Lauren Burns Overcame 12 Operations to Win Gold at the Olympics

of friends that had come to watch. And so after the fight, I went and I did Roy and HD the Dream Yes, which was hilarious. They were fantastic, And then they were like, oh, we couldn't find a good pizza place open, so we went to the supermarket and we got you pizza ingredients and they had pizza. They made it for me, and I actually couldn't really eat much of it. So after all that wanting it, and I

had a piece of pizza, I didn't really have. I had a little bit of champagne, I think, but I had so many bruises, Like I was really really injured afterwards, and I didn't want all the you know, alcohol really helped, like the makes the bruising come out. So yeah, I had a really bad hit to the groin that was just so bad, like really really really bad and actually it was your dad. I went back to the village

and this is a bit too graphic. You might want to cut it out, but tell me the sportsmantheson doctor said we're going to have to drain it. This is like because it was like a hematoma that had come up from this kick. And so Martin and said, yeah, you can't go out like you just you have to do what the doctor said, you know they want to. And I was like, give me one night, give me one night where I'm not gonna like you can't. I

just want a freaking Olympic gold medal. You can't put a needle, you know, in my vagina, And so I said, and so then I had all this arnica. So I had like anaab like I'm just like anything helped them bruising, and so it went down overnight and they said, no, you don't have to drain it, and I was, thank goodness.

you know, so then you're involved. You're not removing yourself away from the situation. I've had a really bad shoulder well, I had a shoulder reco and all sorts of things shoulder injury that does play up occasionally and if I do something now even it'll flare up. So I still go to the gym, I do the you know, recovery. I don't love doing the band, but I'm on the bands and I just turn up and I do the

work and it just builds up slowly. And you know, even today I was at the gym and I was doing the you probably know what it's called, but you know when you hang and you do the rings and you pull yourseld oh yes, y rings. You know two a year ago, there's no way I could have done that. But here I was today doing the rings, and you know it depends like and so it's just like, show up, do the work, do what you can, even if it's you know, you go for a walk, or you can

always modify and do something. And you know, I'm not talking about where you push yourself too hard or you do things that you shouldn't, or sometimes you need a rest. But I never really let an injury hold me back. And what I found early on is I had to I had both needes operated on at the same time, and that was probably the time the only time that I really thought about quitting. I just thought, you know, I don't have to do this. Why am I doing it? I'm not getting paid for it. I'm not like, I

don't have to do this sport. So then I decided, well, if it was asking myself that question, if you want to quit, just don't do it. You know, there's lots of other things you can do in your life. But I had this really strong feeling I didn't want to quit. I loved it so much. I wanted to keep going. So I thought, well, if that's what you want, then don't complain about it. Just do what you need to do.

So I got together with my strength coach Tony Hewitt, and we just rebuilt and I went to he was going to the gym every day like different, to the high performance center, and I then became stronger than I

was beforehand. So it's that whole thing of you know, like that injury allowed me then to take time off the volume of training because you know, as you know, the Taekwondos classes are so aerobic, they're so physical, and so to just go I'm just going to focus on strength training and waits and I rebuilt my body in a way that I never would have had the time to do that and the load would have been too much.

So I often reflect on that time about how, you know, every injury kind of allowed me an opportunity to get stronger in a different way and so and actually that was interesting with your dad as well. So afterwards I went to the club first, So the nationals were happening, and it was selection for the World Championships, and it meant that I couldn't compete, and I was so upset,

like I was devastated. So the first one I'd ever missed out on selections and I was really really upset about that, and really it's probably the worst I've ever felt actually, and so I started back at the club to just move around on the mat. It was time to sort of you know, built a lot of strength, and so I'm moving around and he's like, just do some footwork, you know, do some you know, upper body anyway. So then I just throw a little kick. I'm like, oh, I can actually do I can do a kick, one

kick with one leg, round house kick. I could do that, right. And I was like, I said, you know, Martin, I reckon, I can fight. I can only do one kick. And he's like, no way, You're not fighting, Like no, and I'm like, okay, give me, give me a week, you know. And so every day I came in and I did a little bit more and he was like, okay, I'll see if I can get you a late application. So we put in this application. So when I fought at the National, I could still only do one kick an

ass and that's all I did. So every fight that I had, I did that one kick and I loved it because it kind of it highlighted what I've always known from the Koreans is that there's such a beauty in the simple techniques, you know, doing a kick that is so well executed is often unbeatable, you know. And I felt that before when I'd been at the in Korea training with some of these young kids. And you know,

