Sunday, July 29, 2012

Up close and personal


Sunday 29th July 2012

I have never met a more laid back pair of Athletes the day before their biggest competition in 4 years.

My role today was to take the maintenance men around our GB rooms that needed missing door handles replaced or locks putting on the bedroom doors.

One of the rooms belonged to Tom Daley who was sharing with the rest of his diving team mates.

Whilst I needed to wait around for the job to be complete, I started to talk to Tom and Pete Waterfield who are partners in the Synchronised 10M Platform.

They will be competing tomorrow so I tried not to disturb them as I assumed they would want as much rest as possible, this was not the case, they were so relaxed and totally at ease about competing tomorrow that I stood watching the replay of the GB Ladies diving team with them while they analysed the teams.

Pete is on his 4th Olympics and he explained that he will be competing for the next 2 years, but this will be his last Olympics, He told me he hits the water around 40 miles an hour and eventually it does take its toll on the body.



I asked Tom how he can be so relaxed before a big competition and he simply said that it helps him focus better. He is genuinely a fantastic young man, who even Pete paid  him such a compliment, saying he is such a nice lad who is so down to earth, and has time for everyone.
Tom knows he gets a lot of  attention but he told me that he loves to speak to and get  pictures taken with the fans,  he knows they turn up to watch and support him, therefore he feels he needs to give something back to them…

Now that is one young man with his feet firmly on the ground!!

I will be cheering them both on tomorrow, Good luck boys…

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