love of sport, maintain their cultural ties and give their culture the opportunity to thrive.
“It can also act as a cultural offset - when people face disadvantage sport can be used as a way of getting together and improving and growing and celebrating their connections,” he said.
And he says it’s all about association with country, which he knows plenty about.
Born and growing up in Mudgee, NSW Issac was your typical outdoorsy kid.
It’s not hard to imagine him down the creek catching yabbies or on his bike or kicking a ball around with his older brother and younger sister and tubing, skiing, wakeboarding behind the family speedboat.
“I played soccer and a lot of rugby union and rugby league, and I got into weightlifting and powerlifting when I was 14 and I played basketball the whole time I was at Bond’,” he said of his seemingly indefatigable childhood.
“Last July I started endurance running and ran my first 21km race in December and I’m training for this year’s Gold Coast Half Marathon in a few months’ time.
“I was always interested in fitness, even working as a personal trainer when I started at Bond, so all along I’ve known that was the direction my career was headed.
“In fact, back in January 2021 my initial thoughts coming into the university were to stick with strength and conditioning, which I really enjoy.
“But the more I studied classes like biochemistry the more I became fascinated with the why of it all – why things do and don’t happen to your body during exercise, those sorts of things.
“Like with deeper muscle physiology, those theories underpinned the strength and conditioning techniques, which is something I didn’t expect to enjoy so much coming in.
“And now I’m about to have the opportunity to take those learnings to some of the most remote places in the country and work with athletes aspiring to represent their communities and compete in sport, maybe even one day wearing the green and gold at the Olympics or Paralympics,” he said.
According to Faculty of Health Sciences and Medicine Associate Professor Dr Vernon Coffey one of the primary outcomes of the exercise and sport science program is employability and preparing graduates for the next step within the profession.
“When the QAS approached us about competent and capable students to take part in their athlete talent search program Isaac was an obvious candidate,” Dr Coffey said.
“We connected him with the QAS and Isaac did the rest to be appointed on merit and he obviously made a very good impression on the staff running the program.
“As a result, he has had new doors open to him and we’re all looking forward to seeing the outcomes of his post graduate research and work with Indigenous youth,” he said.