There's more...

Closing ceremonies hasn't come yet, there's still more people!
After the McDonald's meeting we were supposed to meet with our security guy. (Who I wasn't allowed to talk about on here) We said to meet in front of the fountain, but there was about two miles of fountains which we discovered that night. I remembered him saying that we were getting a bus where we had gotten them before. I learned later that he wast talking about a time with some of the girls and I was not on that excursion. So I rounded up the eight of us that I could find and headed to the bus stop we had always picked up our buses. But, there was no bus. We found some Greek cops and asked for their help and they worked to get us some shuttles. Little Stephanie remembered that we had a number we could call if we were stranded so we called the USOC Call desk and informed them that we were just that. Somehow Becky was the only one that found this "fountain" and our security guy so she got to the Village about two hours before us. We had a fun little "bonfire" type gathering in front of the metal detectors in the entrance to the pool. We reflected on our swim, took our hats out and just generally laughed at our unglamourous post medal winning celebration. But the Greek cops came through and got us safely back to the village. The whole team had to wake up early (we had about three hours of sleep since the knox gelatine in our hair had turned to cement and was impossible to get out) The whole team went to a team breakfast but I had to stay behind to give blood as part of the drug testing. I HATE givind blood, I don't even like watching kethcup come out of a bottle and certainly don't like blood being sucked out of me. ewwww
But after that we got to head out to the NBC studios to be on the Weekend Today show. I also met up with my Aunt to give her a suitcase to take my home, and my medal. I didn't want to have that on my vacation.
After a super nap, we headed to a Sports Illustrated party that we had to perform in. We had no warm up and our showtime was at 12:30 am. We were right after a "laser light lady" from Australia. She's the only person in the world that does her act, wow.
We performed in this salt water tank (we got to wear our caps and goggles) and we barely fit in the pool. Everyone loved it. It was salt water so we floated a lot which made a lot of things easier but made getting under water a lot harder. We were all laughing the whole time, it was one of the weirdest things we've ever done. Everyone loved it and then we all got to shower (one shower for ten of us) and went to enjoy the party. Basically every American athlete was there so it was a total blast seeing everyone and saying goodbye.
The next night was the Closing Ceremonies. They were lots of fun, it's just a big free for all with all of the countries mixed together and everyone is so ecstatic. The Greek people were going bonkers for the people that were singing in the Closing but none of us really had any idea who they were. I wish it had been my Greek rappers. After buses taking us back and mobbing the McDonald's, I was ready for bed. I was convinced by Sara and Kendra to head out to the Plaka (downtown Athens) one last time but after an hour I was ready to hit the sack.
The next morning I checked out of the hotel, said goodbye to who was still there and headed to the airport to meet Lisa to start our vacation. I'm going to miss all my girls but we have already planned a reunion for the 4th of July.
Lisa and I are enjoying the relaxed atmosphere of Mikonos and pinching ourselves to make sure we are really here in paradise! Love to you all!
~Lauren

The sorcerer's apprentice....magic!

