Tasmanian footy player Ryan Wiggins lost the use of his legs after suffering a serious spinal injury off the field in 2019.
Following Ryan’s diagnosis, he has dedicated his life to raising awareness for paraplegics and other spinal cord injury sufferers with the help of his partner Lou Calvert.
As a rehabilitation expert, Lou was first introduced to Ryan not long after his injury when Ryan’s sister reached out for help in finding people to put on Ryan’s care team. Lou put herself forward and the rest is history.
In an effort to shine a light on Ryan’s condition, Lou is vowing to break her own world record for the most chest to floor burpees over a 24-hour period.
Lou’s first attempt at the record was back in 2019, where she managed a whopping 5,756 burpees over 24 hours, stopping only for 30 minutes at a time and tearing ligaments in her wrist along the way.
In a chat with Woody & Tubes, Lou explains why she is this year going for 6,000 burpees.
“I really feel that movement is a privilege and then obviously now having that close connection to Ryan, I just want to try and get behind paralysis and get behind Ryan and people with a spinal cord injury,” she said.
“[To] give them the opportunity that everybody should have and that’s to move daily and just create some awareness,
“Before Ryan, I know myself, I didn’t know too much about spinal cord injuries, so I feel like it’s a very grey area for a lot of people.”
Lou reveals how she’s been training to beat her 2019 record, what criteria she needs to meet to have her 24-hour burpee marathon declared a work record and how she is planning to use the money raised to help spinal cord injury survivors.
Tune into the full chat below…