<\/p>\n
As Gout Gout<\/a> has bounded up the steps towards the summit of Australian athletics, never far away has been his coach Di Sheppard. Their journeys, however, could not be more different.<\/p>\n The teenager has arrived in the blink of an eye. The son of South Sudanese immigrants, the Ipswich Grammar student is already a global track star and national 200m champion at 17<\/a>, and has run faster than Usain Bolt at the same age.<\/p>\n Sheppard\u2019s struggles \u2013 as an athletics outsider, through adversity, all the while carrying trauma \u2013 have defined much of her 60 years. \u201cI sit there and say to \u2018the big man\u2019, it\u2019s nice to now get something good,\u201d she says. \u201cI think I\u2019ve paid my dues with the stuff that you have to deal with in life.\u201d<\/p>\n It has been about four years since Sheppard first started working with Gout, the length of time Sheppard believes it takes to really get to know someone. She sees that his talents go well beyond his biomechanics, commitment to training or genetic gifts.<\/p>\n She has recognised in Gout the \u201cemotional intelligence\u201d of someone older, and an ability to understand the variables, the challenges of the everyday. Overcoming them and committing to a longer goal, Sheppard sees, is part of his constitution. \u201cYou know yourself how hard that is as an adult, let alone as a kid,\u201d she says. \u201cHe has a massive ability to be able to do that.\u201d<\/p>\n