Contributors

MYSTERY DAD

Mystery Dad lives in Sydney, Australia with his emotionally intelligent wife, his two emotionally intelligent kids and the head of the household, his neurotic dog. MD and his wife grew up in England but immigrated to Sydney's golden beaches five years ago. Despite his protestation to the contrary, most people who know him vouch for his talent as a soccer player and he really does still play today. MD is the perfect contributor to Sportsocratic because, unlike many other supposed sports-lovers and experts, he can discuss most sports thoughtfully and intelligently. MD works in his own creative business.

ANNA SEYMOUR

Anna Seymour is a Melbourne-based deaf dance artist who graduated with a Bachelor of Creative Arts (Dance) from Deakin University in 2012. Anna was born and raised in the beautiful Northern New South Wales town of Byron Bay. No doubt Byron Bay's deep connection to nature, the arts and surfing provided many opportunities for Anna as she grew. Her deep connection to the ocean and nature influence her work in most of the dance and human movement projects she works on today.

TIMOTHY EDWARDS

Tim Edwards has had a completely rubbish sporting career so it is odd that he seems so obsessed with sport and adventuring. As a basketball shooting guard he had an okay jump shot but couldn't do anything else. As a rugby hooker he spent more time puking then actually playing. As a runner he won an awful lot of consolation prize chocolates for coming fourth but almost never won a ribbon. Despite his inadequacies he still loves sport and has opinions on almost any sporting subject. Tim has spent large parts of his working life in publishing and writing roles and has even done his share of teaching sport management to Uni students. He has coached more sports teams than he cares to remember. Tim is an awful surfer and skier but his lack of competence does not bother him one little bit!

PETER FITZSIMONS

Peter FitzSimons is a columnist for The Sydney Morning Herald and Sun-Herald, speaks four languages, has played rugby for Australia, co-hosted radio shows with Mike Carlton and Doug Mulray, interviewed famous people around the globe from George Bush to Diego Maradona and written 25 best-selling books.
Peter’s writing work is always enjoyable and uplifting to read in that his observations are intelligent, humane and perceptive. His relaxed and often humorous style appeals to everyone… perhaps with the exception of the rare anti-sport hard-bitten cynic.
He is the biographer not only of World Cup winning Wallaby captains, Nick Farr-Jones and John Eales, but also former Opposition Leader Kim Beazley, boxer Les Darcy, aviator Sir Charles Kingsford Smith, war heroine Nancy Wake and Antarctic explorer Sir Douglas Mawson. Darcy, aviator Sir Charles Kingsford Smith, war heroine Nancy Wake and Antarctic explorer Sir Douglas Mawson.

Mandy Nolan

Mandy Nolan is a true renaissance woman. Comedian, author, journalist, humour therapist and comedy coach. Nolan is as at home on the stage as she is on the page. Able to captivate audiences from a diverse socio economic, age and gender demographic: from the rough and tumble of a late night comedy clubs across the country to the considered and measured corporate performances for VIEW Club, or Sydney’s Parliament House or Olivia Newton John’s Invitation Only Private Party. A passionate champion for the underdog, Nolan is a first choice for charities needing a gun MC, auctioneer or feature act, she’s first choice for ladies’ luncheons and even the blokes are giving her a look in with as comedy headline for Alfie Langer’s 400 strong audience (including the State of Origin Team!)

SOCRATES

Short, fat, slow, uncoordinated and clumsy, ancient Athenian Socrates had very few of the physical quality required of the elite athlete. He did have, on the other hand, a better than average brain between his ears and a mouth that could talk opposing players, referees and coaches half into their graves. Socrates, as a sport analyst, is what the world needs and misses. He is an opinionated so-and-so that actually thinks deeply about sport and adventuring and likes nothing better than provoking others into deep thought. Socrates is the antithesis of the sporting jock or the West Sydney soccer supporter.

