Dolphins Drum Home The Message: It Comes Down To Respect … & We’re Rio Ready

The drum lessons delivered as part of the fun package on camp in Auburn for the Australia swim team may come in handy when they reach Samba city and the Rio Olympics sporting carnival begins in earnest next week: if getting used to the impending rise in noise level will help, alongside fine tuning rhythm, then the drum sticks might come in handy to poke any in the eye when it comes to harping back to London 2012.

In a meeting room at the Auburn University Hotel, the local ‘Spicer Music Group’ divided their 70-drum-haul amongst the athletes, coaches and support staff for the evening session on Dolphin Camp.

The Spicer group, Father and Son duo Tim and Tom Spicer, specialise in group music and team building activities with key messages revolving around the importance of listening, sharing, creating and accepting – all while playing the drums …

The Dolphins were tasked with what Swimming Australia describes as: “A ‘Chinese whispers’ style activity which saw a ‘beat’ passed from person to person. As the game went on, other beats and distractions were added but the original beats had to be continuously received and distributed.”

Aussie drums at Auburn by Delly Carr

Good training for beating off all those questions about ‘what went wrong last time’. One gold, several missed opportunities, bad behaviour and a missed podium for the 4x100m free blokes is all water under the bridge with the inquiry that followed. Governance issues, on deck and in board room, will be with us always but this Dolphins team need not tow the past with it, Cate Campbell indicated when she told the media at Auburn:

“You cannot compare where we are now to where we were in 2012. I think that it is unfair and disrespectful to the athletes on this team to constantly be bringing up something that happened in 2012, and most of them were not a part of it. I had a great 2012, and I can look back on that with pride. It’s not just the athlete that’s changed, it’s the organization. We’ve opened channels of communication and it has been a great and liberating process to be a part of. And I think we can very well and truly put this matter to rest.”

Belinda Hocking – the hard work draws to an end, the Games ahoy – by Delly …

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