Limping To The Backwater, A Deep-seated Disappointment Sinks In

Sydney Morning Herald

Monday August 23, 2004

RICHARD HINDS

They rowed slowly and silently, their heads down, their oars barely touching the water. They rowed past the jetty where the medallists were already telling their battle stories to the waiting media. They rowed into a little backwater at the end of the course and toward a bridge, where a fan dressed in green and gold leaned down and yelled: "Come on, Aussie!"

For the Australian women's quad sculls team, it was then that it all became a bit too much. In the third seat, Kerry Hore bent forward and sobbed. Her teammates touched her hand lightly, barely concealing their own distress.

A few minutes before, after six minutes and 34.73 seconds of exertion, the Australians had looked up at the screen only to see the worst number this Olympics has to offer had flashed up beside their names. 4. Fourth. Beaten to the dais by 0.42 of a second.

Coaxed to the shore to discuss a moment they would probably prefer to forget, Hore was at once proud and heartbroken. "We gave it everything," she said. "We backed each other and we just came up short."

From outside the boat shed, it is easy to see rowers as a bunch of big, strong kids from toffy schools who weren't co-ordinated enough to play ball sports. But on a day of desperate near misses for the female members of the Australian rowing team, stiff upper lips and a few old-fashioned harlequin ideals were to come in handy.

In the first race of the day, the light double sculls pair of Sally Newmarch and Amber Halliday had been in the lead after the first 1000 metres.

Having set a world record in the heats, at that stage a gold medal did not seem out of the question. But in the second half of the race, a fatigue that cramps the muscles and rips through the stomach set in. The oars became as heavy as steel, the water like set concrete. When they crossed the line and looked up, they saw that same dreaded number. Fourth.

So, just as the quad sculls team would do later, Newmarch and Halliday made that dejected, slow journey back behind the jetty. Their dark glasses covered their disappointment but did little to hide it.

"That is the most pain I've ever been in in a row," said Halliday. "I've never felt that way in the last three strokes of a race ever. So at least that [not having given it everything] is something I don't have to think about for the rest of my life."

Halliday and Newmarch spoke for a while about their disappointment. How they had known they had to go out hard and how they would have done the same thing again. "We just had the blinkers on for the whole race," said Halliday. "We didn't know they were that close."

Then, as the media walked away, Halliday called them back. "I just want to reiterate that we are so happy to be here, " she said. "We are not going to be surly about the result."

Said Newmarch: "I just want to say there are so many people behind us. I just want to say thanks."

Polite, proud, gracious, good sports. Any housemaster would be proud. Not much had been expected of the Australian women's eight. Not much unless you happened to have been a member of the crew.

Unless you had set the alarm clock for five o'clock every day and sipped on diet cola when your friends were drinking cocktails. Not unless you found yourself sitting at the start line, one of only six crews in the whole world who could win this gold medal.

Then somehow, 600m into the race they were in the lead. Still an eternity to go, but right in it. All too soon, however, the exertion of that fast start hit home.

In the last 500m, dramatically, No.6 Sally Robbins fell backwards, almost too spent to grip the oars. Desperately teammate Julia Wilson tried to push her up, but to no avail. With only seven oars working the Australians trailed the field home. Then they, too, made that sad row behind the jetty. Robbins had recovered sufficiently to pull a slow oar. Recovering from the anguish might take a bit longer.

But rowers, you suspect, are bred to leave their disappointment in the water. At the end of a disappointing day, the only thing drowned will be their sorrows.

© 2004 Sydney Morning Herald

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