After being inspired by his experience as a volunteer at the Sydney 2000 Olympic Games, Boyle reshaped his sporting career with a view to one-day competing at the Olympics himself.

Less than six years later, the former soccer player, one-time ice hockey goalie and full-time man on a mission is an Olympian - and what's more, the first Australian man to qualify for the Winter Olympics in the challenging sport of skeleton.

"I first saw or heard about the Olympic Games when I was eight or nine years old, in fourth class in primary school," the 35-year-old from Wollongong explained.

"We did a project on the 1980 Moscow Olympics and that's a memory that I've had for a long time and has inspired me to do what I'm doing now."

That early memory of the Olympic Games returned with great impact when Boyle became the first Australian athlete to take up residence in the Olympic Village at Sestriere.

"I arrived in my room a couple of days ago and looked at the wall and saw these pictures from children back in Australia, from Sydney and various schools, and it actually brought a tear to my eye," Boyle admitted.

"It brought back memories of what I felt as a child and what the Olympic Games meant to me."

Boyle will share his room with bobsledders Jeremy Rolleston and Shane McKenzie, so the drawings which adorn the wall of their room feature images of those two sports, as imagined by nine, 10 and 11 year old Australian school children.

"Some children have drawn some pictures of skeleton and it's just amazing to look at them and feel what they might have been feeling when they drew them," Boyle said.

"One of them here I'm crossing the finish line and it says 'Go Australia' but I've got two guys chasing me. For everyone who doesn't know, I'm the only one on the track at the time - so you don't normally have two guys chasing you."

Like many athletes who compete a long way from home, Boyle isn't afraid to admit that he is touched by knowing that the 'folks back home' are interested in his exploits.

"They're great pictures. I'll write the names down and hopefully I can send them something back so they do realise that these pictures do get to us and they do touch us because as soon as I walked in and saw these I did realise what it means to people back home and why I'm here and what it means to me."

Murray Brust
AOC