HOW I'M WHIPPING CANCER'S BUTT

SA paddle ski champ Oscar Chalupsy was diagnosed with lethal bone marrow cancer in 2019. In this extract from his memoir he reveals how he fought the disease using techniques he learnt in the water

A SHAFT of agony shot down my back, like a spear being plunged into my upper spine. It was excruciating. I had never experienced anything like it, even though my whole life as an endurance athlete had been dedicated to pushing the extremities of physical pain.

It happened while I was limbering up in the ocean for the start of the Shaw and Partners Doctor (regarded by many as the ultimate ocean paddling contest), a 27km race from Rottnest Island to Sorrento Beach in Western Australia. It’s a highlight on the global surfski calendar, attracting many of the world’s top paddlers.

That year, 2019, there were 437 of us. I race it regularly and have been first across the line three times in a row, but now for the first time in my career, I was seriously considering withdrawing before the starting gun fired.

But just as I was about to drag my surfski back onto the beach, my competitive spirit kicked in. I threw my flip-flops into the boat that would be following the race.

“See you guys at the end,” I said.

The gun fired and we were off.

Despite the pain, I was still in my natural element. I am happiest when surfing down fast-running swells with spray on my face and howling wind at my back. The siren of the sea beckoned the day I got my first surfski as a young boy and now, after almost half a century of racing to extremes, I couldn’t resist the call.

I instinctively found myself starting to dig deep, milking the elemental energy of every surging swell without realising how much harm the pain was doing to my body.