J. F. Campbell

John Campbell grew up in Sydney and is a life-long Rabbitohs supporter. He has been movie reviewer and rugby league correspondent for the Byron Shire Echo since 2007. His short story ‘The New Boots’ won the Herald-Sun short story competition in 2002 and was made into a short film that screened at the Sydney Film Festival and others overseas. John has written and directed four short movies and his paintings have been hung in the Wynne and Sulman Prizes (Art Gallery of NSW) and are in the private collection of John Singleton and Peter FitzSimons. In 2001 he was Artist in Residence at the Griffis Art Institute (Connecticut). John continues to paint and is currently working on his first crime novel … and hoping for a resurgence in the Rabbitohs’ fortunes in the 2016 footy season.

Chris Waterman

It was tough choosing a career of insurance over one in sport however given that Chris lacks talent in any form of the latter it should not come as a surprise. An average footballer, acceptable tennis player and poor golfer his sporting moment of glory came in 1983 when scoring a maximum 180 for The Crown Public House, Elsenham against their arch nemeses The King's Head, Stansted in the quarter final of the Herts & Essex inter pub knock-out darts competition. However this lack of on-field, real life experience has not dampened his belief that he is better placed than most to offer opinion and criticism to any sporting event. Currently living in Japan after 47 years in the UK new avenue's for commentary have opened up including Sumo, Baseball and the much televised world of Mahjong.

Damon Young

Damon Young is a philosopher and writer. He is the author and editor of nine books, most published internationally in English and translation. He's written hundreds of articles for newspapers and magazines, including The Age, The Australian, The Guardian, the ABC and BBC. He speaks regularly on ABC radio.
In 2013 he was awarded the AAP's Media Prize for my work in public philosophy.
He's an Associate in Philosophy at the University of Melbourne, and Founding Faculty at the School of Life, Melbourne.
He lives in Melbourne's eastern suburbs with his wife, sociologist and writer Ruth Quibell, and their son and daughter.

"Guru Jack" Marshall

"Guru Jack" Marshall of Zen Renaissance Healing developed Ki Yoga from the Oki-do Foundation.

Tim Willcox

Tim Willcox is not a freelance writer and will never be one. Prior to not being a freelance writer he has held senior management positions in small business ventures, global corporates both privately and publicly owned, as well as government instrumentalities. He never played with Socrates but did play with his brother who usually was out bludging on the blind. Never interested in the normal pathways he found out why the less travelled road is less travelled for a reason, and has continued to have passion for all things that equate to part time work and has leveraged off an Asian Expat bar fly existence to great effect.

Michelle Connellan

Michelle is currently slave to an online university degree in sports management. Driven down the business path from a love for surfing, skating and yoga when all sporting skills seemed to peak at 15 years old with an award for the biggest wipe-out in the local board rider’s competition on the south coast of NSW. Surfing inspired Michelle to travel, which resulted in marriage to a French ski/snowboard instructor where she is making the most of a good situation and perfecting her wipe-out skills in the snow.

Steve Georgakis

Steve was appointed to the Faculty of Education and Social Work in 2002 and has a long standing interest and passsion in physical education and school sport, teacher education, history and sociology of sport and pedagogy for learning. He served as program director of the Human Movement and Health Education Program 2006-2008 and has taught in all undergraduate teaching programs in the Faculty including primary undergraduate, primary and secondary M-teach, double degree, general education and study abroad.
The author of more than 50 academic publications, he has published on wide and varied aspects of physical education and sports studies including archaeology, history, sociology, pedagogy, comparative and international. His latest publication is the co-authored edited book Youth Sport in Australia

Lollie Barr

Lollie Barr is an international freelance journalist contributing to both the UK & Australian markets, as well as being syndicated in Germany, India, Poland, Italy, US and Brazil. In her career, she has contributed to Marie Claire UK & Australia, Cosmopolitan UK & Australia, Virgin Voyeur, Cleo, Red, Elle, Eve, She, New Woman, More, Top Sante, Women's Health, Zest, The Sunday Telegraph & The Mirror UK.
Lollie's first novel The Mag Hags was shortlisted for the New South Wales Premier's Award for Young Adult Fiction in 2009. She lives between Mullumbimby, Australia and Berlin, Germany.

