The 33-year-old capped off a personal best season with a second-placing at the Pan Pacific Jiu-Jitsu Championships at Melbourne Sports and Aquatic Centre earlier this month.

Wright, currently a blue belt, trains at the Ballarat Dojo under Glen Stanford. 

Prior to his success at the Pan Pacific Championships, Wright also took home silver medals for strong showings at the Jiu-Jitsu Australian Cup and Will Machado Championship.

While he was pleased with second in all three titles, Wright is targeting gold for next year.

“It was great, because I’m one of the only ones in the dojo who goes,” he said. “I usually train six times a week and I’m getting pretty close to moving up to purple – it’s only around the corner.

Wright is a fourth-degree blue belt and has spent six years practising the discipline after originally taking it up as a means for fitness.

“Jiu-jitsu is a life thing ... you never stop learning,” he said

“Jiu-jitsu is like a spider web (technically speaking), you want to be able to have a good web to pull your opponent into to reach the next level.”

Wright has aspirations to reach black-belt status, but is in no hurry, anticipating that it could take another half-dozen years to achieve his ultimate goal.

He plans to spend the rest of the summer preparing for the Sydney-hosted Abu Dhabi World Pro Australasia 2014 Trials.