For Tamworth softballer and Australian captain Stacey Porter her Indigenous heritage has always been a proud part of her story.
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Now, her and team-mate Leah Parry's idea of specially-designed Indigenous apparel has been brought to life with the Aussie Spirit's first-ever Indigenous supporter top being unveiled to celebrate NAIDOC week.
"Leah actually suggested it to me, we had a chat just after the Super Netball Indigenous Round, and she suggested we do something like that," Porter, who is the most-capped Australian player ever with 430 and counting, said.
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"It was good timing because we had just signed on to the new apparel company GAME Clothing so it was great to kickstart it and get the ball rolling."
Based in Queensland when she's not competing internationally, Porter reached out to Ipswich Indigenous artist Kylie Hill - after previously connecting through softball - to create a unique design.
The design is titled "Our Aussie Spirit Journey", the story behind the artwork being:"We came from all over this beautiful country we call home, Australia. We have shared our journeys with families and friends and now we want to share it with you. All the hard work, dedication, sweat and tears have made us what we are today. We will be playing hard for our country and won't let anything bring us down. We are the Travelodge Aussie Spirit Softball Team."
"That's what the Aussie Spirit is, it's all about bringing people together and Kylie did a fantastic job coming up with the design, she was super involved and really excited to be asked," Porter said of the design and story.
"The way she and [son] Jak pulled the drawing together is really special and I'm really proud they've done such a good job."
They have created two designs: a supporter top, and a training singlet to be provided exclusively to the Aussie Spirit squad members.
Porter says having the design on their training apparel while they're competing for Australia at home or overseas fills her with immense pride for her culture not only herself but for Indigenous Aussie Spirit representatives before her and of course her current teammates Janice Blackman and Tarni Stepto.
"It's such a special design, the Indigenous culture is something that myself, those before me and Janice and Tarni who are there now are really proud of," she added.
"And when we're travelling around the world and we've got that design on our singlet, we can connect to that spiritually really quickly. It's a really special thing to be anywhere in the world and know that you're connected to somewhere, that's something you can't make up."
"I think it's something that can bring us together, the girls in the squad who aren't Indigenous are all on board with it which is really cool, and it's something for the other countries we compete against to understand a little more about the Indigenous culture and the Australian culture too."
The launch of the supporter tops comes at an exciting time for the sport with the recent announcement that Fox Sports will again broadcast the Australia Pacific Cup and Summer Slam - Fully Loaded Softball next March.
