Interview: Team UAE on Making History at the World Transplant Games

When Omar “OT” Tom and Katie Larkins logged into our Google Meet last week, the gold and bronze that made headlines were nowhere in sight. Instead, there was a bit of disbelief, and the calm that comes after a storm of competition. Omar sits forward in his chair, still carrying the restlessness of a sprinter; Katie has the composed but faintly dazed look of someone just back from a long campaign. They have only recently returned from Perth, where they led Team UAE to its first-ever appearance at the World Transplant Games and brought back a haul of five medals, including two golds, and a debut nothing short of historic.

“Honestly, it still doesn’t feel real,” Katie says. “To think we went there as this brand-new team and came back with five medals, that’s something we’ll be proud of for the rest of our lives.”

For Omar, who claimed gold in the 200m sprint, talks about how the achievement is about more than times or podiums. “I’m deeply grateful for the gold,” he tells me, “but it’s not what the games are about. They're a celebration of the possibilities. Every step since I received my kidneys, first from my father, then from my brother, has been a miracle. This was about honouring that.”

Their paths to Perth could not have been more different. Omar grew up with basketball as his compass, long before illness entered the picture. “Sport was always my foundation,” he says. “It gave me something to hold onto, even when I was a kid dealing with dialysis.” When kidney failure arrived, it threatened to take that from him but instead, sport became the thing that kept him going.

Katie, by contrast, only came to sport after her transplant. “I was never athletic growing up,” she admits. “But when you go through something like this, you realise there are things you can never take for granted again. The ability to move, to get tired for a good reason, to compete. That becomes precious.” Both describe their transplants as turning points in their sense of identity. Omar calls it the moment he decided to live deliberately: “You have this moment of clarity: you’ve been through all this, and now you have to go through the rest of your life with purpose, it’s shocking and liberating.” Katie nods. “It felt like a rebirth. Physically, yes, but also emotionally. It’s like you get a second shot at being yourself.”

The UAE’s official membership in the World Transplant Games Federation only came in 2024, which meant Perth was a true debut. They were literally building the plane as we were flying it.  As captain and manager, Katie juggled training schedules, sponsorship calls, and morale-building. “There were moments where I thought, why did I take this on? I wanted to give it all to Omar at some point.” she admits, smiling. “But then you’d see the team together, Justin with his double lung transplant, Fatima throwing javelin like a machine, and you just thought, no, we have to do this justice.”

That first medal, Katie and Husena Beguwala’s bronze in pétanque, fired up the team’s morale. “It was such a relief,” Katie says. “Not because of the medal itself, but because it showed we weren’t just visitors. We were competitors.”

Omar’s 200 metre race came near the end of the Games, and by then the UAE’s flag had already been on the podium multiple times. Still, this one felt different “I was really training for it,” he says. “I did my best, gave everything. It wasn’t about beating someone. It was about carrying my father and brother with me down that track.”

When he crossed first, the moment hit him all at once. “It felt like taking all those years, the hospital stays, the recovery, the times I thought I wouldn’t make it, and turning them into something beautiful.”

Katie’s biggest challenge wasn’t just competition but holding the team together. Omar agrees. “When you’re representing the UAE as a transplant athlete, you’re not just running for a medal. You’re running for every patient waiting for a donor, every family who’s made that decision. That’s a lot to carry, but it’s also what pushes you forward.”

Both athletes insist that the Games were about more than medals. “For me, the proudest moment wasn’t a podium,” Katie says. “It was watching the team sit together. That’s when I felt we’d succeeded.”

Neither of them shy away from the difficult parts of the journey. Omar recalls the crushing moment when he learned he would need a second transplant. “It broke me for a while,” he admits. “But then you pick yourself up. You train, you heal, you go again.” Katie’s defining test came in the early days of recovery. “It’s terrifying at first, you’re scared to even move. But you do it anyway. That’s where the strength comes from.”

When asked what message they hope others take from their story, Omar doesn’t hesitate. “That you can really try,” he says. “That there is life after transplant, and it can be bigger than you think.” Katie is more reflective: “I don’t think I get to tell people how to live their lives,” she says softly, “but one thing I would say is never take your health for granted. Not for a single day.”