‘I feel happiest when I’m running’

“Winning in Sydney still surprises me everyday. It’s almost like it happened last night or two weeks back,” Freeman says. “I remember not hearing a thing before the gun went off,” she adds. “When there were only 80 metres to the finish line,I could not feel the ground beneath my feet. It felt like the crowd was carrying me through it. I was overwhelmed and very aware of the entire spectacle.”

Freeman also recalled the honour of lighting the Olympic cauldron. “I broke down before the event for two minutes,absolutely overwhelmed,” she says.

No formula for winning

Programmed to win since she was a child,Freeman says there is no formula to the art of winning,only the will to do so. “Since I was five I was expected to achieve everything I did. It begins with a child’s dream to excel,” she says,adding,“As an indigenous woman I inherited the outdoors. It’s partly a science to win,but it is also a birthright. Maybe I won because I feel happiest when I’m running.”

Having participated at the Commonwealth Games in Canada in 1994,Freeman believes next year’s event will be successful because of individual performances. “All it takes is a single spark or an individual moment to make the Games special. I believe that the CWG will be remembered for these moments rather than what has gone wrong during the build-up.”