Higher, slower, smarter, the Aussies' Olympic motto

Higher, slower, smarter, the Aussies' Olympic motto

By Sheryl-Lee Kerr

(SLK NOTE: This was a special one-off column which appeared in The Advertiser in Feb 2002.)

THERE'S never been a Winter Olympics like it. Just when you were getting

your head around the fine art of luge (a Viking term which was shortened

from the more unwieldy “Loog Out, We're All A-Gonna Die”); and curling

(best played as a drinking game with large Germans, as it will then begin

to make sense after a while); dang if Australia hasn't shown the world how

it's done.

Now I'm not one to crow patriotically about our nation's sporting prowess

when I could instead, say, get rid of the mould build-up on the shower

grouting. But I am seriously inspired by our Winter Olympics gold

medallists Alisa Camplin and Steven Bradbury.

Take Alisa. She had just completed the most superb series of dazzling

aerial displays - known in technical terms as Twisty Twirly Thingies - and

yet almost careened headlong into the media pack while attempting to ski

afterwards. As she endearingly explained: “I wiped out and nearly

concussed myself. I may have won the gold medal, but that doesn't mean I'm a good skier.”

I think this inspiring story gives all of us hope. Yes, if you train long

and hard, make sacrifices and remain dedicated and focused, you, too,

could wipe out half of Fleet St. (Just dream that dream.)

Then there's Steven Bradbury, who proved the tale of the hare and tortoise

was right all along. Not to take anything away from how fit and talented

he'd have to have been just to get to the starting line, nonetheless he

does prove that universal constant: it's not how fast you skate, but how

cool you look with an eyebrow ring as you wait for all your competitors to

fall over.

Terrible it may be, but I have never laughed so hard as I did at the

tangled sight of the world's top speed skaters crawling to get to the line

for the lower medal placings, while a slightly bemused Aussie slowly

sailed past them, eyebrow cocked. He looked for all the world like a

curious onlooker who had happened by the ice arena on his way to buy a hot dog.

By the time the rest of the skaters had finished scrabbling, all hands and

knees, to the line, one could be forgiven for thinking Greco Roman

wrestling had just become a winter sport.

A little-known fact is shortly after that race several leading skating

nations announced they would introduce scrabbling practice into training

regimes to ensure that they will never again be pipped for a medal by a

flailing elbow or upside-down buttcheek.

So, by a quirk of fate and some mighty hard work, we have now left a

legacy to the world following these Olympics. Here are the top three

lessons we can impart:

1. Simply not stuffing up is sometimes even better than being the best of

the best.

2. Vienna is not the capital of Australia.

3. There really is no way to explain curling in terms that don't require

large Germans and copious quantities of beer