Latest / 360 with Katie Woolf / Katie spoke with Ninja Warrior's Olivia Vivian about her work with a Territory gymnastics program for kids

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Katie spoke with Ninja Warrior's Olivia Vivian about her work with a Territory gymnastics program for kids · 360 with Katie Woolf

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Now. My next guest is an Australian Olympic gymnast who
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: competed in the two thousand and eight Summer Olympics. She
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: also became the first woman in Australian Ninja Warrior to
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  Speaker 1: advance to Stage two of the Grand Final, and in
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  Speaker 1: twenty nineteen, she competed in the inaugural Ninja World Championships
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  Speaker 1: in Moscow, Russia, winning a gold medal in four minutes
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  Speaker 1: and well zero seconds. I think her name is Olivia
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  Speaker 1: Vivian and she joins us on the line right now.
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  Speaker 2: Good morning to you, Olivia.
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  Speaker 3: Ah, thank you so much for having me. What an intro.
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  Speaker 1: I know, right my producer Danielle is a fan and
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  Speaker 1: certainly did her research so made sure that I had
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  Speaker 1: everything there that I needed.
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  Speaker 3: Olivia, I know I've forgotten half of that stuff. You
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  Speaker 3: did really good. I was reliving some memories when you
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  Speaker 3: brought it up.
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  Speaker 1: Well, we're so excited because you're actually in Darwin.
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  Speaker 2: At the moment.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah. I know it was a bit of a random,
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  Speaker 3: last minute sort of decisions, but you know, Ben and
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  Speaker 3: I sort of moved to Brisbane and we're trying to
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  Speaker 3: get back to Perth. I've got some work in Perth,
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  Speaker 3: and you know, Mark over there is pretty tough with
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  Speaker 3: these borders. So I was like, you know what, instead
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  Speaker 3: of doing two weeks isolation, when you fly straight into Perth,
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  Speaker 3: I was like, I'm going to go to Norman Territory.
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  Speaker 3: I haven't seen much of it. And everyone keeps apologizing
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  Speaker 3: to me. They're like, oh, sorry, it's not the light season.
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  Speaker 3: You've come at the wrong time of the year. And
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  Speaker 3: I'm like, what are you talking about.
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  Speaker 1: It's amazing, Well, it is warm, it's certainly warm at
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  Speaker 1: the moment, but what have you been up to over
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  Speaker 1: the last week or so?
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  Speaker 2: What have you been to sea?
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  Speaker 3: I had one of my girlfriends come and stay with
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  Speaker 3: me for the first weekend that I was here, and
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  Speaker 3: we booked everything and anything. Like the second we touched down,
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  Speaker 3: we went and did the Cage of Death at the
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  Speaker 3: Crocodiller's place of the crocod there's so many We saw
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  Speaker 3: a cross almost every day. We did a full tour.
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  Speaker 3: I went to Lichfield, we saw the jumping crocs or
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  Speaker 3: it was just jumping crops because I guess it's not
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  Speaker 3: the right season. But we got one ye with that. Yeah,
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  Speaker 3: and the new buggy tour with Double seven tomorrow, I'm
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  Speaker 3: doing a beautiful sunset cruise and maybe the Masquerade Ball
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  Speaker 3: on Saturday. So yeah, I'm getting around it and everything
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  Speaker 3: and anything wonderful stuff.
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  Speaker 1: Well, it's great to hear, and you know, I reckon
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  Speaker 1: it's it's great when you do go somewhere new that
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  Speaker 1: you've you know, that you haven't been to before, to
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  Speaker 1: really immerse yourself in it and see everything that everything
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  Speaker 1: that there is to offer.
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  Speaker 2: So have you ever been to the territory before?
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  Speaker 3: To Darwin, No, I haven't. I have not seen much
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  Speaker 3: of the place at all. I was thinking about going
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  Speaker 3: to Alice Springs and checking out Ularu, but my housemates
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  Speaker 3: pulled out of the motor home tour to do that one,
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  Speaker 3: so I came to Darling. I guess there's a lot
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  Speaker 3: more in the one spot here. Super easy to get
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  Speaker 3: around so far. I'm just I'm loving it, honestly, and
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  Speaker 3: the people are so lovely here. Great.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, it is certainly a very laid back place and
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  Speaker 1: there is it's such a unique place as well. You know,
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  Speaker 1: so much to see and do. And Olivia, I understand
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  Speaker 1: that you're also going to be doing some well a
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  Speaker 1: bit of training with some of the Young Territory gymnasts.
