Ahead of the 2024 Paris Olympic Games, 1News' Michelle Prendiville caught up with Tom Walsh ahead of third appearance, and third crack at trying to achieve Olympic glory.
Tom Walsh knows all too well he has had his chances at becoming an Olympic gold medal winner. The Kiwi has won bronze at the past two Olympic Games but there’s been one man he’s yet to knock off his perch – two-time Olympic champion Ryan Crouser - who just so happens to be the Kiwi’s arch nemesis.
“Ya know, not everyone gets on in the world, and Ryan and I clash," Walsh said frankly.
"The thing about Ryan is he thinks he’s untouchable.
"I think he thinks he's better than everyone else so it's going to be a bloody good feeling when I knock him off.”
2024 may just be shaping up to be the 32-year-old’s best shot at doing it.
Walsh is heading to his third games with a new point of difference – telling 1News fans could see a new and improved version of himself.
“In the early days of my career I thought that shot put kind of defined me as a person," he said.
"Don't get me wrong, it is a huge part of my life. I do tie a huge part of my self-worth to how well I throw, to be an individual athlete it's hard not to.”
But Walsh is now not defined as ‘the shot putter’. He's the dog dad, the builder, the weekend hacker on the golf course. An athlete, with balance.
“Definitely through Covid I lost that. I got hyper-focused on throwing shot.
"I watched so many videos, I looked at so many videos of other people and looked at programmes and all sorts of things, and it was down a rabbit hole I didn't need to go down.”
Tom’s wife Dana agreed that she has seen a shift in him.
“I’ve definitely seen him grow from each Olympic campaign, it feels like now, he can see the bigger picture.”
Walsh is dialling in to try to achieve something no other Kiwi male has done before and land athletics medals at three consecutive Olympics.
But this time Walsh is hoping to add a different colour to his collection.
“Hopefully, I come away without a bronze this time,” Walsh laughed.
His coach Hayden Hall is optimistic.
“If he throws really well, he'll win the gold medal, but the most important thing is going out there and just throwing. If he does that and doesn't think about the distance it will happen.”
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