PDBY Featured Athletes: Donne and Thomas-Laszlo Breytenbach

Donne (D) and Thomas-Laszlo (T) Breytenbach are twin sibling judokas at the University of Pretoria. The pair are working hard towards qualification for the 2024 Paris Olympics. PDBY sat down with them to discuss their journey as judo athletes, from discovering the sport to developing into professionals and the road towards the Games.

You have said in other interviews that you found judo as a result of ditching nap time because you were both energetic children. Do you think your younger selves knew that those actions would culminate into where you are now?

T: At the time it was just sort of like a short-term escape. I think they [our younger selves] would be really happy to see that we took it on to like this whole career path and followed it almost to the very end. And to the pinnacle of sporting events.

D: I think they would be proud to see where we are at now. The discipline and the commitment that we’ve shown. I think they’d be happy.

Nowadays, we have young athletes who know for a fact that they want to make a career of their sport. So, they set out these major goals like qualifying for a World Cup. When did you realise you wanted to do judo professionally as opposed to just recreationally?

T: We moved to Tuks Club in 2012, just before that [years] Olympic games and I think training with athletes that were going to the Olympics then or just seeing them train was fuel on the fire, it pushed us further.

D: The first SASCOC international tournament. [In the year] 2015 that’s when it shifted for me. I was like ‘this is definitely what I want to be doing’.

T: Yeah, that’s when it shifted. But when it became serious was 2016, when we got accepted into TuksSport High School, and then it went on to training three times a day, averaging 5-6 hours, training Monday through Saturday. It became sort of a professional mindset.