KUALA LUMPUR: Felicity Galvez yesterday revealed how her small stature played a substantial role in her failure to qualify for the Olympics in her favourite event at the selection trials in March.
Speaking for the first time since missing out on qualifying for the 200 metres butterfly by 0.06 seconds, Galvez said swimsuit manufacturer Speedo had been unable to find one of its much-hyped LZR suits to fit her 58-kilogram, 167-centimetre frame. Instead, Galvez made the team as a 100m and 200m freestyle relay swimmer.
At the time of the 200m butterfly final, the new suit had delivered 13 world records in six weeks, and if you weren't wearing one, you not only weren't one of the cool kids, you were giving away a mental and physical advantage to rivals - particularly if making the team came down to fractions of a second.
Galvez, who finished third behind Jess Schipper and Samantha Hamill in the final, had hoped to find a new suit in the same style she had always worn - to the knees and with an open back - but the only one her size that could be found was a totally different variety, and when she tried it out, it was too tight, and "was getting water down the front and back" and felt like a "parachute".
"I didn't want to wear something like that at trials because it would make me stress more about it," she said. "I suppose it doesn't always come down to the suit. I do realise at the trials mentally I wasn't right. I don't think it all comes down to the suit. I guess it helps. It feels great on now that I've got a size that fits me.
"I tried to keep them [thoughts of being disadvantaged] out of my head as much as possible. I'm the one thinking. 'OK, don't worry about it, you've got to do your best with what you've got,' so I tried not to let it affect me too much, but when you dive in and see seven other girls next to you wearing the new suit, you're like, 'Geez, I wish I had one,' whether it worked or not. I guess it's a mental thing as well, but that's past now, I'm in the suit and at the Olympic Games now.
"And it wasn't just about the suit. I wasn't very strong mentally. I worried about things too much and didn't let them happen, and I was taking things for granted because I had always just made the team."
What would have made the suit saga more frustrating for Galvez was that wearing the LZR suit she set world records in the 50m and 100m butterfly at the world shortcourse titles in Manchester just two weeks after trials.
Galvez was not expected to be on the team after missing out in the butterfly. She finished seventh in the 200m freestyle, and usually the first six only go for the relay, but both the seventh male and female were selected.
She said she had come a long way since trials, has been given an opportunity in Beijing and, while she admits it will be tough watching the 200m butterfly, she plans to make the most of her relay swims.