London 2012 Olympics

Neil Breen From: News Limited newspapers July 29, 2012 11:52PM

Women's 4x100m freestyle relay claim Australia's first gold medal and stamp.
WHEN Australia's glory girls won Olympic gold in the pool yesterday, their first thoughts were not medals or podiums, but stamps.

The 4x100m medallists Alicia Coutts, Cate Campbell, Brittany Elmslie and Melanie Schlanger became the first Australian athletes to feature on the Australia Post's Gold Medallist Stamps for London 2012.
Led off by Coutts, who earlier swam in the semi-finals of the women’s butterfly and made the final, Australia were third after the first change before Cate Campbell narrowed the gap to second.

Teenager Brittany Elmslie put Australia in front with a blistering 53.41sec split before Melanie Schlanger hung on over a fast-finishing Netherlands with and the United States back in third.
Australia won in 3:33.15 - which was an Olympic record.
The honour was "the thing I was most excited about" ,Campbell, 20, said last night.

"It was one of the first thoughts that ran through my head after we touched the wall - Im going to be on a stamp and I get to fly back business class.

"Terrible, I know. But its just one of those exciting things which comes from being a gold medallist

"Its something that I've always looked at and been like Oh I really, really, want that.

"So to have finally achieved that goal is pretty incredible."

Schlanger, 25, admitted to feeling "jealous" of past Olympic swimmers immortalised on envelopes.
 
"This morning on Twitter Michael Klim posted the photo of the actual stamp that will be released and I realised that, man, I get to be a part of that this year," she said.
 
"Im totally wrapped. I cant wait to see them."
 
Schlanger, who brought home the final leg of the winning race, said she was struggling to embrace the win.
 
"To be honest I don't think it has fully sunk in yet," she said.
 
"I keep looking at the medal and sort of holding it and thinking is it actually real?
 
"They're so heavy and so big. It seems like a bit of a fairytale."

She thanked the heat swimmers, including Libby Trickett and Yolane Kukla, that positioned Australia in the middle lane, giving them the power to overcome the Netherlands and US.

"I do remember before I dived in realising slightly that we were in with a real shot and thinking to myself I didn't want to be the girl that got passed," Schlanger said.

"It really drove me on to, I guess, heights that I may not have reached otherwise."

On their late night return to the Athletes Village following the win, the girls said they were greeted by a cheer squad of Aussie teammates.

"It's a bit of a novelty walking around the breakfast area and having the Australians shout out Great swim! Great job!" Campbell said.

"It is a very heartening, very honouring experience and something which I will definitely remember for the rest of my life."

The girls said they had now passed the baton on to Australia's mens relay in the hope they bring home more medals, and stamps.

"For them to emulate what we did last night would be a fantastic result for Australia and well all be in the crowd cheering for them to do that," Schlanger said.

The Sydney Morning Herald July 30, 2012 - 10:20AM Greg Baum

The first two days of London's Games were startling not for who did win, but who did not.

Once, there was something in the water in England, and it was losing. England was famous for losing, often but phlegmatically and graciously. Inopportunely, the bug has returned, just in time for the Olympic Games, and it is proving to be virulent.

The first two days of London's Games were startling not for who did win, but who did not. Mark Cavendish didn't. Stephanie Rice didn't. Michael Phelps hasn't yet, after two races. Rebecca Adlington, the darling of England's swimming in Beijing, didn't. For Australia, the women's 4x100 swim relay team proved an exception. Great Britain's grim consolation is a string of minor medals. It had invested heavily in gold.

Last night, the Australian men's 4x100m relay team was struck down by the losing pathogen. Hotly favoured, it was doomed from the moment lead swimmer James Magnussen swum more than two metres below his best. Simply, the Missile fizzled. At the end of the race, he sat with his head in his hands behind the starting blocks, a study in abjection. Later, he was as lost for words as he had been for fluency in the pool.

Australia finished in that losing-est of Olympic placings, fourth. The US finished second, but as Phelps drily remarked: "At least I'm in a medal today." When Phelps, the greatest gold medal winner of all, contents himself with a duller colour, it is time to call in the epidemiologists.

Phelps might have had gold except for an astonishing final-leg swim from France's Yannick Agnel, who made up a full second on Ryan Lochte, Phelps's conquerer the previous evening. Except for the wall, he might have swum into the nearby River Lea. Winners are scarcer than losers, but there is always one.

For Australia, no death certificate has been issued, but the post-mortem has begun. Seemingly, the onset was symptom-less. In the morning, Australia had qualified fastest and Magnussen had swum what he said was an effortless 47.13 seconds.

The evening had developed propitiously. Butterflier Alicia Coutts and breaststroker Christian Sprenger won minor medals that spoke volumes for the tenacity of each; it took world records to beat them. Others swum themselves into finals this evening, including Leisel Jones, who along the way reminded all of the languid beauty of her swimming style.
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How embarrassing for the Aussie boys!!!!!

The Telegraph Tuesday 07 August 2012

Australia's lacklustre performance at the London Olympics has left the country reeling as it drops behind the UK on the medal table but it is New Zealand's success that really rankles.

Australian Olympic Committee president John Coates has downgraded his medal expectations from 46 to between 30 and 36, ruling out a top-five finish.

Goldman Sachs had predicted that Australia would finish fifth in the medal table with 15 golds, The Sydney Morning Herald reported.

So far they the country is languishing in 19th place in the medals table having won just a single gold in the first week's swimming and a sailing gold today.

Ian Cohen a senior sport journalist for Ten Network said "cold hard facts" were that performance had fallen short of the high expectations that both the team and Australian public had of the London Games.

Being behind the UK is bad enough but it is the ribbing from their "little brother" across the water, New Zealand, currently at 15th place, which has which has "got under the skin" of many Australians, he said.

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