Those who know me know that I am not into sports. My parents were never into sports so it was just natural that I shared that same disinterest. However, it’s amazing how enthusiastic we become when the Olympic Games come around every 4 years.
We stay up till all hours of the morning watching sports we either never care about, or that we have never even heard of. Staff rooms across the world are all abuzz each morning with questions like “did you see the equestrian events last night? Wasn’t that girl from Iceland amazing” or “Aren’t those rhythmic gymnasts so good?!”
Well, the time for coming to work all bleary eyed from sitting up all night to check on how the Judo is going, is a little while off yet. But I have just read where one of the Australian team’s young swimmers, Eamon Sullivan, has just broken his own world record of 2 days ago! The record keepers barely have enough time these days to record names and check the spelling before they have to hit the delete button and type again!
Australia has had its fair share of legends in the pool. Names like Dawn Fraser, John Konrads, Murray Rose, Shane Gould, Kieren Perkins, Samantha Riley, Ian Thorpe and many others have had their time as greats of the sport. And each year, Australia never ceases to churn out even more talented young water babies who put the previous records to shame.
The rivalries always rear their ugly heads in all sports, but nothing like in swimming. American swimmer Gary Hall Jr., was known to have said that the US team would “smash the Australian swimmers like guitars”, at the 2000 Olympic Games in Sydney. When the US team lost to the Australians, the Australian team did some famous ‘air guitar’ to rub it in. Hall, however, went on to break records and make the Aussie celebrations short lived. The rivalry just kept rolling on.
So three cheers to young Eamon Sullivan for yet again raising the bar, and letting the world know that the legendary Australian swim team is far from running out of up and coming talent. Aussie! Aussie! Aussie! Oi! Oi! Oi!
Sorry about that, I’ll compose myself. Enjoy your day.