WOOWHEEEEE! Hey everybody! (Sorry to leave everyone hanging!) Everything got so crazy after we won our BRONZE MEDAL! But it sounds like most of you got to watch our performance so that's awesome. Thank you NBC!
I know that I will remember that night for the rest of my life. I'm still having dreams about it and I probably will forever.
We were all very excited about our perfomance after the technical program, but we were all very aware that we would have to be really focused and have a very strong swim to secure our place. The Spanish team really bungled their techinical program and still were very close to us in score (synchro politics). So we knew they would be very focused on getting their free program perfect. We headed off to the American College in the moring. There was a palpable tension in the air. We were all trying really hard not to just explode with anticipation. We had our usual morning meeting to discuss our plan for the rest of the day. We had an earlier draw then we had had the day before so we had to do a little bit of adjusting. We had also felt rushed the day before when we got to the pool so we decided to do our hair and very intricate hats before we left for the venue. There was some pretty high emotions that morning in the locker room. We had a little drama and a little scuttle but everyone got to release that tension, vent a little bit, and then we were good as new. We were even able to laugh about the surge of emotions in the locker room and it eased the stress for the rest of practice. We were truly joyous and enjoying each other for the rest of the day. No one got upset with corrections, even though we so badly wanted to be perfect. Anna reminded us that even if we didn't have the most fantastic warm up, in no way did that mean that we couldn't have a great performance. The same thing had happened with their duet and they still had huge success!
So after a good warm up, (our team likes to be overly warmed up for competitions) we headed out for our last meal at the ACG, which was really too bad because the food there was great. We got our hair up and hats on and got a shuttle directly to the venue unlike the maze of buses we had been taking every day prior to that. The second we walked into the pool we all felt like we were on top of the world. Later we were told that the women's water polo coach came in to watch some of our warm up and told our coaches that he had a new respect for our sport. He'd never seen any team work so hard. He could also tell that we were "on" that day and he could tell by the look in our eyes that we would be awesome that night. When we jumped into the pool, I felt that we were like a red white and blue bulldozer. (You kind of have to fight for space in the warm up pool) Even Russia's coach stopped her team to have them watch us warm up. We had a great practice with music as well, we definitely do more than any other country but we like it that way.
Fast forward to "the swim"
I was definitely more confident tonight then I was for the technical the night before. I was much calmer, much more comfortable in my skin where the night before I was ready to jump out of it any second! I felt like all day I had really been able to stay calm and focused and keep the girls in the same mindset.
But something that NEVER happens in world class synchro meets happened that night. Right in the first lap of Russia's routine (the team right before us in order of draw) the music went out and they had to be stopped in the middle of the routine. There was mass chaos behind the scenes while their coach scrambled to find an extra copy of their music and tried to understand what had happened to the cd. The girls came out of the pool completely bewildered, as were we. One of the volunteers came over to us in the ready hall and told us that we were going to go now and Russia would swim after us. So we frantically grabbed our noselclips and began to line up to walk out, working to remain calm. But then the Russian girls changed their minds and wanted to go right away. So after a few music tests, and some rule checking, they started again. We were all a little riled up after that. Sara and I were bouncing around doing some sort of Brazillian rain forest dance, Stephanie was deep breathing enough to blow up a water raft, Anna was stretching on the wall and then Alison, our voice of reason, our foundation, pulled us all into a huddle to try and reign in the troops. The only speech I could think of at the moment was to quote from one of my favorite movies, Grease. "I've got chills, they're multiplying, but we're not losing control, it's the power you're supplying, and it's electrifying!" But seriously, I also reminded the girls that we had spent so many hours together over the past two years preparing for this very moment. Perhaps the moment was a little different then we had visualized, but it was still