We are in the final straight of the Rio Olympics, and the pub chat has turned to how we feel about athletes excitingly exceeding our expectations, or confusingly under-performing.
Then there’s the subsequent nonchalance from the athlete themselves, the unending questions about why we aren’t winning enough gold medals.
I wrote earlier about the strive to win, not winning alone being the spirit of the Olympics; the story of the Australian athlete is better than that of winning a medal.
Early on in the Games we were treated to Advance Australia Fair thanks to unexpected Olympic champions Mack Horton, Catherine Skinner and Kyle Chalmers. All let us rejoice.
Simultaneously we saw seventh placed Cam McEvoy surprisingly buoyant and congratulatory, despite widely being considered favourite to claim the gold in his race. You could hear the national confusion as to why he wasn’t snarling with anger and blubbering with disappointment.
When Cate Campbell finished sixth in the Olympic final we all expected her to win. The sound of her own heart breaking made us shed a tear, as she questioned her own self-worth. She asked us not to.
Her younger sister Bronte, despite not medalling, told us she had already won by racing in an Olympic final with her big sister. How many of us wish we could be able to achieve such significance with our siblings?
I don’t have kids (yet), but I have two charming nephews and a cripplingly adorable niece. I see the pride in my sister when her eldest son receives a kindergarten certificate for “playing fair”; my other sister’s satisfaction when her infant daughter figured out how to use one of her legs to push a scooter 30 centimetres.
I can try to imagine the pride, satisfaction and the “hey, we kinda did ok” for parents Campbell. They had two in an Olympic final!
That’s not under-performing.
And you know something Australia… those girls are our daughters too!
They’re Aussies. They learnt their craft in our waters and they were out there representing us.
Maybe the younger Campbell was sharing some wisdom beyond her years, allowing us all to be proud of them before we lament the lack of a metallic disc around their necks. The sisters were able to navigate all possible obstacles that could’ve sunk that moment of being in the same elite race, the same final, at the same Olympics.
Now I’m not advocating apathy or mediocrity when it comes to competing as an Olympian. But given the pressure of the media, of the moment and that which athletes put on themselves to win a gold medal, the reflections athletes give in interviews can provide balance to the conversation.
The moment after Australia’s Olympic Rowing Champion Kim Brennan, breaking an eight-year rowing gold drought, a women’s all-time sculling drought, and winning Australia’s first ever gold in an individual rowing event, she showed some of the emotions that comes from Olympic pressure.
She finished her race shocked and broke down in tears in the arms of Olympic Rowing Champion James Tomkins. See case study: C. Freeman (2000).
Throughout a four-year cycle, the rowing athletes were regularly reminded by Rowing Australia that selection and funding decisions were made targeting gold medals in Rio. Without medals, amateur sports like rowing have their funding cut by the government.
Kim Brennan’s sculling race was one of the last of the Olympic rowing program. She had seen the Men’s Quad Scull and the Men’s Four both win silver medals, and now the funding for all of Australian rowing would be resting on her result. Maybe that’s more valuable than one medal, given the flow-on effect to so many people in the sport.
The emotions expressed in an athlete’s interview are trying to account for something other than the narrative we hear about medals. They provide a different perspective. Kim shared that her medal had included an enormous broader team, and it was the culmination of 11 years of work with her coach to win gold.
There’s another perspective on how the story behind the result isn’t just about a medal.
I can share from personal experience, and I’m sure Cate and Kim had the same, there’s plenty of people you meet along the Olympic journey, who are only sharing their best hopes and wishes. They say “wouldn’t it be amazing if you won an Olympic gold medal?!”…and it would be, but unconsciously, this adds pressure. It starts to shape the narrative you have to weave when asked about why you did or didn’t.
Anna Meares said after her bronze, “…believe me it’s really been hard and so challenging. Even in my own country…people come up and challenge me for positions in the team. I’ve worked hard to earn my position and I’m proud I’ve done that…”
There’s some balance right there.
And Australia is not the only country that questions its performances. 2014 World Champion New Zealander Emma Twigg finished fourth in the Single Scull. She was at her third Olympics, and was considered Kim Brennan’s strongest rival.
She said, “It’s something I’ll have to live with for the rest of my life that I won’t be an Olympic champion, which is a dream I’ve had since I was a young girl.”
Olympic athletes provide some insight as to what it’s like to work in a high pressure, pass/fail, once every four-year context and not just about the medal.
I remember seeing some dickhead behaviour of a gold medalist during the 2004 Athens campaign.
