Australia’s time to shine

The summer Olympics

Back in May the Olympic qualifier trials for Australian swimmers was aired during prime time television in the evening. I watched a bit of it and saw the excitement in the crowds and I also enjoyed seeing the swimmers break personal or world records. Australia is a power country when it comes to swimming and they are heavily favoured to be medal contenders in all the top swimming competitions.

In the lead up to the games, Channel 7 the main broadcaster for Olympics’ programming in Australia have been airing programs highlighting athletes in various fields of sport. Creating awareness of the competitors, as well as a desire to watch the Olympics on channel 7.

Australia is a sporting mad country, with a population of just over 20 million; it ranks in the top 5 of medal winners for summer Olympics. In the 2004 Athens summer games, Australia was 4th behind the USA, China and Russia with 49 medals won. In comparison Canada with a population of over 33 million people won just 12 medals. But when you look at where Australia placed in comparison to the other countries populations it is quite impressive. The combined population of the 3 countries ahead of Australia is over 1.8 billion people, so 4th is a very very good standing.

Why is Australia so good ?

During my time here I would say the reason for this is the culture. From a young age children and teens are encouraged to take sports such as swimming, rowing, cricket, footy and plethora of other sports and physical activity. This leads to parents and families cheering on their loved ones at stadiums and complexes.

The second reason and the reason there are so many Olympic winners is the Australian Institute of Sport or AIS. Whose mandate is to develop athletes into elite athletes’ through the use of world-class training facilities, coaches and support services. The AIS has 35 programs for 26 sports. A 65 hectare site is located in Canberra, where there are world class facilities. The AIS also has regional facilities located across the country supporting different sports such as field hockey in Perth and Tennis in Melbourne and coaches based in all the capitals of Australia. Currently there are over 700 athletes trained by the AIS.

Interestingly it was the 1976 Montreal summer Olympics and Australia’s medal haul of 5 medals that was the driving force for the AIS. But it took until January 26, 1981 (Australia Day) for the AIS to be opened.

Over the course of the past 27 years, the AIS have proved that it can create an elite class of athletes. In the 1984 Los Angeles games Australia won 24 medals (14th place) while Canada won 44 medals (6th place). How the times have changed since then.

Looking at the results you would think Canada should do the same thing. But I don’t think it will ever happen. Sport in Canada, especially non-winter sport does not create the same passion that is does here in Australia. The money and resources would not be given as easily as it is here in Australia. For Canadian’s it’s a once every 4 years event, so we can easily forget, as our summer athletes do not have the same presence as the athletes have here in Australia.

I will be cheering for the Canadian’s first and foremost and falling back to the Australian’s as my secondary favourite.

Have a happy Olympics viewing.