The family behind our newest gold medallist Chloe Esposito
BEHIND every one of our 422 athletes is a huge support team. The Esposito family from Western Sydney have perhaps sacrificed a bit more for their children’s Olympic careers.
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FROM pre-dawn starts and driving hundreds of thousands of kilometres, to nutrition-packed diets and precision training schedules: it’s not just athletes who take the Olympic journey. Mum and dad have a fair bit to do as well.
Behind every one of our 422 athletes who have competed in Rio is a huge support team, and with our biggest ever crop of rookies, the 2016 Games included a lot of first time (Olympic) parents.
The Esposito family from Western Sydney have perhaps sacrificed a bit more for their children’s Olympic modern pentathlon careers than most, having relocated to not one but two European cities in the past two years on the road to Rio.
This has meant mum Suzanne has been living between Hungary and Australia, as she continues running the family swim school in their Casula backyard while Chloe, 24, and Max, 19, prepared for the Olympics.
“There isn’t a big modern pentathlon scene around Casula, so when the kids both wanted to do this we wanted to give them every opportunity to compete internationally and be ready,” she said.
“We like to think everyone in the family is kind of following their own dreams at the moment.
Not a bad backdrop for #TeamEspo in the hills!@AUSOlympicTeam #OneTeam pic.twitter.com/UIQSWAowVO
— Chloe Esposito (@chloeesposito91) August 2, 2016
“Our other daughter has been in Victoria for her shooting career, and I am here in Sydney looking after the business while the others are over in Europe.
“It might seem a little odd but it works for all of us and it lets everyone work towards what they want. We are all very happy when we’re together though.”
Father Daniel is the duo’s coach, and has spent the past month training in Mexico before the family reunited in Rio for the last week of the Games.
“Working together and training together has its ups and downs, as with anything in life,” he said.
“But … it’s a job we had to get done and so you just go with the flow. So it’s kind of second nature for all of us, we have all been together pretty much since we started the family swim business, kids were born into it and were always with us around the business, so it’s really nothing new.
“I don’t think we are any more special than any other family who try and help their kids achieve their dreams, I like to think we are just your average family, who still brings their kids down a peg or two and bring them back to reality.”
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Originally published as The family behind our newest gold medallist Chloe Esposito
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