Australia was one of the first places in the world to mark the “100 days to go” to the London Olympics. I joined some of the 400 Australian athletes who will be competing in London and Australian Olympic Committee representatives, for a colourful event at the Gold Coast Aquatic Centre in Queensland.
The media were out in force: it’s slightly humiliating appearing alongside Olympic athletes at the peak of physical condition with their finely honed bodies.
In my speech I said London was ready to welcome the world for a spectacular Games. The infrastructure was in place, the organisation in great shape, and the British people ready to offer a huge welcome to the athletes and spectators. The Games are going to leave a great legacy, both physical infrastructure like Olympic Park; the new stadium,velodrome, aquatic centre and the athletes village which will become new homes; and the human legacy in terms of inspiring many more young people to participate in sport. I noted that our International Inspiration programme had already touched 12 million young people in 20 countries.
Legendary Australian swimming coach Laurie Lawrence stirred up the traditional Australian/British Olympic rivalry. He told his athletes that the Poms were the ones to beat. I agreed that there were going to be some great battles between our teams in events like cycling, rowing and swimming. I described the bet between our Sport and Olympics Minister Hugh Robertson and Australian Sports Minister Kate Lundy, which will see the loser forced to wear the opposing team’s colours.
Then we heard from some of the individual athletes like Chris Wright (butterfly), Tom Pichler (gymnastics) and Rachel Lowell (kayak – who used to compete for Great Britain, but has now has now settled here). They talked about how much they were looking forward to competing in London, and described the dedication and hard work which had got them to this point. Some of the Australian swim team joined local school children in a fun 100m relay race. Well I say fun, but these guys can’t help being competitive. This was one of over one hundred 100m events taking place all around the world today to mark 100 days to go.