TOM DUNN: Who is Kieren Devisser?

KIEREN DEVISSER: I am just a passionate Australian who's worried about our plastic pollution crisis. I have grown up in the country and I've been surrounded by nature my whole life. Nature is a part of who I am, and I want to help protect it.

TD: Endurothon Oz is an intruiging concept. Where did the idea come from, and why the focus on plastic pollution?

KD: It's definitely different. I have grown up around sports, my father is a sport teacher. All my brother's were heavily into sport's and I followed down the same path. After my bike ride in 2014, I always thought of cycling around Australia, but I never had a cause worth doing it for. There was nothing that really struck me. In 2017,  My fiance Teresa and I moved up to Queensland as I had a job opportunity up there.  We were hit rough while we were up there, we spent 2 months homeless living off $2 per day. We were living in the back of the car during summer, our car was almost broken into while we slept multiple times, we were malnourished and we were in a difficult place. One of our morning routines was that we would head down to our favourite beach and watch the sunrise, it was a way of keeping our positivity up. One morning, we arrived to the beach and it was covered in plastic that had washed up overnight. Tess and I ended up helping clean the beach with an elderly couple, who educated us on plastic pollution. I began to research into it and my heart broke. Facts such as 3000 marine animals die each day from plastic pollution, 46,000 pieces of plastic float in every square mile in the ocean & that 8-14 million tonnes enter the ocean every year; began to dig into me. I was sucked in and I knew I wanted to help create a change. I thought of cycling around Australia, but the plastic pollution crisis is so big. I felt like I had to do something bigger to help raise awareness and tackle this problem, so I decided to run, cycle and kayak - pushing my body to the absolute limits to get people talking. 

TD: You’re featuring as part of an interview series full of Advocates and Adventurers. In which of those two categories would you place the Endurothon challenge?

KD: Great question! On one hand I am traveling some of Australia's toughest terrain, including kayaking Bass Strait through the trip. So it is definitely adventurist. But on the other hand, we are promoting and supporting a very important cause. We will have to settle for both!

TD: Endurothon isn’t your first adventure challenge, having cycled 2,700km from Uluru to Melbourne in 2014. How has that experience shaped your upcoming one?

KD: I was 16 years old when I organised that trip. I was a shy and was very much afraid of the public eye. I was a kid with a dream and I stuck through it and completed it. That trip taught me so much about myself and that anything was possible if I mind to it. I received an unbelievable amount of negative input from my 'friends' for that trip, saying I would never be able to do it. It taught me to filter out the noise and stick to my guns. There were a lot of things that I attempted with that trip that failed, we initially set the target fundraising goal for $50,000 and only came out with $12,000. I created life long contacts through that event too. Because of my Cycle for Cancer, I now know what not to do, how far I can take it and how to prepare properly. I am going all out on this trip, I don't think I would be so confident if i hadn't have done that initial bike ride.