Seeing me confused and disappointed, some words of advice given to me was: “Chappo, if you’re dickhead before you win a gold medal, you’ll still be a dickhead after you win a gold medal.”
The same goes for all those who don’t win medals too.
Winning or not winning a gold medal doesn’t define who you are.
Cate and Bronte Campbell, Mack Horton, Catherine Skinner, Cam McEvoy, Kim Brennan, Australia’s teary Women’s Beach Volleyball duo of Louise Bawden and Taliqua Clancy, Kyle Chalmers (note this young man) and our Women’s Water Polo Team (who, daringly, publicly stated they believed they could win gold) should, upon reflection, in a quiet moment, remind themselves they are not the media narrative, the performance expectations, the medal, the tracksuit or the social media account they run.
Moreso, and forever more valuable than a Olympic Medals, they are someone’s sister, son, daughter, club-mate, wife, role models and mate who can share a coffee, a beer, a story, a quiet moment, a laugh, a challenge or someone to enjoy whatever the future holds with.
Their Olympic medal, or lack of, will shape their life, their story, and Australia’s story, but it can’t be timeless like a memory you left with someone, like a feeling you remember, a lesson learnt for next time, like how you made someone else feel when you gave it your all or how you inspired the next person to bravely strive for anything that could Advance Australia Fair.
BrainsTrust
Guest
Its not an investment with any rerturn its basically a cash donation. At least the rent would pay for the government to maintain the ground though. The AFL teams in Queensland are noted for paying token rents so the govenrment loses twice as much money. This makes me suspicious that what this is all about is the AFL/NRL axis trying to steal more public money. Get its cronies like Roy Masters to attack the Olympic athletes in order to get even more public funds.
Jack
Guest
I'm an elite athlete myself - Water Polo. Sport is an absolute bastard. It's the best and the worst day of your life. It's so important for people to understand that no one is harder on an athlete than an athlete is on them self. Personally I've been training for 2020 for six years now. Come 2020 it will be 10. Imagine the sacrifice, balancing university studies with part-time employment and a training schedule of 30+ hours a week of training/games/appointments for 10 years. Now imagine making an Olympic final and having that massive achievement overshadowed by people that have never experienced what it's like to sacrifice everything for a dream. It's a horrible thought. I'm so proud of all of our athletes, regardless of their result. The Olympics is different to a world championships, it's about winning sure, but equally as much so it's about the pinnacle of humanity. It's competition paired with sportsmanship, it's the participation of the refugee team, it's about the underdog, it's about countries like Equatorial Guinea competing and it's about friendship. Thank you so much for writing this article. It's amazing to see that there are people out there that understand what a massive achievement it is just to be at the Olympics.
Marcus
Guest
Meh, more recently, Kylie Palmer, Nathan Baggaley. My point was that you cannot call Australia or any other country a "clean sport country" (weird terminology anyway). There is no such thing.
Bill
Guest
Yep and an investement with a reasonable return too.
HarryT
Guest
Gee, that was 1998. I think you need to upgrade your google or something. As of the end of June this year, there were 300 positive tests for meldonium, and not one Aussie among them.
Bill
Guest
Yep and people have a choice to gamble. Do I get a choice where my tax dollars go? Stupid argument!
Marcus
Guest
Bet you believed Stuey O'Grady when he said he just took EPO just that one time...
sheek
Roar Guru
Thanks Chappo, That's a thoughtful response. To respond properly would probably require to do it with a BBQ steak, cold beers & red wines, in a rustic setting!
sheek
Roar Guru
Yes Jameswm, But it must be of concern that so many swimmers swam below par. Not just Cate Campbell. I've said before that at every olympics you'll get a Kyle Chalmers & Cameron McEvoy. At least one stepped in for the other. But at these games, too many fell below par. We can't use the excuse they fell to the pressure of being the flagship sport for Australia. That's been the case for 100 years.
HarryT
Guest
The fact that you have to use the sport of weightlifting mentioned in a report tabled in Parliament in 1989 sort of backs up my argument we are a clean sport country.
Marcus
Guest
Australians are not cleanskins. If you think so, you are in a dream world. Australians commit crimes, cheat on their spouses and their taxes, Aussie teams cheat salary caps, but Aussies don't dope? Seriously? Indeed, the Black Report found there to be a systemised regime at the AIS for weightlifters. Whilst I am not suggesting there is anything resembling systemised doping in Australia now (if there is, we are sh-t at that too), to use "clean athlete country" is laughable.
