In our 2018 Annual Report; by Liam Petterson
Orham Karagӧz couldn’t maintain his balance on a treadmill before starting his fitness journey with Melbourne University Sport in 2018.
Since then the PhD student in Anthropology, who is legally blind, has come a long way.
“I can jog on the machine easily, whereas before I couldn’t even do that without holding the bars”, he said.
MU Sport Fitness Instructor, Matthew Cotte, notes that Karagӧz’s most impressive improvements have been on the Stairmaster and the Erg Bike.
“I’m better than Matthew now”, Karagӧz jokes.
He first joined the University’s gym in April 2018 after hearing that another legally blind man, Josh Morgan, was working out there.
“When I found out about him I thought, why shouldn’t I try that too? After that I thought I should have a go.”
“[At the beginning] I came here to lose a bit more weight and be a bit fitter…but losing weight is not always crucial, it is more to do with being healthy.”
He is particularly grateful to his personal trainer, Isaac Smith, who has enabled him to gain confidence using free weights.
“With Isaac I tend to do the difficult stuff like [free] weights, and cardio I tend to do with other people because it’s not as risky. Weights are a bit more risky.”
“I appreciate that Isaac is particularly cautious of my safety and health. He takes good care of me.”
Karagӧz comes in four times a week, twice for cardio and twice for weights – something which Smith really values.
“He’s very resilient with training and that’s something that I really like to be around,” said Smith.
“I think something that’s really important for someone who has a disability in the gym is that you don’t start to lower the bar.
“Something Josh Morgan has said before is that there is a natural tendency that people want to help you out, but it does lower the bar, and if other people are lowering the bar for you, you tend to lower the bar for yourself.”
However, Smith said that Karagӧz pushes himself hard.
“He’s like ‘give it to me…don’t hold back’.”
Smith would ultimately like to see Karagӧz pursue powerlifting, but the anthropology student is focusing on finishing his PhD first. He’s on his third draft and expects it to be completed by late 2019, but will strive to maintain his physical progress.
“I’ve come a long way and I’m more confident. But I’m still learning more stuff – you have to learn. If you say there’s nothing else for me to learn then, basically, there’s no purpose to life.”
