Aussie Olympian paralysed from the chest down in freak accident shares baby joy with his world champion wife
Willoughby, 33, won silver in the men's BMX at the 2012 Games in London, but his life came crashing down as a result of the horrific training run crash in America.
Now the star is on cloud nine after his wife Alise gave birth to a baby boy.
'Beau Matthew Willoughby joined us July 14 at 2:38am and we couldn't be more in love with our little man,' the three-time BMX world champion posted on her Instagram.
'Longer birthing journey than we anticipated but (we are) excited to be home.'
In the lead up to the couple's wedding in San Diego, on New Year's Eve in 2017, Willoughby was determined to be vertical for his special day.
He did so, walking down the aisle and dancing with his wife in moving scenes.
'I value life now more than ever and I probably overdo it a little bit sometimes, but I'm just trying to do everything I can to be healthy and keep moving forward,' he said at the time.
'I've already made gains that they said I never would and my ultimate goal is to be out of the wheelchair one day.'
Willoughby's family haven't been surprised by his ongoing physical progress.
'He's just been used to setting goals and chipping away at things,' his mother Sharon said.
'The sport of BMX, you need to be pretty mentally tough. You train hard, you tick all the boxes but that doesn't mean you're guaranteed an outcome.
'So it's a bit like that with rehab.'
Sharon Willoughby also paid tribute to her daughter-in-law, who is a four-time Olympian.
'They are just a remarkable couple together. The support and the energy they get from each other and the positivity is just amazing in itself,' she added.
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BBC News
16 minutes ago
- BBC News
Raised by Lions, Morgan ready for the Test arena
Australia v British and Irish Lions - second TestVenue: Melbourne Cricket Ground Date: Saturday, 26 July Kick-off: 11:00 BSTCoverage: Live on BBC Radio Cymru, text commentary on the BBC Sport website and app with post-match analysis on iPlayer, BBC Radio 5 Live and Rugby Union Weekly podcast. Flanker Jac Morgan seemed destined from an early age to be part of a British and Irish Lions series in Sunday for the best part of 10 years, 1989 Lions series winners Rob Jones and Clive Rowlands would be on the sidelines at Cwmtwrch RFC watching Morgan turn out for the junior team. Rowlands and Jones were watching Tiaan, their grandson and son respectively, play in the same side as was scrum-half and Rowlands team manager in the Lions squad that triumphed in Australia 26 years Swansea Valleys could again be represented in a series-winning side, with Morgan named as a replacement for Saturday's second Test at the iconic Melbourne Cricket Ground (MCG). Travelling faithful There is a travelling contingent of around 30 from Cwmtwrch in Australia hoping to see Morgan help the Lions clinch the series, after the tourists won last week's opening are more in attendance from Morgan's home village Brynaman, which is two includes family and a couple of the Ospreys back rower's best mates. One has even made the trip with a six-month-old baby to be there. Unfortunately it was too long a journey for his grandparents. When it was suggested his grandfather Garth Morgan, who was a close friend of Clive's, would be watching in the rugby club, it was met with bemusement from Jac's father Rhodri."He [Garth] always watches in the house with the volume full-blast, so he doesn't miss a thing," he said."Then he'll go to the club on the final whistle." Family affair Rhodri and his wife Rhian have made the trip among a large Morgan contingent but they are not shouting about of sounding too boastful, they typify the reserved Welsh nature. Call the Welsh anything, just never was there a moment they realised their son was special? "Jac was named forward of the tournament in South Africa when he went there with Wales Under-18s and I thought then, maybe he is alright," said is said half-jokingly, but they are immensely proud. If Wales were only going to have one Test Lion on this trip, they have a true Welshman. More comfortable conversing in his native tongue than English, actions speak louder than words for the hard-working back rower, humbly representing the Welsh village he is from and now the Morgan means a lot to Cwmtwrch, what does the village mean to him?"Everything really," says Rhian."He's with his own there. They've always backed him, not just for his rugby but for him as a person. "He's as comfortable with three-year-olds as the 80-year-olds who are sitting by the bar." Recognised for Lions Test selection That attitude is mirrored on the pitch. As comfortable in the number six or seven, Morgan played 50 minutes at blindside flanker for the first time this tour on Tuesday in the victory against First Nations & Pasifika will now take his place on the bench this week having missed out on a spot in Brisbane last Saturday, where the tourists won 27-19 with Wales not having a player involved in a Lions Test squad for the first time since inclusion is significant. Not because he is Welsh but because there is a strong feeling he has deserved more from the tour. The heated discussion around flanker Tom Curry's selection at seven last week had more than the Englishman's ability at its all, Lions head coach Andy Farrell was essentially picking one world-class flanker over others. Ireland openside Josh van der Flier was World Rugby player of the year in 2022 and has not yet played in a Lions Test. Curry more than justified his selection with a magnificent performance. It was the lack of sentimentality around rewarding tour form that fired up the fans. It is the Lions ethos, after all. Picking on merit Farrell has not been swayed by romance or nationality selection this week has rewarded form but it is also the best fit for the head coach who is targeting a 3-0 