Eliza McCartney Boyfriend Lukas Walton-Keim Is A Kitefoil New Zealand Champion

Eliza McCartney boyfriend Lukas Keim is a three time national level Kite Foiling Champion from New Zealand.

From 2020 to 2022, Lukas has maintained an impressive three-winning streak for New Zeland Kite Foiling Championships. The athlete comes from a family that has a history of paragliding and kiteboarding. His father is a paraglider who has raced internationally and established a school for paragliding and kiteboarding.

After it was announced that Kitefoiling would see its debut in the Olympics, Lukas has been preparing for the sport’s debut as well as his. So as to see his Olympic dream to an end, Lukas has been spending a lot of time training overseas as there are no tough-level competitors in New Zealand.

Lukas started paragliding when he was just ten. His mom is also an avid paraglider, and he also grew up doing it. In 2019, he finished third in the 2019 European Championships with Justina Kitchen in the team relay.

Keim’s alma mater is Auckland University of Technology in Marketing. Apart from being a kite foiler, he is also an instructor at Wings and Waves; he has been instructing and teaching for eight years now.

He has interned with Gin Gilders in Korea, where he learned all that is there to know about paragliding, its design, and manufacturing.

But all of this glory has not come without hiccups; when he was just 14, when kiteboarding one day in Shoal Bay, he injured his back and injured his L5, fifth lumbar spine vertebrae, which still flares up occasionally. That is why he proceeds with caution when it comes to sports injury. He knows how sports injury can derail one’s career. He has seen it with his lover Eliza, and his roommates, sailor Paul Snow-Hansen and footballer Fern Emma Roulston.

Eliza and Lukas have been going out with each other since February 2015, and both of them like traveling a lot.

The Kiwi duo’s Instagram has been bedecked with posts devoted to each other. Like in this instance, which happened to be their sixth year together, Lukas took to his Instagram to show off his celebrations with a very cheery photo of Eliza. He took Eliza out and spent their day together. His caption read, “6 years with this one (Eliza); glad we could get out today; love you.”

Just in July of this year, before Lukas headed to Gizzeria for the World Series Event, they took a very blissful trip that sounds straight out of a storybook, filled with sunflowers and lavenders. They traveled from Marseille, a historic port city in the South of France, to Valensole, a place known for its beautiful lavender fields. 

Eliza didn’t qualify for Tokyo Olympics, and she was understandably heartbroken, so she decided to take a break from sports and rest for a while.

Lukas took to Instagram in June of last year to write a lengthy post showing his support for her, and he explained that he has always been amazed by the perseverance and dedication she has always shown. Furthermore, he added, “It takes a lot of courage to do what you do on the good days and much more on the hard ones.”. Finally, he added that he was looking forward to spending his time during her break.

In response to that, Eliza took to comments to acknowledge that she could only do this because Lukas has always been on her side, day in and out. During her sabbatical, she spent time reading, gardening, and sharing her home-cooked meals with Lukas. 

But the good news is that Eliza and Lukas will try out for the Paris Olympics in 2024.