our moment. It was a moment, the last one, that we all got to share together. We had worked so hard for it and we were sooooo proud of our free program. Let's show everyone what an amazing free program we have. Let's take every part of the routine and show it off, step by step, never getting ahead of ourselves. Just think that every move we make, it's the last one we'll do, so let's make it our best. One deep breath and top secret team cheer later, we were back on track. I set foot on that deck and while I was aware of the crowd, I was completely focused on my teammates and the water I was about to dive into. Chi-Chi, the Olympic referee stopped us on the deck in the middle of our walk on and said to wait until our music was tested. (Once again, something that NEVER happens) I told the girls, "This is awesome! Let's enjoy it!" I gave some quick instructions to adjust our walk on a little bit and when Chi Chi gave me the signal, we started to complete our deck work.
I don't even really remember the swim, it felt like a dream, like I had no control of my limbs and some other force was pushing them into the right places. I remember hearing the crowd going nuts during our first lift where we float Stephanie down the pool and I remember thinking, you ain't seen nothing yet! I also remember thinking, on the last strokes, wait! it can't be over, we just started! Am I already at the end of the routine? And then I choked on water and had no air for the last hybrid so the moment quiclly transitioned from glorious to near-death. But I stayed calm, and then that was it. My Olympic swim was over! We all came up and waved to the crowd and all of us were smiling so big it was hurting my cheeks! I didn't even care what our scores would be (ok, well, maybe a little) but swimming in that pool surrounded by my sisters was one of the most amazing feelings. We got our scores, there were a couple of yucky scores in technical merit but two 9.9 in artistic! I'll take that!
We walked off the deck and attacked our coaches we were so excited. Little Kendra became a sobbing mess, it was adorable. I was barely hanging on to the tears but Anna and I had to give the interview for NBC. As soon as we were out of the mixed media zone, we sprinted to the TV to see Spain's scores. When they flashed up on the score board, Erin turned around and said, "We did it! " Next ensued a lot of crying, hugging, dancing, shrieking and other "Oh my gosh we did it!" kind of actions. I was immediately greeted by a drug tester and informed that I was the one person from our team chosen for drug testing. I didn't really care, I even hugged the drug tester! By the time I got out of drug testing it was about 11:00 pm and I rushed off to try and find my family. Leave it to Americans to meet up at McDonalds! But there were Big Macs and fries for everyone. It was so great meeting my family there. I felt so special and so loved. Every time one of the athletes walked in, there was a group of very drunk Hungarian water polo fans that would do this goofy Hungarian dance for us. It was cute the first ten times but then it started to get old and we were all getting tired so we decided to call it a night. But the looks on my parents faces were something I will always remember. We just sort of looked at each other and thought yeah, we did it too! My daddy had a big goofy grin and tears welling in his eyes the whole time and my mom just kept hugging and kissing me profusely. They have been with me through it all. They were there when I was 12 and I quit for ten minutes because the water was too cold and I didn't want to swim anymore. They were there when I won my first Gold medal in figures when I was 14. They were there when I had the most horrible meet of my life in Moscow when I was 17. My dad spent a fortune on faxes and phone calls then. They were there whenI missed the Olympic team in 2000. They were there when I made the 2004 Olympic team. And they were there to watch my final swim, and the most thrilling of them all. I am so grateful to God that I got to have my parents there with me. And Eric and Leah and Malcolm and Carol and Marilyn and my best friend Lisa. And EVERYONE back home that watched me and has sent me e-mails and phone messages and telepathic good thoughts. I'm so glad that everyone got to share the Olympics with me, it made the whole thing so much more special.
The Olympics is a strange beast for sure. But the sense of peace, goodwill, agony, ecstasy, joy, sorrow and everything the Olympics stands for was so apparent every step of the way. The Olympic creed states that the glory is in the struggle, and that is so true. Every morning I didn't want to wake up, every muscle ache, every tear of frustration was worth it. I loved every step of it and I will take that with me in my next adventure. Life after synchro, is there such a thing? I guess I'll find out!.............

