Thank you!

I would just like to take this opportunity to thank everybody who has followed my progress throughout the journey to Beijing. It has been long and it has endured its ups and downs, but all has come to an end. I am so appreciative of the support that I received from everybody. Through hero messages, text messages, emails, facebook messages the lot, I honestly had no idea of how many people have been reading this site until I received countless messages of support and congratulations. It has blown me away!
Thank you to those who even went to the effort of organising events including the Toowoomba Downs Club members and my school friends who have made the effort to always keep in touch even though I have always been many many miles away!

The Second Week of Olympics!

Probably the best week of my life! Parties, friends, shopping, watching other sports and relaxing. Life couldn't get much better. The Olympic Village in the second week was one of the greatest experiences ever.

Athletes are an interesting breed. We look after our bodies as if they are a porcelain doll 99% of the time, however, that 1% when it is time to let the hair down, it most definitely is let all the way down! The second week of the Olympics, was that 1% of the last four years. I had the opportunity to meet so many other Australian athletes, which we don't normally get to do.

In the village, everybody is relaxed, happy and enjoying every moment of the day. It doesn't matter who came what, or where you are from, everybody will talk to everybody (especially at the McDonald's line in the early hours of the morning).

I had the opportunity to spectate some other sports including both the men's and women's basketball matches versus USA, the syncronised swimming duet finals, the 10m platmform men's diving qualifiers and watched endless hours of actual live closed-circuit television of every single event. Not like the Channel 7 'live'; that was about a 45 minute delay! It was awesome!

The Olympic Wrap Up

I suppose by now, almost three weeks after we raced in Beijing, I have had enough time to reflect on our performance and my experiences at the Olympics.

I won't sugar coat it, I was very disappointed with our racing at the Olympics. Every race we started, within 250m we were already on the back foot and struggling to keep up with the other crews. This was shattering. After having such a great lead up to the Games, it was really hard to comprehend how fast the other crews were going. I wouldn't say we were going any slower than earlier in the year, our problem was that we needed to step up from those performances but we didn't.

We only have ourselves to blame, however, at this stage it is hard to pin point exactly where we went wrong. Most of us are baffled. On the positive side, the girls that I have spoken to about the racing and myself all believe that we have learnt from our experience in Beijing and are keen to try it again in London.

Prior to the Games, many people were commenting on how little experience our crew had at the Olympics. With only one member having competed at Athens, we were a young inexperienced crew trying to take on veterans of the event. Initially, these comments didn't phase us, although, now having competed at the Olympics, experience actually helps. Maybe not your physical contribution to racing, but experience would definitely help your mind cope with the overwhelming distractions that the Olympics offers. Subconsciously, your mind is thinking overtime trying to absorb all the new activities happening around you. It was like nothing I have ever experienced before!