Corney Swanepoel: Olympic diary

Being in Brisbane for the Grand Prix last week I was reminded just how exciting and intense a swimming meet can be.

Big crowds of people supporting their favourite swimmers, plenty of space, daily news coverage and prize money for podium finishes. There were many small differences, things we don't have here in most of our sports, things that just made the atmosphere there amazing.

Even when I wasn't competing I was so fired up, cheering my team-mates on and generally enjoying being part of the whole event.

My coach told us to use the meet to simulate the routine we would use at the Games before our race - preparation, the race itself, and afterwards what we would do to recover for the semis and finals.

The result at the meet was not as important as getting all the details of the race right. Swimming it smart, she said. So that's just what I did, followed a routine right through the warm-up that would be good for me to do in Athens.

Every athlete, be they a swimmer, a runner, or any other sportsperson at a big event, has their own pre-race ritual. For some swimmers it's just walking back and forth swinging their arms listening to music a while before the race.

Not me. I lie down with my feet in the air and swim the race in my head, going over it and over it, thinking especially about the areas in the race that I'm not so strong in.

In my race I was trying out the new Nike swim suit. It looks very different from any of the other togs out there and all the other swimmers took a second glance. Instead of the conventional tie up that other swimming togs have, these have a tight rubber band that keeps them from falling off. They feel good, they feel fast.

The result of the race was alright. I came third, beating two members of the Australian Olympic team who will be doing the 100 fly at the Games. But more importantly, I now have a clear idea of how I need to swim my race, how to pace it and do all the small things that make the difference.

The only thing that I didn't enjoy about the meet was that we left straight after it finished and went to the airport to catch our flight back home.

So Monday came and we were all back at the pool at 6am hoping that we would ease into the week's training because we were all stiff from the travel and competition.

But our coaches don't always have the same views on such things. We were told that all the training we had done up until now was just a preparation for these next two weeks of training; to make us fit enough to make it through this phase of our training; to make us do it better than ever before.

Looking back at that morning, it was funny to see all our faces drop when we heard that.

When spending all this time at the pool, especially when we are in hard training, it is good to just get out and do something else. Even something as simple as playing on my X-box or going to see Shrek 2 is good for unwinding. When I get back to the pool for the next session I feel ready for more punishment.

* Corney Swanepoel is in the New Zealand swimming team for the Olympics