At His Own Pace

Not many 24-year-olds are retired blade-running Paralympians and also members of the New Zealand Order of Merit. But Liam Malone is extraordinary.

Born with fibular himimelia − an extremely rare condition that caused the absence of the fibula bone in both his legs − Malone had his legs amputated below the knees, and had his first pair of prosthetic limbs fitted at 18 months old. At 19, he crowdfunded $20,000 to buy a pair of blade prosthetics, and represented New Zealand three years later at the Summer Paralympics in Rio de Janeiro. He won silver in the men’s T44 100-metre final, and gold medals in the T44 200-metre and 400-metre finals, breaking the previous Paralympic record held by Oscar Pistorius. ‘The Paralympics will make the Olympics look like the Antiques Road Show in 50 years,’ tweeted Malone in July 2017. ‘Paralympians will be the most advanced humans on the planet.’

Liam Malone represented New Zealand in the 2016 Summer Paralympics in Rio de Janeiro, winning silver in the men's T44 100-metre final and golds in the T44 200-metre and 400-metre finals.

Malone’s decision to retire from the Paralympics in January was, in part, influenced by waning motivation. ‘I didn’t agree with rule changes which affected the design of the blades,’ he says. And for every elite athlete, the question of longevity eventually arises − even at 24 years of age. ‘The life-cycle of an athlete is really short. I didn’t want to get to 30 and have to make the decision that I’ve made now. It made sense to think of transitioning out earlier and creating a whole new set of opportunities to move forward with.’

Malone was New Zealand’s flag bearer for the 2016 Summer Paralympics closing ceremony. Last year, he was appointed as a Member of the New Zealand Order of Merit for his service to athletics and was awarded Disabled Sportsperson of the Year at the 54th Halberg Awards. After such exceptional accolades, his departure from athletics wasn’t altogether premature.

‘I don’t view myself as disabled when I can do everything,’ he says. ‘Shaping how society thinks about people with disabilities is really important because my experiences have often been uninspiring as a child.’

Growing up in Nelson, Malone was bullied at school. He grew self-conscious about his body, wearing trousers for seven years to hide his prosthetics. He ‘learned to be resilient as a result,’ he says. As he grew older, his insecurities caused the onset of anxiety which persisted throughout his teenage years. When he was 18, his mother died after a six-year battle with bowel cancer. ‘I had family members die around the same time as my mum. I had two artificial legs and I had a lot of different societal perceptions that I had to deal with as a teenager,’ he says. ‘How you deal with death and loss is pretty hard. You don’t get over these things.’ At the time of his mother’s death, he grappled with his identity. He self-medicated with alcohol and crashed a car while driving drunk. He pulled himself upwards from rock bottom with fortitude and self-discipline. He balanced his studies in Marketing and International Business with training for the 2016 Paralympics. ‘Your body and your mind learns to deal with these things,’ he says. ‘That’s just life. You want to be able to think forward and look back, and say how do I want to be remembered?’

He is an advocate for the benefits of mindfulness, a practice that helps him bring awareness to the present moment to create a sense of detachment from stresses and negative thought patterns. ‘We have huge mental health issues throughout New Zealand. I think mindfulness will become one of the biggest skills we’ll end up having to teach in schools.’

To Malone, mental and physical wellbeing are not separable and their interdependence is a relationship he recommends fostering. ‘The world is changing at a faster pace and dealing with change is really unnatural for a human being. Mindfulness allows us to deal with change much easier.’

Malone looks to the future. He’s begun working for Auckland artificial intelligence firm Soul Machines. The company aims to humanise online self-service by creating emotionally responsive digital human beings, thus democratising immersive technology.

For Malone, technology is an antidote to the fragility of the human experience – from prosthetics that go beyond the limits of the body’s anatomy, to digital creation unrestricted by societal inequality.

Despite his change in career direction, he isn’t about to relinquish the physical ambition that pushed him to become one of the fastest Paralympians of his time. He’s still marathon training, with a regime that’s ‘different, but it’s intense in a different way.’ When asked about his approach to physical wellness, he says he structures his routine by dividing exercise, sleep and nutrition into three equally important parts.

Written by Alena Walker | Photograph by Paul Petch