Drumline!

Ok, this has to be brief, I will elaborate more later but tonight was so exhilarating. I was shaking before we walked on the deck. It seemed like the whole crowd was full of Americans, and they were all chanting, "USA! USA!" Or maybe Americans are just noisy enough to sound like they have filled an entire stadium. Either way, it was unreal. I didn't stop shaking until the part in the deckwork where I get to turn around and look at the girls. When i saw their faces, at first I wanted to cry. They were so beautiful and it was all my best friends staring at me. But I pulled it together and led us into our deck stunts (which we nailed by the way). The routine felt like a dream, I barely remember it. When it was almost over I couldn't believe it and I wanted to do more! But the judges seemed to like it, we are holding strong to bronze. We drew fifth tomorrow, right after Russia again. It's going to be great. Keep up the good thoughts, we all felt them tonight!

Life is good!

I think it's official, I'm the luckiest girl in the world. Today was so great, and I haven't even started competing yet which is the really fun part!
We started out with another great practice. We feel absolutely unstoppable! Then I got a special treat, my parents my Uncle Malcolm, my Aunt Carol and my Aunt Marilyn all came to have lunch with me at the College of Greece! I had so much fun catching up with them and hearing about all of the events they had been seeing. I felt so special to have so much family there to come see little old me!
After lunch with them I was shuttled off to the set of the Today Show! I can't believe it! I am so fortunate to be in a career that allows me to meet my idol, Katie Couric. When we arrived we went to straight to the Green Room which certainly could have used a little bit more air conditioning. Then Kendra, Becky and I (the three that were able to be on the show today) got our hair and make up done. We felt very special. Then we were golf carted over to the set, that is right in the middle of the Olympic square. On my way over there I got to see Raj Mathai who is our local NBC Sports guy in San Jose. He just happened to go to high school with my brother and has been doing a lot of coverage of me for the folks back home. I haven't seen him since I was about 8 so that was really fun!
Then we headed over to the Today set. We did our interview with Matt, he really feels like he is a part of the team since he did they synchro challenge with us last week. He was upset that we hadn't called him to be on the team for the competition tomorrow night. The set was surrounded by Kendra and Becky's families and other adoring Today Show fans. They even interviewed little Khadija Zanotto (Kendra's little sister) because it was here birthday and her big sis was on Olympian. She was fabulous, and a big hit on the set. All of the family and fans were screaming during the whole interview and along with my absolute excitement for being on my favorite show with Matt two feet away from me and Katie about ten feet, I completely froze during the interview. My sweet boyfriend told me I was probably fantastic but he has to say that. Hopefully it didn't show. Katie even told me that I have a future in TV, but not until she's done! They were so great and stayed around to take photos with us and everything. I even got a bobble head Katie pin, very cool.
After that, (I'm still glowing) we headed out to the pool to watch our duet at Finals. They made me cry, they were so beautiful and gave so much to the audience, everyone was entranced. They won the bronze, so deserving. Chris and Anna and Alison and their fantastic alternate Sara have worked so incredibly hard this year that it was so fitting to see them rewarded with a medal. I am so proud of them. They couldn't have set us up better for the team tomorrow night. Our swimmer friend from Iraq even came to cheer on the duet. He was a little afraid of the photographers taking photos of him with us so we had to be careful. It was strange to know that he was actually afraid of photos that might reach home. But we love that we have a good friend in Iraq.
One of the fun things keeping us entertained is that Dr. Don, our trainer, has adopted four stray dogs that greet him on his walk back to his apartment from the village. They are named Brillo, Mugs, Delilah and Sorcerer, all with distinct personalities. He enlists our help every night to smuggle scraps from dinner to feed the dogs. We are literally smuggling out banquet sized portions every night, but don't tell the food staff here!
Anyway, I'm off to get some rest to prepare for tomorrow, think good thoughts!
Love,
Lauren

Riding the wave....

Well our duet has put us on quite a roll. We were still riding that wave when we woke up this morning and trucked off to the American College of Greece. We shared the bus with our Women's Water Polo team. They were so excited to tell us that they had watched our duet on TV last night and because they had been watching our practices they could tell who was good and who wasn't among the other countries. It was really fun to see how good their synchro education had become after just a few weeks of hearing our corrections belted over the microphone. Apparently in the athlete lounge in the village, synchro was the sport everyone wanted to watch, even some wrestlers were getting into it! The support here is so great, and our water polo girls play tonight and we'll be there to cheer them on when we can.
Practice ran smoothly this morning as well. For those of you who are synchro girls you'll feel me on this one.... Chris (our coach) always says, "If you get this right the first time, we'll be done and you can get out." That NEVER happens by the way, that's always the sentence that starts out practice in the morning and then we get out about 4 hours later. Except for today! We were so hot today that we got everything right the first or second time so that we got out ten minutes early for lunch! Wowee! I don't think that has ever happened to me in my entire 16 year synchro career! I think a lot of our improvement is coming from our landdrills. Maybe I get a little "nazi-like" as Kendra called me today in our landdrills but we are going to be so awesome for our tech! I have the best teammates in the entire world, I wish all of you could be a fly on the wall and watch this team work. I guess through my journals you are. We just get better and better the more pressure we feel.
Well, after all this excitement of the morning, I'm off to take a nap before we take the bus to the competition pool. See you after the duets tonight!
(Post duet entry)
Well, our duet was fabulous once again! I swear I'm not biased but they were the most beautiful duet that competed tonight. They were flawless and exciting and captivating. And, like Anna pointed out, their success here shows that you can still have your own style and be competitive. A lot of the countries begin to look all the same.
During duets I got to sneak up and see my parents and my Aunt Marilyn. They are so fun and such great cheerleaders. I really have been lucky with how much I've been able to see my family.
Besides our duet holding strong to third place, I got some more exciting news. Becky, Kendra and I are going to be on the Today Show again tomorrow. (the morning of August 25 for you in the US) I hope I get to meet Katie! Well, I'm off to bed, sleep is becoming a precious commodity.
By the way, the Olympics is sooooo exciting, I can barely stand it!!!!!!