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  Speaker 3: Absolutely, you know, I think given my sort of experience
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  Speaker 3: with the sport and then also just staying sort of
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  Speaker 3: athletic in the new path of Ninja Warrior, I figured
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  Speaker 3: why not just jump in? You know, I wish I
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  Speaker 3: had more people come to my gym when I was younger.
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  Speaker 3: And yeah, we're going to do some fun Ninja sessions
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  Speaker 3: with the gymnasts in Darwin and we'll have some fun.
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  Speaker 3: We'll do some meet and greets and some talks and
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  Speaker 3: Q and A so they can sort of get to
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  Speaker 3: know whatever they want to know out of me and
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  Speaker 3: just have a lot of fun with it. That's what
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  Speaker 3: it's about.
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  Speaker 1: I reckon they're going to be incredibly excited. I've got
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  Speaker 1: a little ten year old girl who's very excited to
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  Speaker 1: meet you, and they they will all love having you
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  Speaker 1: there and I'm sure they're going to be really excited
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  Speaker 1: to find out a bit more about Ninja.
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  Speaker 2: Warrior as well. What was it like for.
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  Speaker 1: You, you know, doing so well and being the first female
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  Speaker 1: really in Australian Ninja Warrior to get to Stage two
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  Speaker 1: of the Grand Final and showing all those young girls
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  Speaker 1: that you can be so super strong and athletic and
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  Speaker 1: do something you know that's a bit out of the ordinary.
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  Speaker 3: Oh, I'm so all about It looks like the Year one,
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  Speaker 3: you know, Season one. I think they recruited a lot
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  Speaker 3: of former Olympic gymnasts. You have quite an expensive production.
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  Speaker 3: They didn't really know how it would go. And I
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  Speaker 3: remember just thinking, oh, cool, free trip to Sydney. That's
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  Speaker 3: all I thought. It was like just the fun. I
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  Speaker 3: thought I was doing wipe out. That's what I thought
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  Speaker 3: I was doing. And I showed up and it was
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  Speaker 3: not wipe out. It was this super size, amazing playground.
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  Speaker 3: And I failed my first year. I ran into the
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  Speaker 3: wall three times like a puppy trying to get up
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  Speaker 3: on the couch. But I didn't go through the semi finals,
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  Speaker 3: and I wanted to just sort of lit a fire
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  Speaker 3: within me. And then over years, over the years, my
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  Speaker 3: intentions have changed, my goals have changed within the show.
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  Speaker 3: You know, I went from just wanting to be the
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  Speaker 3: ball to going, why don't I aim for at all?
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  Speaker 3: Why don't I go to the top. You don't have
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  Speaker 3: anything to lose. And through doing that, my training change,
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  Speaker 3: and I've now been given this platform to sort of
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  Speaker 3: inspire other women and young girls to absolutely just set
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  Speaker 3: a big goal chase the dreams. Then also know that
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  Speaker 3: it takes a lot of hard work and a lot
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  Speaker 3: of relentless sessions where you just never give up. But
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  Speaker 3: I truly believe that we're capable. You know, we might
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  Speaker 3: not have the same muscles or the power capacity as
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  Speaker 3: the male athletes on the show, but we can find
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  Speaker 3: our own way through the obstacles. And yeah, hopefully that
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  Speaker 3: I'm showing that as possible through doing it.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah. Oh, you are absolutely amazing to watch and you know,
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  Speaker 1: and seeing the way that that your cruz through those obstacles,
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  Speaker 1: it makes it look like it's easy when I know
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  Speaker 1: it's not. How much training goes into it.