series win. With Australia's best ball-carriers Will Skelton and Rob Valetini returning in predicted wet weather at the MCG, Morgan's tackling and relentless work at the breakdown is favoured off the bench ahead of England back row Ben Earl's carrying. The Welshman is second in the charts for tackling and joint top for turnovers won on this tour. It is that ethic which means Morgan is not just a Wales favourite in Australia. He has been championed by fans of other nations too, who can appreciate a player putting everything into their to former England wing Ugo Monye and Scotland flanker John Barclay, every other fan they bump into in Australia is Welsh. It is something England and Leicester lock Ollie Chessum has also noticed."Everywhere you go, there's a Welsh contingent of fans and every time they see him they go wild," said Chessum, who has a Welsh-speaking girlfriend."The people in Wales are going to get what they've been waiting for at the weekend." Morgan the man There is a generation of Welsh fans who will eulogise about the back rowers of the 1970s such as Terry Cobner, Derek Quinnell and Mervyn recently, we have seen the generation of Sam Warburton and Taulupe Faletau. Now we have Morgan whose name might start to stand alongside previous greats. Unlike some of his predecessors, he has had to cope with being the solitary Welsh player on this with the famous 1971 Lions tour of New Zealand which had an average of eight Welsh starters per that weight getting to him? Not according to his father: "If it is, he's not showing it."Morgan has had to cope with adversity during his career. He has consistently stood out in a struggling Welsh side and led a group of players with dignity and grace who deserve more from authorities running the game. He and his peers have stepped into an environment, led at times by a directionless Welsh Rugby Union (WRU), with the players forced to deal with constant distractions of threats of player strikes and mergers with a noticeable lack of succession planning. That lack of respite from the off-field turmoil is epitomised by Morgan excelling on a Lions tour, while wondering what the future of the Ospreys side he captains will be, after the WRU announced it could cut the amount of professional sides in Wales. Bertie's big day That will be put to one side for now, ahead of Morgan's big day in man who has been hoping for this moment is Morgan's old Cwmtwrch junior coach Bertie said on Tuesday he was yet to see his old mentor, who coached the Wales captain for 10 years at junior level and has been a school friend of his father since they were 11. When asked whether he will have the chance to take it all in, alongside Bertie, at the iconic MCG on Saturday, Jac's dad replied: "It's been a treadmill, I'll enjoy it once it's over."It may be a while before it is over for his son.
The Guardian
40 minutes ago
- The Guardian
Mark Humphries: ‘When did the Australian dream go from owning your own home to owning somebody else's?'
Mark Humphries has moved house five times in the past seven years. First was the place in the Sydney suburb of Turramurra he had to vacate because it was, 'forgive me for saying this – leaking like a giant breast from the ceiling'. Next came a house so damp, mushrooms began growing under the carpet; a small flat that was OK except for being utterly freezing, and another one-bedroom apartment where the rent went from $500 to $660 a week, forcing his exit. It's of no comfort to the comedian and TV presenter that he's not alone in having found it extremely difficult to secure an affordable and liveable home. 'This is the common experience,' he sighs. 'It's been extraordinary seeing everyone I know go through rental increases [over the past few years] … I feel like every one of us needs to start a GoFundMe just for our daily existence.' Housing affordability is a topic Humphries is angry about. And, perhaps ironically, that emotion can be a very useful tool for a comedian. 'I have found with a lot of my work that it's easier if you're angry about something,' he says – like, say, those political texts we all received in the lead-up to the election, or all things Mark Latham. 'Even if you're just doing comedy sketches, if you are genuinely annoyed by what has happened, you can channel that into something amusing.' Recently, Humphries has channelled his rage 'not just for myself, but everyone' over the housing crisis into a new documentary called Sold! Who Broke the Australian Dream? Out on Binge, it's a one-hour look at the problems with Australia's housing market, and how we've landed in a situation where, as he puts it in the documentary, even a 'D-grade celebrity like me can't afford a home'. We're discussing all this in the incongruous setting of a quaint cafe specialising in tea and scones – Humphries' choice of venue. This was meant to be a quick bite before a walking interview but the moment the scones hit the table, we've lost all motivation to stand up again. Humphries, he proudly tells me, eats a lot of baked goods. He even once auditioned to host The Great Australian Bake Off, a job that 'would have been heaven'. That particular gig wasn't to be, but Humphries has nonetheless carved out a very busy career on our screens, largely as the tall, blond and affable face of Australian news satire. You'd probably recognise him from appearances on programs such as SBS's The Feed and Channel Ten's The Project (the recent cancellation of which is a 'great loss' for Australian comedy, whatever you think of the show itself, he says). Unlike most comics, Humphries has never been one for standup – he has done it, he can tell me very specifically, only 12 times in his life and found each one 'immensely stressful'. In fact, he's more reserved and strait-laced than the typical comedian, deflecting attention by asking me as many questions as I ask him. Rather than seeking out the stage, Humphries spent his early years after school working at a Blockbuster video store and then a warehouse. The video store may have been every millennial's teenage dream job, but it wasn't all roses. 