The duet leads the charge!

Whew! I was too tired to write last night. We had a pretty intense day. But tonight was our first day of competition with the duet! They swam their technical program, 24th out of 25 duets. The whole time we watched the other duets I just kept waiting for any duet to knock my socks off. Then came our duet and they did just that. They were higher than anyone there, they were the most elegant and the most beautiful, they were consistently strong in every single one of their elements (unlike some of the other top countries that completely bombed some elements). And, without any American judge on the panel, they are now well ahead of Spain and France holding tightly to third place! This is so exciting for all of us. We all just bounced our way back into the village, sprinted to McDonald's for a quick dinner (it's 11:00pm!) and raced off to tell our families about the news. This sets us up so well for team, we're so thrilled with our wonderful Duet-y! It's very interesting to see other countries crack under the pressure while we just seem to get better and better.
This morning started off with our trainer playing a mix cd that I made for the team. During Bill Withers' "Lean on Me" our head coach, asst. coach, manager and trainer all stood up and started singing along and leaning on each other. It was pretty adorable. And it kicked off a great day. We had so much intensity, it was so exhilarating! The duet and our coaches needed to rest so the remainder of the team rested and then landdrilled on our own. When we got in to practice a little bit during the duet warm up our coach was very impressed with the improvements we had made during our self run land drills. We were excited because now she can really focus on the duet and know that the team will still be working hard!
The competition tonight was very interesting. It's nice to see that the level of athletes internationally has really improved. It's very exciting for our sport. But most of all it feels so good to be competing finally! I can count the days on one hand! Thanks to everyone back home for all of your phone calls and e-mails and well wishes. It's working! Keep it up!
Love,
Lauren
(I need to sleep!)

Tammy and I in the Village picking up our laundry (picture from Yahoo Sports)

Two unidentified United States Olympians stop briefly outside their housing quarters to send encouragement to some teammates at the Olympic Village Monday, Aug. 16, 2004 in Athens. Once the Olympic games are over, the buildings will be turned into apartment homes. (AP Photo/Julie Jacobson)

Another relaxing day off

Our coach has really been quite generous with the days off. I guess we have been here for over two weeks but we still feel very lucky to have a day off in order to enjoy ourselves a little bit while at the Games.
I woke up about 9:30 to get ready for a TV interview. It was for the NBC affiliate in Sacramento, where I was born, and they even let me give a "shout out" to my Grammy. Then I had a nice leisurely lunch with some of my swimmer friends like Nathalie Coughlin and Larsen Jensen both who had Finals tonight. I hope they do awesome, I'll be watching them on TV.
After lunch I headed off to get a massage in the International Zone. On the bottom floor there were pool tables, and air hockey tables and video games and a little cafe. And upstairs is the massage salon. I just had to walk up and say I wanted a massage and I got one! 45 minutes later I felt completely relaxed. I wish it was that easy back home. I might go again tonight before I go to bed.
Then we all headed out to the velodrome to watch our cycling friends in their team track race. All the tickets were sold out because the Greeks were competing in the event. So, Sara and I, being very stealth and inventive, managed to "accidentally" sneak into the venue. I still don't know how we did it, we didn't even really mean to. But it worked out perfectly and right as we walked in our team was racing. It's really a crazy sport to watch, they're basically flying around on bicycles on a wooden track, horizontal to the ground at about 60 km an hour. Not something I plan on trying anytime soon. They finished 11th, they didn't make the Finals but they were the youngest team there so they did really well.
I have to insert here an observation about European women. A lot of people ask me how they can dress in Europe so they won't look like Americans. Personally, I would just stick to looking like Americans. European women match EVERYTHING in their outfit. The woman next to us today at the velodrome was head to toe in neon orange. Neon orange pants, orange shirt, orange sandals, little orange belt, orange jewlery and neon orange hair clip. It was a lot of neon orange but I suppose she could go jogging at night and be very safe in an outfit like that.
Anyway, then we headed back to the village for dinner and e-mails. We're going to listen to my Greek hip-hop cds and play some UNO. I feel completely refreshed and ready to start our week of competing. Here we go!