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  Speaker 3: Well, to be honest, you know, I think at the moment,
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  Speaker 3: I just mostly do forty five to be honest, Just
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  Speaker 3: try and stay in good shape. Because when you show
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  Speaker 3: up to the show, they show you this this course
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  Speaker 3: about an hour before they start filming, so you don't
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  Speaker 3: get to try it, you don't get to test it.
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  Speaker 3: So when you step up on that flat and that
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  Speaker 3: platform and it's the light, the cameras to countdown, it's
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  Speaker 3: so mental, you know, it's how you're going to handle
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  Speaker 3: that pressure and the nerves. And you know, I honestly
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  Speaker 3: get so nervous I lose feeling in my arms and
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  Speaker 3: legs and have to slap them and remind myself I've
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  Speaker 3: got men. So you know, training wise, I try and
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  Speaker 3: keep nice and fit, and you know, you might do
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  Speaker 3: some rock i'ming here and there. Gymnastics is great, but
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  Speaker 3: mostly just staying in good shape because when you shut
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  Speaker 3: up to the course, you want to do a lot
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  Speaker 3: of the mental training, a lot of the positive, positive reinforcements,
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  Speaker 3: telling yourself you can do it, visualizing yourself getting through
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  Speaker 3: the obstacles because you haven't tried it before, and that's
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  Speaker 3: the tough part.
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  Speaker 2: I bet.
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  Speaker 1: How does that training though, as a gymnast, when you
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  Speaker 1: know you're in your younger years, how does that sort
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  Speaker 1: of help you?
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  Speaker 2: Because it is such a mental game as well, isn't it.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, And you know the competitions that we did within
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  Speaker 3: gymnastics and even like stuff like worn't Champs and Olympics.
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  Speaker 3: Obviously it's good practice to compete under pressure, but with gymnastics,
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  Speaker 3: you know, the pressure came from doing it when the
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  Speaker 3: green light was on, because I trained my routine thousands
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  Speaker 3: of times, so the hard part was doing it when
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  Speaker 3: you had to do it. But with you haven't tried
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  Speaker 3: these obstacles, it's a totally different of pressure. So yeah,
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  Speaker 3: gymnastics has definitely helped I think personally with my ability
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  Speaker 3: to build swing and my body awareness. But I'm telling
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  Speaker 3: you right now, everything else I have I've had to
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  Speaker 3: learn from scratch. I had a little chicken legs that
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  Speaker 3: just didn't work, and having to build power and agility
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  Speaker 3: in my legs, I was like.
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  Speaker 2: What is this?
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  Speaker 3: Like? Who is is that?
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  Speaker 2: Yah?
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, there's a lot of things I've had to learn,
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  Speaker 3: but I also I love that aspect, you know, because
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  Speaker 3: a lot of them. It took me six months to
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  Speaker 3: learn a wall. And you know, I think with a
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  Speaker 3: lot of kids these days, through that instant gratification that
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  Speaker 3: we get on social media and just scrolling and always
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  Speaker 3: looking for new stuff, I think it's really important to
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  Speaker 3: if you don't get something straight away like that's great,
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  Speaker 3: you shouldn't see it as too hard. You just have
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  Speaker 3: to view it as a challenge and something to work on.
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  Speaker 3: And that's where that the lentless lentless sort of attitude
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  Speaker 3: has to come into it and that never give up attitude.
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  Speaker 1: Such good advice and no doubt you'll have all of
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  Speaker 1: those young kids hanging on every word over the weekend, Olivia, when.
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  Speaker 2: You have a chat to them.
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  Speaker 3: And not wait, it's going to be so much fun.
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  Speaker 1: Well, Olivia Vivian, it's been lovely speaking to you this morning.
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  Speaker 2: Thank you so very much for catching up with us.
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  Speaker 3: Oh my pleasure, Thank you for having me.
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  Speaker 1: That's Olivia Vivian there, as many of you will know
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  Speaker 1: as the Australian Ninja Warrior.
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  Speaker 2: Of course, I reckon.
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  Speaker 1: She's just about everybody's favorite ninja warrior. Definitely Dannielle, my
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  Speaker 1: producer's favorite ninja warria, my daughter Bronte's favorite ninja warria
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  Speaker 1: as well, and I reckon mine too