HarryT
Guest
As clean athlete country, we are always going to have major disappointments. Recent retesting of samples taken at the London Olympics put the failure rate of athletes at 8.7%. That is 913 of the 10,500 athletes competing for, wait for it, the 900 medals on offer. Russia, guilty of systematic doping, won a massive 79 of those medals. When random drug testing was introduced after the Seoul Olympics it demonstrated just how beneficial doping is to an athlete. For example Ben Johnson went from a 9.79 sec runner to a 10.40 sec runner and Petra Felke went from a 80 metre javelin thrower to a 59.02 metre thrower. A clean athlete fights fatigue and injury for every hundredth of a second or centimetre of improvement. They have bad days, weeks and months, because it takes twice the energy to do two thirds of the training a doped athlete can manage and they break. So, next time a clean Aussie athlete doesn't do well, or doesn't live up to your expectation, think of Lance Armstrong. Cause that is what you are asking for, an athlete who had no bad days , no bad weeks and one that never had a competitor who was doped more than he was.
HarryT
Guest
Just wondering how you fell about the $120 million both major political parties have pledged to replace the Cowboy's home ground. Despite the fact that on their official website the Cowboys describe the existing stadium as " one of the best-equipped sporting and entertainment complexes in Australia". At current rates this amount of money would pay for the scholarships for the Track and Field athletes until the end of this century.
James Chapman
Expert
Sheek, Good chat and good points. I completely agree that Cate had a swim she would be, and should be, bitterly disappointed with. Chappelli would tell her how he felt about it too no doubt. I think Cate will be dishing out her own version of tough love on herself given the way she clearly felt disappointed with her performance. For her to be at the level's she's at, and been at for three olympics, she would have days, like Chappelli did with the bat, perform above average, and sometimes below average. The tough thing for Olympians is we don't get another test in two weeks time, or the next tour to make amends. But all through that, there would've been plenty of tough love, decisions, sessions and triumphs over below average days toget to the level she did. We could all do with some tough love. I agree. I had a few particularly good coaches, with that nous, to know when to encourage me, and when to put their fist down. I couldn't possibly go into all of the grueling training sessions, terrible races, disappointment and criticism I've had to overcome over the years to achieve the standard I did. Not many can handle that, and that's why they leave sport, especially amateur sport where there is no financial reward. So the ones left tend to be those that have graduated from the school of overcoming disappointment. But like in any workplace, they will do the soul searching in a more private setting than on camera to Ch7. This article was to talk about the broader athlete story, and some of the reflections they've shared after their olympic results. Not trying to make excuses for them. That's something they all have to deal with in their own time. That will be tough too. Having been a battler athlete that has toiled for many years, probably a stereotypical journeyman, I feel I can speak with authority on some of the good, and some of the emotionally tough things these guys and girls are going through...and after all they are humans competing in a human environment. This is often forgotten. Another point I was trying to make in the article. Even the NZ'ers we should treat like humans ;) So as much as I agree with you that sport has been corporatised and money drives so many of the decisions, and hence outcomes, I don't agree athletes should shove off, cause they're not the ones benefitting from the corporate dollar. The consumers are those benefitting. As for professional sports, that's a whole different conversation. Chappo
James Chapman
Expert
JAJI, There's plenty of hockey and people that watch hockey more than every 4 years...here's my thinking... $29m of government funds, tax sourced funds, that goes into Hockey Australia and there's 250,000 registered players for hockey nationwide (according to Hockey Australia website). My back of the envelope calculations make that $116 per registered player. But with all those registered players, they are training at school, or their club, maybe once a week on average. Probably playing 7 months of the year on a weekend. They are all watching hockey at training and on weekend games. Their parents, friends and partners are also watching those hockey games. Along with the paid coaches, support staff, administrators, etc who pay taxes out of their pay which cycles back into the system. Because we all aren't consuming hockey, the public benefit isn't seen by all, but there's probably a lot kids, teenagers, young adults, parents and grandparents watching hockey. There's also keeping people active, a goal to strive for, social skills, etc, etc. For me, at $116 per head per year...that's pretty good value.
