Under the bright stadium lights and quiet determination of early morning training sessions, the path from youth sports to professional status in the UK is as draining as it is inspirational. Studies show that only about 10% of youth football academy players get professional contracts, and across various sports, less than 1% of young athletes make it to elite levels.

This article takes a deep dive into the life of a young, determined athlete, seeing their setbacks, sacrifices, and rare success lead to a successful career path that has allowed his skill set to shine on the biggest stage.

Izaiah (Izzy) Auduhene a 20-year-old stuntman based in the city of Nottingham started doing flips and turns on the mats of his gymnastics centre.

Izaiah’s journey into athletics began in 2013 when at just 8 years old, he stepped into his new second home Derby City Gymnastics Centre for the first time. The gym, with its towering apparatus and crash mats lining the floor, quickly became a place he could call home, a place where he managed to push his body to its limits and learned the art of controlled movement.

“I remember walking into the gym for the first time and being in so much awe with everything I saw,” Izaiah recalls. “The bars, the rings, the foam pits- it was all a kid’s dream as if it was a giant playground, but soon realized it was also a place that demanded discipline.”

Gymnastics became the foundation of his athletics career; to this day he still goes there to train amongst his peers. Despite the talent and the commitment, he had to the sport, it was not always smooth sailing.

“There were times when I hit a mental block with certain flips and honestly, it was pretty shit,” he admits. “I’d stand there, knowing in my head I was capable of doing it, but my body just wouldn’t listen. It was frustrating as hell.”

Mental blocks are a common struggle for gymnasts, where fear and hesitancy will hold them back, even the most skilled athletes suffer from this. For Izaiah, overcoming these obstacles was just about mental resilience as it was about physical ability- a trait that he would later pick up when transitioning into bodybuilding and stunt work.

As Izaiah grew older his passion for gymnastics started to shift. Although his love for the sport was still there, he was drawn to a different kind of challenge, one that focused more on strength rather than agility. “At 15, I started lifting weights initially to get bigger and stronger for gymnastics “, he explains. “But the more I trained, the more I realized I enjoyed building muscle.” The routine of gymnastics felt like it was limiting him, whereas bodybuilding began to offer a new sense of freedom for Izaiah, one where he could shape his physique on his terms.

“With gymnastics, you need to fit a certain mold, you need to be light, lean flexible, there were times I was told I was too light or too lean growing up too. This is why bodybuilding over time appealed to me more I took the criticism and realized that I am now able to build myself in whichever way I please now.”

This transition wasn’t just physical; it was also about finding a new identity as an athlete. Instead of chasing perfect routines, Izaiah became obsessed with sculpting strength, pushing his body beyond its previous limits.

From a young age, Izaiah saw being a stunt man as something to aim for it wasn’t just about building muscle or mastering flips, it was always about preparing for something bigger. “I always wanted to be a stuntman,” he says with quiet confidence. “That was the goal from early on.” While most kids dreamed of becoming footballers, content creators, or musicians, Izaiah was watching action scenes, fascinated not by the movie stars but by the anonymous figures taking the falls behind them.

But taking a dream like that did not come without its fair share of doubts. When asked if people questioned his ambitions he nodded. “Teachers at school, friends, even some of my peers didn’t take it seriously,” he admits. “They all thought I had no chance because it’s not exactly a traditional path and it’s not easy to get into.”

To many, it sounded like a fantasy, a long-shot career reserved for a lucky few who managed to make a breakthrough. The doubt fuelled Izaiah to make sure he reached his dreams. Whilst others laughed off the idea, he was quietly building the strength, agility, and mindset to make this happen. “I knew it wasn’t going to be easy,” he says. “But that just made me want it more.”

Years of discipline, training, and unwavering commitment paid off. “And now I’m doing that as a job,” he adds with a grin, a key reminder that what once seemed to be unrealistic has now become his reality.

There were a few important figures in Izaiah’s life who proved it was possible. His earliest inspiration came from two people he saw not just as coaches but as real-life role models. “My gymnastic coaches Damien and Greg were gymnasts and now they’re top stuntmen,” he says. “I always looked up to them, which is a huge part of the reason I chose the path I did.”

Watching two people he trained under make the leap from the gym floor to the film set made the vision of a stunt career feel less like a fantasy and more like a blueprint. It showed Izaiah that the skills he was learning balance, spatial awareness, and fear management, were not just for gymnastics competitions. This would become the foundation for a career built on adrenaline and precision.

Their success planted a seed that has stuck with Izaiah through every setback and transformation. His coaches not only taught him the skills and techniques of becoming a gymnast, but they also showed him the kind of life that could come from mastering movement and never giving up on an unconventional dream.

Izaiah’s first steps into the stunt world didn’t come through an agency or casting call but through the trusted connection with his gymnastics coach who had since made his transition from gymnastics to stunt coordinating, which changed everything for him.

“My gymnastics coach was stunt coordinating on a movie and brought me in to watch and observe how things run,” Izaiah explains. “Just being on set and seeing how it all worked behind the scenes was crazy, it made me want it even more.”

That film turned out to be Argylle, a spy thriller directed by Matthew Vaughn, best known for his work on Kingsman. At the time, Izaiah wasn’t there to perform but to learn. But as fate would have it, the movie needed additional reshoots.

“They shot the film and needed some reshoots,” he says. “By that time, I was at a decent level, so brought me in to perform for the reshoots.”

Just like that, Izaiah had his first professional credit. To him, it was not just a stunt but a signal that all the training and quiet ambition had finally led to somewhere real.

For most viewers, stunt work usually looks like a blur of chaos, explosions, high-speed chases, and perfectly timed punches. But what they don’t see is the months of preparation that go into every moment look natural.

“There’s insane amounts of prep that goes into it,” Izaiah explains. “Before the movie even starts shooting, there’s usually about four to six months of rehearsals, especially on big action films.”

During these rehearsal periods, stunt teams work in dedicated studios to choreograph and film stunt pre-visualization. “We create and perform the action scenes in a rehearsal room and then present the pre-vis to the director and higher-ups,” he says. “They either approve it or ask for changes, and then we go back, adjust, and reshoot the pre-vis until it’s ready.” 

They make it to set only after these sequences are locked in. “On the day of shooting, we’ll first do walkthroughs with stunt doubles to ensure everything is safe and dialed in. Then the actors will come in and fight the other stunt performers,’ Izaiah adds.

It’s remarkably different from just “jumping into action.” Every move is measured, repeated, and refined under intense physical and mental pressure.

At just 20 years old, Izaiah has already carved a path for himself that many could only dream of, and seeing this is only the beginning there is no telling what could come next for him.

“You’ve achieved so much already, what’s the next step for you?” I asked.

He took a moment, reflecting on what his biggest dreams had always been with a calm expression.

“I want to continue working on big Marvel films like I did with Deadpool and Wolverine last year,” he says. “And more than anything I want to work on projects that push me to my limit. I want to be part of the kind of action that made me fall in love with these movies to begin with.”

This isn’t just about being in front of explosions or pulling off jaw-dropping stunts.

“I want to be proof that if you’ve got a dream when no one else believes in you, you’ve just got to try hardest to achieve those goals,” he says. “At the end of the day, that’s how I got here.”

It’s a reminder to the youth of today that passion, persistence, and belief can break through even via unlikely paths, sometimes the kid with ‘unrealistic dreams’ is only just getting started.