Adelaide’s Molly Goodman, Olympia Aldersey to unite in Brazil to make Olympic debuts
TWO South Australian rowers will make a last-minute dash to Rio after their women’s eight crew was dramatically elevated to the Olympics on Tuesday night.
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TWO South Australian rowers will make a last-minute dash to Rio after their women’s eight crew was dramatically elevated to the Olympics on Tuesday night.
Adelaide’s Molly Goodman and Olympia Aldersey were on opposite sides of the world on Wednesday but will unite in Brazil next week to make their Olympic debuts together.
Goodman had just returned from a holiday in Doha to visit her parents when she got a phone call saying she needed to get to Melbourne last week.
Part of Australia’s women’s eight rowing team that had missed out on qualifying for Rio, they were suddenly a chance again following an investigation into their Russian rivals.
Confirmation that they were going to the Olympics came via a teleconference call at 9.15pm on Tuesday night.
The eight’s inclusion means the spirit of rowing legend Sarah Tait will live on at the Rio rowing regatta.
London silver medallist Tait lost her battle with cancer in March at just 33 in a setback that rocked the Australian rowing establishment.
She had been a member of the infamous 2004 women’s eight team involved in the Laydown Sally affair before rebounding to qualify the eight at the following Beijing 2008 Olympics.
While Goodman was in Melbourne, Aldersey was in Varese, Italy, training as an emergency for other crews but it is understood she will be part of the eight crew competing in Rio.
Aldersey got the news on her 24th birthday.
“It’s been very hectic,” Goodman said.
“We got a phone call late last week informing us (of what was happening) and we came to Melboune on our own.
“I was with two of my friends waiting for the call last night and it feels very surreal, I don’t think it’s hit yet.”
Despite not setting foot in a boat for six weeks, the women’s eight is suddenly back together training on the Yarra River and will compete in Rio in two weeks.
While some of her team-mates had been training for a marathon or cross country skiing, Goodman took the chance to visit her parents in Doha for a mental and physical break.
When the 23-year-old got back to Adelaide she did some dryland training but has plenty of work to do before leaving Australia on August 6 to make her Olympic debut.
“Lots of high intensity training,” she said.
“My parents live overseas in Doha (her father works for Hassad Foods) so I don’t get to regularly see them, so (after missing qualification) I thought it was the perfect time for me to go over there.
“I did a bit of training in Doha and when I came back to Adelaide I did the same thing, I was thinking about getting a job but now ...”
Goodman lives in St Peters, went to Wilderness School and was studying health science at university before rowing took over.
She made her first senior team in 2014 and competed in the world championships.
Aldersey is studying a double degree in law and health science at Adelaide University while training at the top level.
The women’s eight narrowly missed out on qualifying for Rio when they finished third in the selection regatta in May.
“I took it quite hard,” Goodman said.
“But the last qualifying regatta is quite literally the death regatta ... it was disappointing but it was always going to be tough.”
But all that changed on the weekend when the International Olympic Committee announced that any Russian athlete with a history of doping would be banned from competing in Rio.
That led rowing’s governing body FISA to deem the Russian women’s eight crew ineligible and elevated Australia to the Games.
reece.homfray@news.com.au