Dec. 28, 1997 Well, it's my first day in Australia and I feel like I have been awake forever! It is 4 p.m. in Wollongong, but back home in Pennsylvania, it's 3 a.m. The good news is I had two seats to myself on the airplane and I slept at least eight out of the 14 hours. We had our first team meeting and practice and after that Amanda (Adkins, my roommate), and I were so tired we had to keep ourselves awake so we took a walk on the beach, collected rocks, and took pictures of ourselves in Australia! I can't believe I am actually here! All the hard work has paid off. Dec. 29, 1997 It is the most incredible thing waking up in the morning to the sound of waves crashing. Our room has a wonderful view of the mountains and the ocean. We went to the pool for practice and the ENTIRE U.S. team got drug tested. I've never seen anything like this before. Practice was a little shaky, but I'll blame that on jet lag. It is so much fun practicing with a completely different team. Our team really gets along well; this is going to be a great trip. We went to the beach for awhile today, a bunch of the girls got absolutely fried. There is no ozone in Australia, so I broke out the SPF30. I really can't believe how beautiful it is here. Dec. 30, 1997 The charm of waking up to the waves has not worn off yet! I love it here! I called my mom today and described Wollongong only to make her jealous. Today at practice, Amanda and I were one of the last people out of the water; we were still swimming when the boys got in. This scared me a little, because I always get super-worried during taper-time, but I talked to Jack (Bauerle, my coach at the University of Georgia), and felt much better! Poor Amanda! I am going to drive her nuts with my worrying! We had a team meeting and learned that the rookies (myself included) have to do skits. Should be very funny. Then we have to put alias names down for ourselves for when we get to Perth. I put down one of my UGA teammate's name! Did I already mention I love it here? Dec. 31, 1997 Today was lots of fun. Amanda and I only had one practice today, so we went to the beach aimed with our waterproof cameras and hit the waves ¡K actually more like they knocked us over. After that we went to our New Year's party. We found out who our Secret Santas were who had been giving us little presents. I had Ashley Whitney for my Secret Santa and Catherine Fox had me. She stocked me up with lots of chocolate. New Year's Eve was really low key, we watched a ping-pong tournament, played some funny games and at midnight, we were on the beach celebrating with cider ... only 20 people made it to midnight. I am kinda proud of myself. Jan. 1, 1998 Happy New Year's! I celebrated New Year's by doing double practices. I still haven't made a resolution yet! It didn't feel like New Year's until 4 p.m. here in Wollongong and midnight EST, so I celebrated in the middle of practice too. For one of the first times, I realized I missed my teammates at home. A bunch of us went to a place called Southern Crepes for dinner! It was so good. I sat with B.J. (Bedford), Maddy (Crippen), Amy (Van Dyken) and Jenna (Street). I learned today we can e-mail people - no need to say more - I am an e-mail junkie. (Thanks to everyone who e-mailed me via the USS homepage.) Tomorrow we go to Sydney. I am really excited about swimming in the 2000 Olympic Games pool. Jan. 2, 1998 We had to wake up extra early to leave for Sydney, but it was worth it. It was a little over an hour-long bus ride, but when we finally saw the pool, all I could say was "Wow!" The pool is absolutely breathtaking. I have never seen a pool like this EVER. The roof is so high, I didn't realize there was a 10-meter platform. In a room aside of the competition pool, there was a mini-water amusement park with a huge waterslide - of course everyone had to go on it! Practice was okay. I still feel shaky. We practiced relay starts. We got two hours to ourselves to shop and sightsee around the Rocks, a darling harbour in Sydney. Sydney is definitely the most beautiful city. I wish we had more time there. I wouldn't mind living here! I got most of my souvenir shopping done. Opals are very reasonable here, so I got great gifts. We got to see the Opera House, which is awesome. But then we had to go. Jan. 5 Well, the weather wasn't so nice today, but that's okay with me. That just gave me an excuse to sleep, I always seem to have to take naps during taper. Practices are starting to feel fast. I did some sprint breaststroke to get me ready for my 100-meter breaststroke and some 50s pace to help me get ready for the 200-meter breaststroke. For dinner the whole team went to an old sheep-shearing shed and it had a band that made us do the hokey pokey. It reminded me of when I was little at the skating rink. Then we did some other Australian dances. On the way there and home we got to ride in a double-decker bus. The whole night was a blast; I haven't laughed that hard in a long time. Jan. 6 Today we had the choice of going to see a movie or go to the Symbio Koala Gardens. Since I have already seen Titanic twice, I decided toget a real taste of Australia and see the animals. First, we saw the koalas; they weren't as exciting as I thought they'd be. They were kinda just like stuffed animals. We got to see wombats dingos, and I can't believe it but I held a python. I spent most of my day playing with kangeroos-they are SO CUTE! I wanted to take one home with me! I actually took a whole roll of film. I can't wait to see my face from when I held the snake! Jan. 7 I'm kinda sad. It's our last day in the Wollongong tomorrow we leave for Perth! The meet is getting closer and closer. Every time I think about the meet I get butterflies bouncing around my stomach. But lately I have been trying to do what Sheila Taormina did and imagine the butterflies flying like birds in a "V." Tonight, we had to do skits. I was lucky enough to be in the Rookie group since this is my first World Championships. The group was Maddy (Crippen), Tyler (Painter), Trevor (Runberg), Steven (Brown), Diana (Munz), Jenna (Street) and myself. We acted out a commercial scene and in the end we dumped a whole picture of ice water over Jon Urbanchek! It was so funny, he chased us around the room with the water! Jan. 8 PERTH! We're finally here after a five-hour flight. Actually the flight was fun. I overcame my fear of flying and Amy (Van Dyken) and