Michelle Steele - 2 time Olympian living and competing in the Northern Hemisphere.
Racing Skeleton in the northern hemisphere Winter Olympian Michelle spent half a year (for 10 years) living and competing abroad.
About Michelle
2 time Winter Olympian Michelle, was the first Australian woman to compete in the event of Skeleton at the Olympics. Following a 10 year career in the sport Michelle retired in 2014 and now lives in Brisbane with her husband and 2 daughters.
Michelle transferred into the sport of skeleton in 2004 at the age of 18 from Surf Life Saving and Gymnastics. Her first overseas experience was in Calgary with a team of Aussie girls learning to slide skeleton tracks. Michelle then followed the world cup circuit each northern hemisphere winter for 10 years. She spent a lot of time in Europe and North America, also raced in Japan and Russia.
“You cant have what you want, on the day sometimes, and thats how it goes.”
When coming home...
- Emotions Michelle faced - Eger to return home, intense and burn out but good to come home.
- What had changed - Came home to work, starting a family.
- Biggest stress - Missing the sport, setting herself up financially.
- How did her mindset change - Continually reflecting on the ups and downs and learning from that.
- 3 Lessons learned from travel and reverse culture shock
- Everything comes to an end - ebbs and flows, highlights and lowlights.
- Be open to new things - you can always find another way of doing something.
- Life is to be enjoyed.
- Advise to herself for returning home - know that there will always be another adventure, and it may look and taste and smell different and I may come about it differently but there are always good things to come if you apply yourself if you keep an open mind.
“You always through life pick up a little bit more insight and I always try to be reflective. There are so many benefits from the ups and downs from travel and racing and the good hard looks at yourself, the things that you have to get yourself through when there is no one else to help get you through.”
Links
Australian Olympic Committee: Michelle Steele
“Everything comes to an end... there are always ebbs and flows. You cant expect life to be highly exciting and special and the ultimate. There are always times in between and those times are needed, it doesn’t need to be emptiness but it does come back down and normalise.”
(Header photo source: Adam Pretty/Getty Images Europe.)
(Photo Source: Alex Livesey/Getty Images Europe)