Eric Brymer

Eric specialises in outdoor and adventure sports with a particular focus on the health benefits of being in nature and the psychology of extreme sports. He is a reader in outdoor and adventure studies and currently holds an Adjunct position at Queensland University of Technology, Australia. Eric’s research focuses on the two major interrelated issues confronting societies today: concern for the health and wellbeing of populations and the state of the natural environment. He specialises in researching the reciprocal wellbeing benefits of the human-nature relationship. Projects include investigating the psychological health benefits of nature-based experiences, understanding how the relationship between human beings and nature benefits wellbeing and learning for pro-conservation and pro-sustainability behaviours.

Tim Baker

Tim Baker is the best-selling author of numerous books on surfing, including “Bustin’ Down The Door,” (Harper Collins, 1996, now in its eighth print run), “High Surf” (Harper Collins, 2007) and “Occy” (Random House, 2008). He is a former editor of Tracks and Surfing Life magazines, and former editorial director of Morrison Media Services. He has won the Surfing Australia Hall of Fame Culture Award three times and been nominated for the CUB Australian Sports Writing Awards.
At 47, he has worked in the media and surfing magazines for 25 years and has surfed and travelled throughout Australia, Indonesia, Hawaii, Central and South America, North America, Europe, South Africa, Fiji, Tahiti, and Sri Lanka. He lives in Currumbin, Queensland, with his wife and two children.

Karen Rinaldi

Karen Rinaldi is the publisher of Harper Wave, an imprint she founded in 2012, and a senior vice president at HarperCollins Publishers. Rinaldi wrote the story for Maggie’s Plan, the 2015 feature film inspired by her novel, The End of Men. Her non-fiction work has appeared in The New York Times, Time.com, Oprah.com, Prevention, The Inertia among others. She is currently working on a book based on her article, (It’s Great to) Suck at Something: What Surfing Taught Me About Humility, Patience and Taking it on the Head. She and her family split their time between New York, New Jersey, and (whenever possible) Costa Rica. You can follow her at https://www.facebook.com/karerinaldiwriter
Image - Rocco Rinaldi-Rose

Max Sherry

Guru Jack Marshall and Elena Razorenova

Guru Jack Marshall is a master in Oriental Medicine developed the school of Ki Yoga, a diagnostic and remedial yoga, to find meaning and direction in daily practice.
Elena Razorenova is a dedicated and remarkable Hatha and Ki yoga teacher from Russia.

Georgina Mudge

Geoff Ebbs

A bookish lad, Geoff Ebbs rarely engaged with spectator sports while growing up in Melbourne but discovered a post-partum longing while in Alice Springs that fed a nostalgia for South Melbourne while living in Sydney and for Fitzroy now that he lives in Brisbane. He lived in both those Melbourne suburbs as a young man.

Holly Isemonger

Holly writes & reads & studies & surfs & I is the assistant editor at The Bohemyth. She has been published in Cordite, Shabby Doll House, and Voiceworks. She is the author of the chapbook Hip Shifts (If A Leaf Falls Press), Deluxe Paperweight (Stale Objects dePress), and is a contributor to Balancing Acts (Brow Books).

Jade Court-Gold

Jade Court-Gold is a prize-winning and award-winning artist (ceramics) currently working towards her Master of Fine Arts degree at the National Art School. Before commencing her artistic training, Jade worked in the film and television industry for six years, performing in several camera crew roles. In her teen years, Jade played representative basketball in Northern N.S.W. and still likes to shoot around a bit when she gets the opportunity. Jade lives in the inner-Sydney suburb of Glebe with her boyfriend, Kiran and catfriend, Frank.