I went in the cockpit and talked to the pilots. We got them to steer the plane off course a little bit too! When we landed we went straight to the pool. It is really hot here. I may have to find sunblock higher than 30. The pool is like nothing I have ever seen in my life. It has stands surrounding the pool, kind of like a football stadium and there is a clock on each of the blocks so you can check your time at the blocks! But watch out for the lanelines, I already have bruises from them. As for swimming, I am getting really excited! My breaststroke feels better and better each day only five more days until I swim the 100! Jan. 9 Another hot and sunny day here in Perth and to match the heat, there's the controversy over Chinese swimmers. One of the breaststrokers, just my luck, was caught sneaking drugs into the country. Now she's banned. But I am not worrying about that, I just need to concentrate on myself. But that's a hard thing to do when the press is making a huge deal over this. Today, I went my fastest 50 breaststroke from a push - EVER! I am starting to feel really good in the water, which is good since I swim in only four days. Scary! Jan. 11 Thank God the meet is starting tomorrow. I think everyone is getting antsy waiting around. I even went to church today, that will make my mom proud. And to pass the time by today, some lady came by and did all of our nails! I wanted to get stars and stripes, but I am very superstitious about not having polish on my nails when I race. I did some more pace 50's today and I was going four second faster than what I was supposed to! I am so excited and ready to swim! Tomorrow is the women's 100 free, 400 IM, the men's 100 breast and 200 free. Oh yeah, Amanda and I won a bet with Bryan Jones and Neil Walker that the University of Georgia men would beat the University of Texas men and they did, so they gave us M&Ms! But of course I won't eat candy until after the meet! Ha, ha. Jan. 12 The first day of competition-FINALLY! There is absolutely no protection from the sun during prelims. If you looked at the team, all you could see were USA Swimming towels wrapped around our shoulders and heads. The team got off to a great start. The environment is much different from the U.S. The Aussies had a band and a singer who sang songs from Prince and Grease. That was really funny ¡K kaoroke at a swim meet. And they had cheerleaders. It was a riot! But I get to swim the 100-meter breaststroke, my personal favorite, tomorrow. I am really excited and nervous all at the same time. I felt great in the water tonight and I finally get to shave. I'm so excited. Hopefully I'll be writing tomorrow with good news. Jan. 13 I finally got to swim today! In case you haven't heard, I WON THE BREASTSTROKE! Actually, I won three hours ago, but I can't calm down yet! It is finally sinking in. I did a personal best of 1:08.42! After the morning session, I was sixth so that put me in lane 2. It was so great because absolutely NO ONE had a clue who I was. They still can't say my name right. For the first time ever, I was very strong the last 20 meters of my race, I am just so excited! This means everything in the world to me, this makes for all the disappointments I have ever encountered! The medals are really cool, in a matter of a half hour, they engraved our names in the medals and the top three get these really cool leather "Australian" hats. It was definitely a night to remember, I don't think I'll be able to sleep tonight! But this is worth it. I seriously don't think I could have done this without the looking up at them chanting U-S-A after I finished! They were great. Jan. 15 The only word I can say is WOW! This is incredible! I came into the 200-meter breaststroke seeded 11th and tonight I got second. That is better than I could have ever imagined-I even dropped three seconds off of my best time. It was an incredible night for all of Team USA. First Jenny and I went 2-3, Jenny T. won the 100 fly, Misty got 4th, and Lenny won the 100 back. Then the men's 4x100 free relay got into a showdown with the Australians, but we pulled off a win! I feel bad, Amanda, my roommate, lost her voice cheering tonight. I asked her what happened and she said her voice was left back in the 200 breast. But I am sure when she swims on Saturday my voice will be worse off than hers! Tomorrow's the 4x100 medley relay-I am so excited! Jan. 16 SO CLOSE! Tonight we swam the 4x100 medley relay and we were only 0.3 seconds away from the World Record set by the Chinese in 1994! So close! I split a personal best 1:07.2. I was so happy with that time! The night got off to a great start. Kurt came out of an end lane (the American breaststrokers seem to have good luck with outside lanes) and WON the 200m breast, Maddy got 5th in the second after four of the Chinese swimmers tested positive for an illegal substance! And then our medley relay almost got the WORLD record! We broke the American record! It was so much fun standing on the first-place podium with Lea, Amy, and Jenny! We laughed the whole time and then belted out the National Anthem! I couldn't have asked for three better people to be on a relay with! Amanda, my roommate, finally gets to swim her 200m back tomorrow! Jan. 19 As I am sitting on the plane on the way back to the U.S., I feel really sad. I am excited to go home and see my true friends at Georgia, but I am really going to miss this team. I feel so close to everyone on this trip. This was definitely the most fun trip I have ever been on. I think our training camp inWollongong had a lot to do with how close our team had become. We actually knew most of the team from the Pan Pacs in Japan, then orientation in Colorado Springs in September, and finally two weeks on the beach in Australia to bond! I definitely feel that my success at this meet was because of the great team we had. Rookie or veteran, the team cheered for you all the same. It was the best feeling in the world having a team screaming your name as you're standing, or in my case, shaking behind the blocks. I couldn't have swam the way I did without them. And the trip itself was an experience I will never forget. Hopefully, I will be back in Australia, but this trip made a lifetime impression on me. All the more reason for me to stay motivated in swimming and work for the next two years for another trip to Australia.

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