Leg-up needed

Why is this 50 year-old self-confessed overweight smoker, who loves a drink, about to pedal his bike some 3755kms across Australia?  For another veteran who’s doing it tough. That’s why!

Former infantryman David Beacham will set off from Coogee Beach in Perth on 1 March and push his overweight frame across one of the toughest endurance rides in the world – all to help raise money to buy a leg for a veteran he’s never met. When he arrives at Coogee beach in Sydney he’ll be a few kilos lighter and hopefully close to his target of the $130,000 needed for a prosthetic leg for Perth veteran (of Army and Air Force), Brendan Smith.

Smith was living with PTSD after his service and on the way to a therapy session in April last year he crashed his motorbike. He lost most of his left leg.

What has irked many is the fact that Smith didn’t lose enough of his leg. Had he shaved another couple of millimetres off he probably would have been entitled to more assistance and possibly the cost for a prosthetic limb under the national injury insurance scheme.  As it is he’s come up short.

Beacham heard about Smith’s plight in his role as a member of Overwatch Australia, a not-for-profit organisation working to curb high rates of suicide by Australian veterans. The active RSL member decided whinging about the red-tape was not going to help a fellow veteran walk again so he decided to get on his bike – so to speak – and raise the money himself.

The loss of his leg cost Smith his job as a rigger and the additional financial hardship is putting more strain on him and his family than ever. A new prosthetic will give this man who served his country the chance to walk and work again.

If you can support Beacham’s ride and help Smith donate online through the Coogee to Coogee Ride for Veterans Facebook. If you don’t have Facebook you can donate via GoFundMe.