Luba Josevski

Luba Josevski is a 31 year old wheelchair tennis athlete who was born with Bilateral Tibial Hemophilia. Despite numerous surgeries throughout her childhood, starting from the age of 6 months, at the age of 16, she made the difficult decision to have both her legs amputated.
She has demonstrated excellence throughout her 10 plus year career as a wheelchair tennis player. Luba is one of the very few athletes that work full time and complete at senior level both nationally and internationally.

She has been mainly self-funded and has had very little support via sponsors, etc. Despite the above, she has achieved a world ranking of 27 and won numerous nation and international tournaments as per her profile on the Victorian Institute of Sport, International Tennis Foundation and on www.tennis.com.au.

She has represented Australia in the World Cup Team on numerous occasions. In 2012 she gained 2nd place in the Asia/Oceania World Cup Tournament.

She has volunteered her time to the Villa Maria Organisation and promoted the new App that they have developed, which allows wheelchair bound individuals to check the wheelchair accessibility status of public venues such as restaurant’s, sporting arenas etc. in an accurate and timely manner using their phone.

She initiated the setup of a stand at the Villa Maria “Out and About Family Fun Day”. Her work there led to a recent radio spot on ABC Radio, where she shared her story and promoted the new App.

Luba has been an amazing role model in so many different ways. From the time she was a teenager and took it upon herself to convince her parents that her amputation was a good idea, to the time she was wheeled into surgery, with a smile on her face. After her surgery she decided that not only would she volunteer at the Good Friday Appeal but she would walk in to the building with her new prosthetic’s, only a short 4 months after her operation.

Luba travels the world mainly unassisted, with 2 wheelchairs, her tennis gear etc. to countries which are not as wheelchair friendly as Australia. This in itself is a huge feat and most would have given up. Once Luba sets her mind to something, despite her challenging physical disabilities, she lets very little get in her way.