By Mikayla van Loon
Although she graduated from Mount Lilydale Mercy College 10 years ago, Bree Walker will be representing the school community as she takes on the Beijing Winter Olympics in bobsleigh.
Probably an unusual and unknown sport to many, the 29-year-old had always known she would eventually make the move to the winter activity.
Originally from Mount Evelyn, Bree started out at Yarra Ranges Athletics doing little athletics, where she was mainly running the 400 metres before taking on the 400 metre hurdles.
Bree’s athletic capability got her a scholarship with the University of Arkansas in the USA but after some injuries and a different training program to what she was used to, she decided to return home.
“I was watching the Rio Olympics and I had to ask myself the big question ‘was I going to be able to compete for Australia at the top level internationally and at the Olympic Games with 400 metre hurdles?’ And the hard answer was no,” she said.
“Bobsleigh was something I thought I would do after my athletic career but I was young and I still had a lot more to give, so I just signed up for the talent identification camp.”
Bree was selected to head to Canada in October 2016 to learn bobsleigh.
At the time, bobsleigh was being revamped in Australia for the 2018 PyeongChang Olympics, although a team wasn’t selected by the Australian Olympic Committee to compete, it gave Bree something to work towards.
“I guess the rest is history,” she said.
Inspired by Cathy Freeman in the 2000 Olympics, Bree’s goal was always to represent Australia at the highest level in any sport she could.
“It wasn’t just about going to the Olympics, it was about representing Australia at the top level and showing the rest of the world what Australians can do.
“Now that I’ve been able to do that in bobsleigh, I’m really proud to represent Australia because it’s obviously not a sport that’s very common for Australians to do but I think we’re holding our own and doing the country proud.
“I hope it opens the door for other people who have ideas like I had and so they can have opportunities like I’ve had.”
For Bree’s family and friends, the reaction to her wanting to pursue bobsleigh wasn’t so much a shock because she came from a town without snow but because she had always had crazy ideas.
“It wasn’t a big surprise to my family and friends that I want to go and do something so crazy because I’ve done it in the past, I’ve traveled around the world with athletics and and those things kind of just pop up out of the blue and I’m just like ‘yeah I’m going to go do it’.”
Now based in Germany, Bree hasn’t been home to see her family in two years but plans to head home for a little while after the Olympics have finished.
“I’m so excited to see my family and friends and I’m so excited to just drink a lot of Melbourne coffee. I miss it so much.
“I was such a local in Lilydale and I’ve missed going out for coffee with friends, so I’m very excited to do that and just catch up with everybody.”
Bree will be gracing the screens on the last two weekends of the Olympic games when she competes in both the monobob and two women bobsleigh.
The Olympics get underway with the opening ceremony on Friday 4 February. The Star Mail will be following Bree’s Olympic campaign closely.
