Hello. My name is Joanna Fargus and welcome to my blog! I am a member of the Australian swim team and over the next few months I will invite you into the day to day life of a swimmer in preparation for the Beijing Olympics. I have already had a pretty colourful swimming career, so before I take you on my journey towards Beijing 2008, I should probably fill you all in on the journey that has brought me this far.

I was born in Hong Kong to my mother Bernice (a true blue Aussie) and father David (a proud Scotsman). I began swimming at a very young age along with my 2 older brothers. We were always either near or in the water and we competed through the ranks of age group swimming, where I showed a lot of potential. When I was 10, as a lot of foreign children living in Hong Kong do, I began attending boarding school in England. From there I began making English junior teams, competing throughout Europe. However, when I was 15, I decided to move down under to finish my high school years on the Gold Coast. Due to the fact that I had previously competed for England, I was now required to continue competing for them, which spoiled my plans of swimming for Australia. However, in 2000, my swimming took a monumental leap forward and I dropped almost 5 seconds to qualify for my first Olympic Games, competing for Great Britain.

The Olympic experience was incredible. Sydney put on a fantastic show; however, individually I did not. Being my first ever senior international meet, I wasn't too disappointed but I knew I wanted greater things. The following years I competed at the World Championships, winning a bronze medal, and the 2002 Commonwealth Games, winning gold and silver medals. Throughout this time I had accepted a scholarship to attend college in America, at the University of Southern California. I knew that swimming wasn't going to last forever, so it was imperative for me to get a degree and a scholarship to one of the best Universities in the US was an offer I couldn't refuse. Due to my collegiate and international swimming success, I was on a high, until an accidental fall saw me break my right ankle in 3 places, shattering my dreams of continued success. It took me almost 2 years to gain the strength back in my leg, but even longer to regain to confidence I had as a youngster. I missed the 2004 Olympic team by one spot and it seemed as though my swimming career was on a downward spiral.

Due to many factors, including great support from my college coach, my family and my friends, I stuck with swimming and pushed myself every day to make it back to my best. However, I was not receiving the level of support I felt I deserved from the British system, so I made the arduous decision to switch my allegiance to Australian swimming and after I graduated with honours with a BA in Communication, I moved back down to Queensland. It was a tough decision for me because, although I knew Australia was where my heart lay, I had achieved such great success in Great Britain. But this was something I had to do to stay true to myself.

So, from there, I qualified for the 2006 Commonwealth Games team to compete on my very first Australian swim team and I went on to win a Gold medal in the 200 backstroke in Melbourne. This year I qualified for the World Championships team, and although I did not compete to my best ability, there is still much room for improvement. I am now the 2^nd fastest Australian female all time, and every day I strive to go even faster.

So, that is a brief history of my journey so far. In the meantime, coming up next weekend is the World Cup meet in Sydney, closely followed by the Telstra Australian Swimmer of the Year awards, but more on that in my next blog.

In the months leading up to Olympic Trials in March, there will be many ups, many downs and a whole lot of stuff in between and I'm looking forward to bringing you all along for the ride. Until next time,

Jo