How I Really Feel About My Olympic Teammates

Two years ago this month our Olympic Team was chosen. Two years since the course of our existence changed forever. Two years since our names and lives were bound together to put our own little mark in the Australia Olympic history books. And two years since the reality of our goals lay divided between the hands of nine individuals.

Looking back on that time I don’t think I could’ve ever imagined how much we really became one being divided into nine parts. We were each other’s best friends, confidants, counselors, family and of course Olympic teammates. I pretty much knew what happened in every waking moment of each of my teammates lives, from what they ate for dinner to how big their latest poop was. No one else truly understood the gravity of emotions that we were dealing with every day so we all stuck together like glue.

Spending eight plus hours a day together six days a week within less than a meter from your teammates at all times leads to a spectrum of emotions. It very much became a love hate relationship; bickering with each other one moment, and laughing with each other the next. Some days I couldn’t wait to wake up and chat with them all at breakfast, other days I wanted nothing more than a few hours of personal space with no one coming within one meter of my bubble. And let me tell you when you learn each little emotion of every teammate they all start to annoy the heck out of you! You start to pick up on each persons little mannerism, daily habits and quirky ways. Sometimes they all just drive you crazy because making a collective decision with nine people can seem near impossible! Somedays you want nothing more than be able to make a darn decision completely on your own and not have to rock up to every moment in your life matching like the Brady Bunch. And I bet you they all felt the same way at some points!

Not uncommonly during a training session would we all argue so much trying to prove our own point about how a move is done or what count it is performed on it would take a few minutes to recognize that we were all arguing the same thing! We would get so heated to the point where one of us would have to calm everyone else down from realizing that we were all on the same side.

But at the end of the day when all the tempers had calmed and our emotions were levelled, we loved being with each other. We would spend hours on end side by side and never run out of dialogue to talk about, never run drama to gossip over and never run out of silliness to disperse leaving us all in stitches of laughter. We travelled the world together, lived together, competed together and were united together. We were sisters, we were family and we were unified in our common Olympic target – nothing could break that connection.

There’s something a bit magical about strangers brought together fighting for a common goal. Something binding us all to each other, being strong for one another in moments of weakness and leaning on each other when you felt like you couldn’t go on. What I have noticed having time away from our bond and moving on with each aspect of our lives is how different we all are.

Most of those girls I wouldn’t be friends with if life were different. Not because of any other reason than we are all such different people and without the bond of synchro I don’t think we would’ve been brought together, but through our joint experiences and our powerful vision we have all become synchro soul sisters. It may sound cheesy I know (I was definitely always the cheese ball of the team) but I know that bond will never be broken.

We held each others lives in our hands, putting our full and complete trust in one another knowing the essentiality of being able to pull off those workouts, those highlights and most importantly the two most pinnacle fulls of our lives. We trusted each other with our hopes, dreams, aspirations and our lives. We held the golden nugget of our Olympic goal in each other’s hands and knew we could only accomplish that with our solidified unity.

So how do I really feel about my Olympic teammates? No matter how often I see them or not, no matter if live in the same city or across the world, no matter if our friendship stays strong past synchro or not. I love each and every one of them dearly and am proud to call them my Olympic teammates and synchro soul sisters until the day I die.