The Paris Olympics may be in the rearview mirror, but for athletes targeting gold in Los Angeles in 2028 or Brisbane in 2032, the hard work is well underway.
One of those athletes is Christian Massimino, who competes in the Korean martial art of Taekwondo. Christian’s goal is to follow in the footsteps of his dad Carlo who represented Australia in the sport at the 2000 games in Sydney.
Carlo finished fifth in Sydney and is now training his son with the aim of getting Christian on the medals podium, if not in LA then at his home games in Brisbane.
“We have a lot of fun and it’s really special that I get to share this experience with him,” says Christian.
When Carlo retired from the sport he decided to open his own Taekwondo gym to pass on the skills he had learned over his career.
Fast-forward nearly two decades and Carlo now has a thriving business spread across four locations, with plans to further expand in his home state of Victoria and beyond.
“We’ve got a great product, a great curriculum, and we’d love to be able to bring that to more people,” Carlo tells Wire in an interview.
He admits that growing a business has not always been plain sailing but adds that his experience as an elite sportsman has helped him push through the tough times.
Taekwondo is built on the five tenets of courtesy, integrity, perseverance, self-control and indomitable spirit – qualities that all good business people need to succeed.
“Since I started Team Carlo Taekwondo we’ve definitely had our ups and downs. Things don’t always go to plan and it can be challenging. You need the determination and the discipline - these are things I’ve learned as an athlete and I’ve been able to transfer them into business.”
He’s also been able to count on Westpac’s support since those early days.
“Westpac came in and supported us with some banking loans and set us up with our EFTPOS machines and gave us some business support. As an athlete I didn’t have those business skills, so I was able to lean on them to get help at the beginning.”
Carlo is excited about the future, with a dual focus on growing the Team Carlo brand while also training his son for the Olympics.
“I have this great opportunity to pass on the lessons I learned,” says Carlo. “I feel like Christian has the potential to go all the way and win gold.”
Josh Wall is the Head of Video at Westpac Wire. Prior to joining the team, he spent 10 years as a video journalist and documentary filmmaker, most recently as Head of Video for the Guardian Australia. He also worked across numerous News Corp mastheads in Sydney as a presenter, producer, writer and video journalist. Josh is originally from Perth, Western Australia where he began his career by co-creating a video magazine that focused on music and the arts.
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