James Chapman
Expert
Mike & Bill, In my personal experience, all of the training, preparation and analysis is designed, planned, set up and worked towards competing at you best in one moment every four years. There's a lot that goes into that, given you try to execute a plan every day for four years straight...but when it comes down to a 6 minute race in our event, or much, much shorter for events like 100m freestyle, there's a lot of contingencies that can, and clearly do, go wrong. Now that you've said that's unacceptable, where along the line of responsibilities do we hold someone accountable? The athlete, and go to the next in line and expect them to do even better? The individual athlete's coach, the team physiologist that set up the training plan, the physio's looking after the injuries, the team manager organising the accomodation, the head coach, the National Sporting Organisation's Board, the Australia Sports Commission, the Department of Health? And these people are all in paid job, paid jobs that pay taxes too. As for it being at the taxpayers expense, I'll go into more detail below in my response to thesheek and JAJI below, but taxpayer dollars don't go to the athletes pockets in amateur sports. I saw pretty much two fifths of FA in the last four years, whilst having worked full-time, paying all my taxes for 16 years at Westpac .I didn't pay any tax on the zero money I received from the government to train before and after work. The goverment funding makes it to very few athletes. It all goes to departments, which provides jobs, which also pay tax. Maybe that's where the cuts should take place?! But then we want better results...
commonwombat
Guest
James, but the performance (or lack thereof) in Rio of the bulk of those teams was largely predictable. The positives - women's sevens: were always going to be thereabouts given their consistent top 2-3 over the past 3 Worlds Sevens series. They had some luck (draw w US allowing them to top pool & easier QF) but they made the most of it - men's archey: a pleasant surprise. QFs were probably the expectation - men's basketball: hasn't fully played out & 3 previous men's teams have made Oly semis but those were due to favourable QFs. This team has made it on merit. As to whether there are longer term ramifications is open to question as a number of prime movers are "up in age" but the acheivement cannot be debated - three day event: an event where AUS has histrorically usually been competitive. Given the vagaries of the cross country, there is always going to be that uncontrollable aspect. - women's football: their qualification for Rio was cut-throat. An awful start agst CAN but pulled it together thereafter. Only a slight lack of maturity & composure denied them a place in the semis but they walk away knowing that they now scare the $@#& out of every other team in the women's game & can now beat the super-powers The ugly: - for the past 20 years, the Opals have been nigh certain medallists at World/Olympic level but this has been due to two main factors. Firstly two superb generations of players; the first being the one that hit its prime for Sydney and then the post Sydney generation. Secondly the presence of two legitimate international superstars in Jackson & Taylor. The post Sydney generation has now passed from the scene and the successors are merely internationally competitive. Jackson's last hurrah was London & Taylor, whilst still formidable, is now in the region of diminishing returns. They can still be competitive but this is reliant on discipline & structure which was notably lacking in too many games - men's sevens: have not been contenders in recent World Sevens series and so it played out - men's hockey: have gone into EVERY Olympics since Moscow as either gold medal favourites or at worst 2nd money. They've walked away with the big one ..... once. Ob yes, they've cleaned up at a number of secondary tournaments but under pressure, their efficiency falls apart. They have always had one of the worst records at converting set pieces and both of these completely fell apart here in Rio. Furthermore, the squad was littered with superannuants. All distinguished names, some even greats but ALL clearly in the realm of diminishing returns. - women's hockey: the Olympic record of this team post Sydney is one of unalloyed failure; not once making the semi finals. Even moreso than their male counterparts, this team is serially inefficient. Showy, yes, but too many turnovers, inefficient in attack, leaky defence & deplorable strike-rate at set pieces. TBH, Hockey Aust bunged the succession to Rick Charlesworth post Sydney and have continued to compound the error by continuing to appoint coaches out of the AUS system. The entire elite culture of AUS hockey needs a clean-out and that probably needs coaches from outside the system. - men's water polo: perennial make weights and have Never remotely contended for medals. Maybe its time to "call time" on this program - womens water polo: have always been thereabouts, not always there. Missed the medals at last year's Worlds. An awful lot of veterans in this squad. Is this a selection issue or is the talent pool just too shallow ?
jameswm
Roar Guru
They come from sponsorhip dollars. Or dollars from club pokies. Where does that money come from? The people who pay taxes. In any case Baz was the one comparing th two. He didn't differentiate. And I doubt either of you know how athleye grants are given out, and whether it is really "for being average". You do realise standards have to be met, don't you?
jameswm
Roar Guru
"We must all take ownership of our own stuff-ups." "Cate knows she stuffed up, which is why she wants to have anther crack in 2020." That isn't taking ownership? Will no less than clinical depression be enough for some people? It's sport. You try your hardest and sometimes you're below your best, and sometimes it can't be explained. That's sport - the highs, the lows the entertainment.
jameswm
Roar Guru
So no smiles, right?