Nicola Olyslagers celebrates with the Australian flag at the Paris Olympics.
Nicola Olyslagers celebrates her silver medal at the Paris Olympics.
In short:
Nicola Olyslagers followed up her Paris Olympics silver in the high jump with victory at last month’s World Athletics Indoor Championships in Nanjing.
Olyslagers is focused on adding a world outdoor title to her CV later this year.
What’s next?
She will face Eleanor Patterson in the high jump final at the Australian Athletics Championships in Perth on Sunday.
Nicola Olyslagers jokes she and husband Rhys are living the “Australian dream”.
It’s not a glib comment from the Paris Olympics silver medallist, however, as she credits everyday lifestyle changes — such as home and pet ownership — with helping maintain her love of high jumping.
“My husband and I got married just after the Tokyo Olympics and we sort of put our lives on hold in order to be performing to the best of my ability in Paris,” Olyslagers told ABC Sport.
“After that finished we were like, ‘Oh, what now?’
“So we went down that route … we just got a house now and we got a puppy. We did the Australian dream kind of thing.
“But I found that brought a lot of strength too because it didn’t impact my training.
“It actually spurred me on to love training because that was my consistency. I could go back.
“Even though my life is changing so much, the weights don’t change. I still know what it feels like to lift 80 kilograms above my head.”
Olympic athletes are prone to experiencing a post-Games lull, where motivation may be lacking after committing to a four-year cycle focused solely on achieving one goal.
Olyslagers was mindful of avoiding this trap after claiming silver for the second consecutive Olympics in Paris last year.
Nicola Olysalgers competing in the high jump at the World Athletics Indoor Championships.
Olyslagers won her second consecutive gold at the World Athletics Indoor Championships last month.
And she could not have asked for a better start to her 2025 season following the successful defence of her high jump gold at the World Athletics Indoor Championships in Nanjing three weeks ago.
“I think with good rest and making those right decisions and changes, it can renew you,” said Olyslagers, who is competing at the Australian Athletics Championships in Perth on Sunday.
“It can bring a different kind of strength.”
According to Olyslagers, prioritising rest is crucial to an athlete’s emotional wellbeing.
“Rest is so important and communicating with the people around you, as well as finding people who value you as a person outside of you as an athlete,” she said.
Olyslagers out of ‘comfort zone’
Olyslagers arrived in Perth for the national titles buoyed by her triumph in Nanjing.
She won gold ahead of fellow Australian Eleanor Patterson on countback after both cleared 1.97 metres.
They finished in front of Ukraine’s Olympic champion, Yaroslava Mahuchikh, who exited the final at 1.95m to collect bronze.
“I went in there and I just wanted to give myself the ability to do something surprising, do something new, which was to open a season on an international circuit and to do it well,” Olyslagers said.
“I think that really brought a freshness to my preparation, to be out of my comfort zone, and so to get the gold medal, I was delighted.
“I thought I’d have to do something out of this world to do it. But as it was with the timing and how the competition went, I’m very satisfied with my performance.”
Nicola Olyslagers and Eleanor Patterson pose with Australian flags at the world indoor athletics championships high jump final.
Olyslagers (left) and Eleanor Patterson shared the podium in Nanjing.
Olyslagers will face Patterson again in Perth as they continue their healthy rivalry.
Patterson shared bronze with Ukrainian Iryna Gerashchenko at the Paris Olympics and won gold at the 2022 World Athletics Championships held in Eugene.
She was the silver medallist behind Mahuchikh at the Budapest world titles in 2023, with Olyslagers taking home bronze.
Patterson’s personal best of 2.02m is 1 centimetre shy of Olyslagers’s national record and their head-to-head meeting will be a highlight of the weekend’s program of events in Perth.
Olyslagers is not putting any expectations on her performance, choosing instead to look ahead to her outdoor campaign overseas.
She will compete in the Chinese leg of the Diamond League circuit at the Xiamen (April 26) and Shanghai/Keqiao (May 3) meets, but is unsure of how her European schedule looks at this stage.
All roads lead to September’s World Athletics Championships in Tokyo, where Olyslagers is determined to add outdoor gold to her indoor victory.
“I wasn’t aiming to peak at this one (World Athletics Indoor Championships),” Olyslagers said.
“My real aim is Japan this year, so it was just a glorified start to the season with a golden finish to it.”
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