Matt out of blocks in Olympics
Jon Tuxworth | 23rd January 2010
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Former Olympic sprinter Matt Shirvington believes his experiences as an athlete will help him in his role as an interviewer at next month’s Winter Olympics.
It is certainly a different gig for someone who spent his own sporting career chasing the summer warmth around the globe.
But former Olympic sprinter Matt Shirvington is hoping to use his track experiences as an advantage when he joins Foxtel’s commentary team for next month’s Winter Olympics in Vancouver.
The 31-year-old, who has also graced the small screen, on the opening instalment of Dancing With the Stars and technology show Beyond Tomorrow, believes the Australian team will return from Canada as the most successful in our country’s Winter Olympics history.
He points to aerial skiers Lydia Lassila and Jacqui Cooper, snowboarder Torah Bright and defending mogul skiing champion Dale Begg-Smith as the green and gold’s best gold medal hopes.
“It’s good to have some past physical background of my own and I’ve got a newfound respect for winter athletes and what they have to do in terms of training involved to be competitive,” Shirvington said yesterday. “I’ve definitely done the research in terms of scoring and terminology.
“To be honest, I’m not an expert commentator. I’ll be on the ground interviewing athletes and hopefully I’ll be able to use my experience in connecting with other athletes.
“Essentially, winter athletes have to deal with the same fundamentals summer athletes do.”
Shirvington will be covering everything from speed and figure skating to ice hockey and curling, but admits he has found ski jumping the toughest to get his head around.
“That may sound stupid, because you’d think it’d just be who jumps the furthest, but what’s tricky is the way they nominate parts of hills where they have to land near and get deducted points in terms of how close they get,” he said.
“There’s also points for style and I’ve talked to some competitors who say that sometimes they don’t even know how the judges arrive at their scores.”
The former Commonwealth Games 100-metre finalist endured plenty of media attention during his halcyon days in athletics and has been adjusting to being on the other side of the fence.
“As an athlete, the idea of giving someone an interview the day before an event wasn’t really a high priority, but that’s switched now,” he said with a laugh.
“Now I’d do anything to get hold of an athlete the day before the event.”
Foxtel’s coverage of the Vancouver Winter Olympics can be seen on AUSTAR from February 13.