A new start after 60: I became a wrestler

On the night of her 60th birthday, Sally Goldner climbed to the top rope of the ring in an Alpha Pro battle royal and launched herself with a missile dropkick as the crowd roared; for a second she was completely airborne before landing on her opponents, who later wished her a happy birthday as they threw her out of the ring.

Goldner, who lives in Melbourne, has been a lifelong fan of wrestling, watching on TV and at the city’s Festival Hall and even recreating matches at home with the furniture as turnbuckles. Much of the sport’s representation felt wrong to her growing up — “most of the representation seemed to be burly cisgender men … A lot of the storylines reflected queerphobia” — and she did not understand that she was trans until later in life.

Australia, Melbourne

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