SWIMMING: At the Olympic Games in London 2012 they were the new kids on the blocks, but in 2016 the likes of Cameron McEvoy, Mitch Larkin and Bronte Campbell have established themselves as some of the best swimmers in the world and have brought their childhood friends along with them.

Although the wider Australian Olympic team is made up of 65 per cent rookies and the swim team has 24 swimmers making their Olympic debut, the mood within the team is relaxed and there is a sense of trust, friendship and respect that is building into a formidable force of positivity in Rio.

Dual World Champion Larkin said there wasn’t a lot that could distract the current team – they have seen it all and were now focussed on a common goal.

“The feel within the team is certainly different,” Larkin said.

“For me personally in London it was about experience, getting to know what a Games is like, trying to take in so many sites, all the distractions. Then this time around I think the whole team, we knew what we were expecting when we were coming here.

“The team now gets along, we’ve all grown up together swimming and there’s a really different sense of pride and trust and you know there is a lot of respect within the team.

“Whether you swim the sprint event or the long distance open water, you know there is a great deal of respect and we all know how hard we have all worked to be here so we can trust each other.”

McEvoy agreed, adding that the closeness of the team was something that couldn’t be replicated.  

“We’re a team who have basically grown up together with the sport, we’ve seen each other compete well, compete not so well and move through the sport from the young age groups to where we are now,” McEvoy said.

“That’s something that is hard to replicate or to simulate in any other instance so I think it’s really rare and a huge part of our team. It is something so important and so hard to replicate, it’s something special about our team.”  

From club meets, state meets, national age championships, national open championships and representative teams, the Australian swim team have been through it all together.

The familiar faces and routine that has come from years of swimming together is playing a positive role with the not so familiar backdrop of Rio.

“Myself, Mitch and Bronte are very similar ages, we’ve been racing each other or racing at the same competitions with each other since we were seven, eight, nine, 10 years old on the Gold Coast, in Brisbane and at Queensland states, and I’m sure that the same applies for Cate and Em and a lot of other people on the swim team right now,” McEvoy said.

And while they are friends off the pool deck, they are also friends on it and this team has discovered the key to their success may seem selfish, but is actually quite the opposite.

By focussing on themselves and their performance they are enabling their teammates to do the same.

Dual World Champion Bronte Campbell is not only friends with her greatest rival, but sisters, and uses the same tactic.

“I’m not really racing against Cate, I’m racing against myself and trying to do my best regardless of what Cate is doing,” Bronte said.

“It is very different and I’ve always really enjoyed racing together, us against the rest of the world, not necessarily against each other.”

And Cate agreed.

“I can’t control what anyone else does in the field, especially what Bronte does, I have to focus on what I can do and hopefully get a good result,” Cate said.

Kathleen Rayment
olympics.com.au