The Roar
The Roar

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The Opening ceremony can make or break your Games: An athlete's perspective

Was one amazing night in the Bird's Nest ultimately bad for performance at the 2008 Olympics? (Peter23 / Wikimedia Commons)
Expert
5th August, 2016
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I know y’all want to read about life in the Olympic Athlete’s Village, but given the Opening Ceremony is this morning, here’s an insight into the fanfare-laden spectacle from a participating athlete’s perspective.

The rowing team doesn’t, typically, participate in the Opening Ceremony. With competition the day after, it is performance suicide.

I have only “walked” in Beijing 2008. Reason being, our competition started two days later and one of our crewmembers, three times Olympic gold medalist, James Tomkins, was the flag-bearer. That title goes to the inspiring cyclist and gold medal-owner Anna Meares for Rio.

After my experience in Beijing, it’s possible the Opening Ceremony can slam shut the windowpane of opportunity to compete at your four-year peak.

In Beijing, we were bussed to the gymnastics venue, adjacent to the Bird’s Nest Stadium where all Olympic athletes were corralled. The hive of star-athlete activity was concentrated in one space, including the USA NBA All-Stars setting up a ring of vending machines to protect themselves from other Olympians fanboy/fangirling out (and plenty do). I inadvertently walked right underneath (I’m 6’3”) Chinese basketball star Yao Ming’s armpit (7’6”).

Very little of the actual ceremony was on the screens inside the gymnastics centre. It was boring waiting around for over two hours on stadium seats with pretty much nothing to do. The New Zealand Team even broke out a Haka to get the people going. Lurking in the back of my mind was the thought I was not freshening up for racing.

Finally, the excitement levels went ballistic; we were told Australia’s athletes were up. Athletes were bouncing around like pogo sticks; screaming, squealing in a mass of released tension, bulging muscles and adrenalin.

For amateur sportsmen and women like me, our usual opportunity to entering a stadium is when we carry a slimy pie and warm beer down to our seats at the footy. But walking into the flatland of a stadium’s cauldron, with thousands of screaming fans getting their Olympic ticket price worth of athlete, is a very unfamiliar burst of stardom.

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Having seen Opening Ceremonies on TV for years, now you are one the uniquely dressed Australians waving at the crowds, filming the experience from the inside out, and the emotion is turbulent. Thoughts race like, “I’m at the Olympic Games!” “I’m an Olympian!” “This is pretty cool, these people are excited to see us… us! They’re excited to see regular, amateur athletes like me, Chappo…the guy who grinded and battled, without any fortune or fame along the way to prove he was good enough to be in the crew, to be an Olympian…and now it’s a tidal wave of momentary fame!” It’s hard to process such a new feeling.

Then you watch the remainder of the show from the inside; the lighting of the torch, more screaming, plenty of noise. You, like me, may even lose your shit over Ana Ivanovic standing a few metres away from you. It all winds up around midnight.

Sports fans know what it’s like leaving a packed stadium to head home after the big game, and this is the same for an athlete at the Olympic opening ceremony. You arrive back at the athletes’ village, and you’re still buzzing. Despite that, you know the next day you’re getting up early to train.

Is that training session compromised? Would you have that moment of stardom, standing in the middle of the Olympic Stadium watching one of the greatest shows on earth, back after your result later that week?

Is it worth it?

Walking in the Parade of Nations was a feeling of patriotism impossible to articulate, but I’ll try. I felt proud walking behind our country’s flag (republic debate aside). I felt a spike in the pride of all the other Australian athletes I was walking with, hoping for a sensational result for their respective sports. Being among other countries’ athletes you realise you are a part of something much bigger, as well as the realisation that athletes from other countries are just like you and are very beatable.

Is the adrenal drain and lack of sleep outweighed by the emotional charge you absorb? Does it make a difference when you’re neck-and-neck in a race, and you want to dip into that extra bit of Captain Australia power to give those supporting you back home a little green and gold glow of pride?

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Or should it be choreography, fireworks and torch relays for the TV viewers, without athletes, leaving them to grip their pillows tight awaiting their contest?

I felt like it took a lot out of me.

The performances of our eight in Beijing was underwhelming. There was a lot more at play that affected our result than solely walking in the opening ceremony, but I sometimes wonder if it, combined with other factors, contributed to the disappointing result.

I raced better at the London Olympics, where we didn’t walk in the opening ceremony. I was a better athlete by four years then. We very much bunkered down and that allowed me to concentrate on my job.

Maybe that knowledge is a part of being a better athlete.

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