Melissa Perrine may have a vision impairment, but her sights are firmly set on a gold medal at the Beijing Winter Paralympics.
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These games will be extra special for the para-alpine skier as she was recently named co-captain of the Australian team alongside para-snowboarder Ben Tudhope.
That means she will not only be competing in her fourth games as an athlete from Saturday, February 5, but she will also be cheering on the other Australian paralympians and giving them her full support.
Just like anything life throws at Perrine, the Welby resident says she is tackling the experience head-on.
"I couldn't be prouder of being appointed a co-captain of this amazing paralympic team alongside Ben Tudhope," the 34-year-old said on her latest Instagram post.
"It is an honour that I never dreamt of, but I am determined to do it justice."
Due to Beijing's COVID-19 restrictions, Perrine and other athletes won't have any family or friends physically with them at the games.
However, the Mittagong Lions physio for over five years has plenty of support back home.
Lions president Matthew Aiken said the players and staff would be cheering her on as she was a loved member of the Lions family.
"We're incredibly proud of her and we hope she does really well," Aiken said.
"She's solid, methodical, always goes by her word and is incredibly professional in everything she does.
"Everyone is thinking of her and we're wishing her all the success in the world.
"We hope this is her year and her time."
Perrine was born in Nowra with four separate eye conditions including cataracts, nystagmus, microphthalmia and glaucoma.
Her eyesight is slowly deteriorating and she can only see blurry shapes and colours.
She is already a dual paralympic bronze medalist, both coming in Pyeongchang four years ago, but the flag bearer for Australia at the closing ceremony in 2018 still has a lot of fire left in her belly.
In the alpine skiing, she'll be hoping to win at least one gold in the downhill, giant slalom, slalom, super-G and super combined disciplines.
She will compete in the B2 category, which is for athletes with some partial vision or the ability to recognise the shape of a hand, but have a field of vision less than five degrees.
Helping her down the Yanqing National Alpine Skiing Centre course, which a lot of athletes struggled with during the able-bodied Winter Olympics a couple of weeks ago, will be her guide Bobbi Kelly.
They are already a successful pairing, having won gold in the super combined, silvers in the giant slalom and super-G and bronze in the slalom at the 2019 World Para Alpine Skiing Championships in Slovenia.
No matter what happens in Beijing though, Wingecarribee Council's Young Australian of the Year for 2007 can be proud of everything she's already achieved both on and off the sporting scene.
She was Ski and Snowboard Australia's paralympic athlete of the year and female para-athlete of the year at the AIS Awards in 2019 and also holds a Bachelor of Exercise Science and a Master of Exercise and Sports Science degree.
You can catch Melissa Perrine and the entire Beijing Winter Paralympic Games live and free across the channels of Seven including 7plus.
You can also see her make her entrance into the opening ceremony from 10.40pm on Friday, March 4 and daily highlights on the main channel.
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