'I got held up at knife-point three times when I worked in a video store,' Humphries recalls. 'It was awful. I had to leave that job after the third one, because I was so affected by it.' He can still see the humour in that formative trauma – such as when he went to the police station to do an identakit after one of the robberies and described the knife-wielding assailant as 'surprisingly handsome'. Or the time his unfailing politeness kicked in as he was being held up and he asked his attacker if he'd like a bag for all that cash. Or that after he finally quit and booked a ticket to London to try and decompress, as he stepped off the tube from the airport, a fellow holidaying Australian recognised him and exclaimed 'Hey, Blockbuster Crows Nest!' But through every odd job, Humphries was quietly nursing dreams of breaking into comedy. His career eventually began 13 years ago when he called up the satirical current affairs program Hungry Beast and asked for an internship, unsure of how else to get started in the industry given 'there's no university degree in comedy'. His turn as a comic came to the surprise of those closest to him. 'I was talking about how I'd always wanted to be a comedy writer [in a recent interview] and my dad said to me, 'I spoke to your mother about how you said you'd always want to be a comedian. We were gobsmacked, because you never said anything funny to us.'' Humphries' dad, who actually does very much support his son's career, gamely appears in the new documentary – to decline him any financial assistance cobbling together a house deposit, because, as the elder Humphries puts it, 'I'm renting too.' 'We're so obsessed with property in this country, and it's become worse especially in the last 25 years, where the idea of accruing multiple properties has become something that people aspire to,' Humphries says. 'And it's a line that I use in the doco, but I think it's true – when did the Australian dream go from owning your own home to owning somebody else's?' What makes the situation harder to fix, Humphries thinks, is the fact the majority of Australians do actually own a home. 'Owners outnumber renters two to one,' he says. 'So it's very hard to get huge change on something that the majority of people benefit from. House prices going up if you own a house is great, but for everyone else, it's a nightmare. And so the challenge is, how do you get people who are benefiting from the current system to ultimately make a sacrifice for the greater good, so that we don't end up with this two-tier system of the homeowners and the renters? Which is essentially what we have, and it's only getting worse.' At this point the anger Humphries had spoken of is starting to show, tea and scone neglected as fires up and rattles off the issues with Australia's housing market. Obviously, supply is part of the housing crisis, Humphries says – so it's great that the federal government has pledged to build 1.2m new homes by 2030. 'But the issue with the supply argument is that it doesn't take into account the other part of that, which is demand. So again, if you have this system where people are able to tap into these tax incentives and buy multiple properties, increasing supply doesn't really solve that. It ends up with a whole bunch of people owning even more properties.' Humphries points out he doesn't begrudge investors for taking advantage of the tax system – 'but that system shouldn't exist'. Couldn't the government, I proffer casually while Humphries finally gets the chance to take a bite, just put a cap on the number of properties people can own? 'Humphries nods furiously as he bites through his scone,' he narrates after a pause to chew and swallow. Ultimately, he says, to fix the housing crisis we need to rid ourselves of the idea that property prices should perpetually climb higher, and allow the value of homes to become static. 'And some of these changes can be introduced incrementally. It's not about crashing the housing market.' So, I ask, does Humphries ever see home ownership in his future? 'Bizarrely, at age 39 I just bought a home – I just moved in yesterday,' he admits with the mix of sheepishness and amusement now typical to any millennial who manages to get a foot on the property ladder. 'But I maintain the rage!' He is lucky, Humphries says, to have got enough work in the last year to secure a mortgage on a two-bedroom apartment near the airport, together with his partner. The irony of having used the salary from a documentary about not being able to afford a home to buy a home is not lost on him. And he insists being a very newly minted homeowner hasn't changed his perspective on the problem at hand. 'Like, I used to work in retail, and I'm still as annoyed today about rudeness towards service workers as I was when I was in the video store,' he shrugs as we dust off the scone crumbs and wrap up our conversation so that he can head home to start unpacking boxes for what is hopefully the last time. 'I'm thrilled, obviously, to get to that next stage of my life,' he adds. 'But it's something that, growing up, I thought I would have done 10 years ago, and it just felt like the possibility of it just kept moving further and further away. And I don't go into it with the idea of, now I can't wait for this to increase in value. I haven't bought a place because I want to make money. I bought a place because I want to live in a place.' Really, he's mostly just very grateful to not have to move again anytime soon. 'I'm excited to have a bit of stability,' he says, before pausing to consider the implications of this very momentous life change. 'And just to be able to stick a nail on the wall.' Sold! Who Broke the Australian Dream? is streaming now on Binge.
