LESS IS MORE FOR SWIM HOPE LEISTON
OLYMPIC PAIN DRIVES PICKETT
LEISTON Pickett couldn’t work out why there were so many drivers on the road.
Didn’t they know the opening ceremony for the Rio Olympics was being broadcast? They should be sitting at home in front of their televisions watching the Australian team march into the Maracana Stadium.
It was the only place Pickett wanted to be. But after missing out on making her second Olympic swimming team, the Gold Coast breaststroker was forced to watch on from half a world away.
“Sometimes you feel like your world is going to end,” Pickett said of the lows she experienced after missing out on selection for Rio.
“Missing out in 2016 and then experiencing the Olympics at home – which is never what I pictured and never what I wanted – made me realise that there’s a big, bad world out there.
“I remember the opening ceremony, I was driving in my car and the opening ceremony was on and I could hear a bit on the radio and I was like: ‘What are all these people doing on the road, they should be at home watching the opening ceremony’.
“I think it was at that point I realised the world doesn’t stop. You’ve still got to have things outside of swimming.
“So I think that big learning lesson has created that balance and enabled me to continue swimming.”
The turnaround wasn’t immediate. There were times Pickett wanted to quit. But the belief of Southport Olympic coach Glenn Baker and the drive to compete at a home Commonwealth Games kept Pickett in the pool.
On Thursday, the 26-yearold dives into action on the opening day of swimming competition at the Gold Coast Aquatic Centre, the pool where she has trained for the past decade and where she will attempt to join a select group of Australian athletes to have won the same event at three consecutive Games.
Pickett won the 50m breaststroke in Delhi as an 18-yearold before backing up in Glasgow four years ago.
And after battling injury, form dips and a rollercoaster of emotion since making her last senior Australian team four years ago, Pickett has the chance to write herself into history.
“It just would be so special to get a third title,” said Pickett, who ran through Southport in the Queen’s Baton Relay yesterday.
“I’m quite proud of just getting here and making the team. I haven’t been on the team for four years.
“It’s been quite a hard battle and after 2016, I sort of didn’t really know if I was going to push on through – I probably hit the low of lows in sport,” Pickett said.
“To be able to come back here and be able to represent my country at my home pool, it gives me goosebumps.
“It makes me emotional even thinking about it.”
Pickett said there were plenty of times she didn’t believe it would happen.
But the belief of Baker kept driving her dreams and a better balance outside swimming – she is now working at Gold Coast accounting firm WMS Solutions and finishing her degree at Griffith University.
“Without a doubt there were times I didn’t think I’d make it. But my coach always believed in me even when I didn’t,” she said.