A top Kiwi skier whose sporting career and Olympic dream was ended by a broken back is seeking a career in paramedicine.
Three years ago, Taupo freestyle skier Rose Battersby broke her lower spine in a practice-run crash at the X Games in Aspen, Colorado.
Medics rushed to help the stricken Battersby, then 19, and their efforts have inspired her to retrain. Now 22, Battersby is one semester into a paramedicine degree at Auckland University of Technology.
"Becoming a paramedic and passing on the work done by the people who saved me and the use of my legs, I feel like I owe it to the universe to become a paramedic and change people's lives they way they changed mine," Battersby said from a working holiday in Mammoth Lakes, California.