The Guardian
an hour ago
- The Guardian
Australia's cycling queen Sarah Gigante: ‘It's a bit mean, but I love to make others hurt'
Sarah Gigante has an infectious energy that shines through whether she is saluting after blowing away her rivals on the toughest of mountain stages, or celebrating every day as much as her successes on social media. The Australian cyclist even keeps her smile beaming while reflecting on a recent health concern that threatened to bring her promising career to a standstill. But hidden just beneath the surface is a killer instinct to 'make others hurt', as well as a steely determination to overcome challenges on and off the bike that have helped lift Gigante into the cycling form of her life. The 24-year-old is still coming to terms with the thrill and pride taken from finishing on the podium at the Giro d'Italia Donne when she was third overall behind winner Elisa Longo Borghini. Gigante finished 1min 11sec behind the Italian home favourite and defending champion, with Switzerland's Marien Reusser in between, but claimed a pair of spectacular stage wins when soloing away on mountain-top finishes and cemented her place as the best climber in the race with the Queen of the Mountains jersey. Gigante says she 'wasn't expecting even one of those four super cool results' but can't help but wonder what might have been in the race for the maglia rosa, after losing 1min 42sec on the main group including Longo Borghini and Reusser, when her team AG Insurance-Soudal were caught out in crosswinds on stage five. The three-time national champion concedes that she still has room for improvement on the flat as well as downhills, while wanting to build on her strengths in the mountains that are now allowing her to pile on the pain. 'Especially at the end of a tough race, I just love the hard work and pushing myself,' Gigante tells Guardian Australia ahead of this weekend's start to the 2025 Tour de France Femmes. 'And maybe it's a bit mean, but I love to make others hurt. 'I think that's why I'm able to come back from the setbacks, because I just love riding so much, no matter how hard it is. It's my job but mainly it's my hobby and my passion.' Gigante's ability to perform at her best in her job, let alone to just continue to enjoy her hobby and passion, were under threat as she suffered through increasingly regular and intense pain and numbness in her right leg. After several years of frustration without a diagnosis, she was finally found to suffer from iliac artery endofibrosis – a condition that affects the flow of blood and oxygen. 'The artery was all scarred and kinked but also going into spasm every time I exercised, so when I needed more blood, I was getting less,' she says. Sign up to Australia Sport Get a daily roundup of the latest sports news, features and comment from our Australian sports desk after newsletter promotion The eventual diagnosis and operation to correct the condition in December meant a nine-month layoff from world tour racing. But it has allowed Gigante to come back stronger than ever. The rapid return to form for a rider who first burst onto the scene as an 18-year-old when winning a national road race title in 2019 and posting a breakout GC result has sent an ominous warning to her rivals. But now that she is fighting fit, Gigante expects her best is still to come. 'It was actually the worst case the surgeon had seen,' Gigante says. 'Since I had it fixed, it has made such a huge difference. I don't think about my leg at all anymore. I do have two massive, really ugly scars, but I don't care because I can ride my bike again, happily but also quickly. 'It was seven weeks [after the operation] until I could ride again. It was quite a lot of waiting and trying not to think too much about the 'what-ifs'. But when I started doing max efforts I was already stronger than when I had been training at the end of last season. The power was already better, almost coming off the couch, just because I had two legs again.' Gigante now hopes to carry her renewed fitness and imposing form into the Tour de France Femmes when it begins on Saturday. It will be her second time riding the biggest stage-race on the calendar, after she was seventh on general classification behind Kasia Niewiadoma last year. The Netherlands' Demi Vollering was second when finishing a mere four seconds down on the Polish winner, after a costly and contentious crash on stage five, but is widely considered to be the rider to beat. Punchy terrain on the opening two stages this year, and sprint finishes that are expected to follow on the next couple of days, have AG Insurance-Soudal earmarking Kim Le Court as their protected GC rider rather than Gigante. The Mauritian has exposed form to challenge for yellow after winning Liège-Bastogne-Liège in April, though Gigante will aim to stay within touching distance of the GC leaders before the race heads to the mountains from stage six. The GC battle looks set to be shaken up, if not decided, on stage eight which will start with riding 13.2km uphill to Col de Plainpalais, and end with a brutal 18.6km climb at 8.1% to Col de la Madeleine. It looms as Gigante's time to attack. 'We're totally different riders,' Gigante says of combining with Le Court in a one-two punch. 'We can play off each other for stage results when the opportunity comes, but stage eight does look very nice for me with a big mountain at the end. I've definitely had my eye on that one for a while.'