I remember training with this one boy. It was at a high school and he just had this back lag roundhouse kick that was so beautiful, and even though I knew what he was going to do, I could see him coming. I had all these different things that I tried to do to get even just move out of the way, and he scored on me every time. And you know, there's such beauty in that, you know, doing

something that's just so incredibly elegant. And so that's what I felt when I was going through there, you know, this competition, and I even had someone say to me, you should write to your opponents and say, oh, I'm just going to do this one kick. Really it's all I had. But I won that nationals and made that national team, so that it made me really think about that. Yeah, the simplicity and beauty of doing the simple thing.

to get an idea about, you know, lifestyle. But really what came out of it was psychological skills and attributes are key, so you know, mindset is just so important. And some of the elements that came out about that are things like realistic optimism, being a knowledge seeker, having a really clear sense of self regulation, self confidence, and dominance,

mental toughness, having a strong work ethic. So those elements were all really really key across all athletes and all different sports, and I purposely sampled them so i'd had athletes from small sports, you know, as in like individual sports, small teams, big teams, combat sports, you know, so I kind of wanted a really interesting cross section and athletes who, yeah, they had to have won a gold, Olympic gold medal, World championship medal, Paralympic gold or world cham Paralympic, world

championship medal. So but then also what came out of it that I probably didn't expect is the importance of interpersonal relationships and connection. So that theme really sort of came out of the data, and I then delved really deeply into that work and wrote a piece for the British Journal of Sports Medicine about strengthening into personal relationships in sports. So that's kind of where I've really been

focused a lot of my attention these days. I had some work commissioned by the Australian Institute of Sport and we did gold medal winning athletes and gold medal winning coaches to sort of look at characteristics of gold medal winning teams. Yeah, so it's been really interesting.

so important. Some people it was a coach, some people it was a friend, some people it was a sibling,

And so it's about creating that connection. And when I sort of delved into the research, there's a lot around how quality relationships attenuate our stress response, and you know, I really felt so, you know, when I did more work with AIS around this characteristics of gold medal winning teams, there's a lot around you know, trust and yeah, like that emotional management, and there was some work that I was looking at around just being near someone that you

have a quality relationship that actually attenuates our cortisol levels and helps us to you know, to have like it's like our self red and our ability to cope with stress. So you know, that's something like you know when for me standing you know, at the court side about to go into an Olympic final or whatever, and if you've got someone next to you who's you know, you feel comfortable with, you're going to be able to self regulate

a lot more than if you're more fraught. And so yeah, or just knowing, you know, knowing where people are in the stands that you've got you know, you've got that support. So yeah, it's so it's incredibly powerful. And then you know, now we know so much more about loneliness and how it's like a social determinant of health and there's just so many elements around relationships and connection.

and it kind of puts everything in perspective. So part of it is, you know, one of the things we saw with the athlete research is when I was looking into all of that is unstructured play and early diversification is so important. So you know, it's not always you know, keeping them in this one sport that you've chosen but you know, giving them options, helping them to play, move their bodies, you know, and kind of that. It's like lifelong learning and lifelong movement and then also modeling it

so you know, they they see that. So, you know, I've had my like my son is sixteen and fifteen, and he's been at the gym with me and I just it's so awesome. And you know, he would come along. We've been training together for a few years. He's now just moved on where, but at least he came with me and we've you know, I've got a great coach that I work with now, and it was about you know, so firstly he used to come along and what you know,

and he just sit around. Well, I did my session, and then it started playing around on some equipment and then you know, my coach took a real interest in him and he created a plan for him that was around you know, like his basketball and putting on a weightfest and jumping and elastics and you know, so it was creative and it was specific, but it also then again built this trust and allowed him to learn how to use weights and his body more so then you know,

and when you've got like my coaches quite buff. So you know, when you've got a big, strong guy going okay, let's lower that weight so that you can get better biceps or whatever, is you know better than your mum saying that's too y.

sport that they're in as much as you can. You know, like when they don't want to go to class, you know, just okay, let's go along, or let's just try for the first bit and then you know, once they get there, they're happy and they go along. So and yeah, really sort of modeling, I think, you know, healthy habits and doing and doing hard things, and doing things when you

don't want to do them. So often I'll say that like I really can't be stuff going to the gym, or I don't want to go and I go, and I just showing that.

the best for me. But then, you know, you were so you and Bridget were so young sometimes and you know, your mom would be picking you up and taking it at different things. And I just sort of think of it in a different way because he would drop anything for any of his athletes, you know, like you know, I'd bring him and say, can you meet me at five am at the club for you know, I just want to work on this one kick or something. Yea, yeah,

sure of course. He loved all that stuff. And after he had a young family and you know he has.

we were at the club. We were we were exposed to elite athletes and Olympians and you know, like we got to witness that elite level of sport and it was so good for me the role modeling, to see you training, and like I grew up in it, like women weren't really doing the sport when I was, like when I was really young, like mum was one of the first women to earn a black belt in Australia, Like it was just it was just awesome to see you on the mats, Like I can't tell you.