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Lauren we are fast approaching the London Games, what are your chances of Olympic success?
Individually I hope to make beam and floor finals, they’re kind of my pet events and
yeah they are looking quite good at the moment so yeah hopefully I can make beam and floor
finals and then as a team obviously top eight and we came sixth last time so hopefully we
can equal or better that. You competed at the 2008 Beijing Olympics,
four years ago, what did you learn from that experience?
Like you said that was like my first Olympics and the whole experience of the village life,
the dining hall and then going to and from the competition venue, that was the first
time I had experience any kind of that stuff and yeah going in again four years later I
know what that experience is like and I can, even though it is kind of a cliché, it is
just another competition, and even though it only comes around every four years and
I has the name the Olympic Games it is another competition you have to go out there and you
have to show the same routines that you would show at a competition week before or a week
later, yeah. Does it take some of the pressure off though,
having been to an Olympics before, you know about opening ceremonies, you’ve been in
that big Games village with thousands and thousands of athletes, that that won’t be
new to you this time around? Yeah that’s going to be very helpful that
it’s not new and not kind of daunting cause looking around at all of the other athletes
you are like ‘”whoa that’s such and such” and yeah that’s going to be a lot
different this time and um kind of going in there with the rest of the team, and we’ve
all been training together for so long now it’s going to be a lot easier.
You are already a world champion heading into London, what does that success you’ve had
in the last couple of years, what does that do for your confidence ahead of the London
Games? It definitely gives me more confidence knowing
that I am up there with the rest of the world and I have a high star value so I can compete
competitively with the rest of the world, where as previously I had an average star
value, so I can compete with the rest of the world but not really competitively, so this
time round going in as an actual competitor is quite a nice feeling
How important is funding and support from the Government, AIS, WAIS and Gymnastics Australia.
How important is that support to a gymnast and furthering your career?
The support that we receive from everyone is phenomenal, like without it we wouldn’t
be able to travel to all of these international competitions and then compete and get the
experience to become a world champion, or to be able to go to the Olympic Games or Commonwealth
Games or just back at home, the support that we have at home with nutrition and physch
and school stuff and all that around us that we don’t really have to think about as much
so we can just focus on our training has been so helpful for us