Who will be Australia’s 100th female Winter Olympian?

The Beijing 2022 Olympic Winter Games will see a significant milestone – Australia’s 100^th female Winter Olympian – but exactly who that will be is not that simple.

Australia’s first Winter Olympic representative, speed skater Ken Kennedy, took part in the 1936 Games in Garmisch-Partenkirchen, but it wasn’t until 16 years later in Oslo that we sent our first female competitors – figure skaters Nancy Burley and Gwen Molony. Since then, a further 94 have competed – bringing the total to 96. Another nine women will make their debut in Beijing.

Our women have competed at every Games since 1952 except Grenoble 1968 and Sapporo 1972, and in every sport/discipline except ski jumping, ice hockey and curling. Tahli Gill will make her debut in curling’s mixed doubles event in Beijing, while women do not take part in Nordic Combined.

Here are some summaries of Australian women at the Winter Olympics.

Australia’s participants by gender

Year	Venue	Disciplines	Men	Women	Total
1924-32	No participants
1936	Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Germany	1	1	0	1
1948	St Moritz, Switzerland	No participants
1952	Oslo, Norway	4	7	2	9
1956	Cortina d’Ampezzo, Italy	3	8	2	10
1960	Squaw Valley, USA	6	26	4	30
1964	Innsbruck, Austria	1	5	2	7
1968	Grenoble, France	3	3	0	3
1972	Sapporo, Japan	2	4	0	4
1976	Innsbruck, Austria	3	5	3	8
1980	Lake Placid, USA	4	6	4	10
1984	Sarajevo, Yugoslavia	5	8	2	10
1988	Calgary, Canada	6	16	2	18
1992	Albertville, France	9	16	7	23
1994	Lillehammer, Norway	9	20	7	27
1998	Nagano, Japan	8	16	8	24
2002	Salt Lake City, USA	5	14	13	27
2006	Turin, Italy	10	23	17	40
2010	Vancouver, Canada	11	20	20	40
2014	Sochi, Russia	11	29	31	60
2018	PyeongChang, South Korea	10	28	23	51
Total			163	96	259

Australia’s participants by sport

SPORT	Men	Women	Total
Alpine skiing	28	20	48
Biathlon	3	3	6
Bobsleigh	25	5	30
Cross country skiing	14	7	21
Curling	0	0	0
Figure skating	15	18	33
Freestyle skiing	19	22	41
Ice hockey	17	0	17
Luge	2	2	4
Nordic combined	1	0	1
Short track speed skating	14	5	19
Skeleton	3	4	7
Ski jumping	0	0	0
Snowboarding	13	10	23
Speed skating	9	1	10
TOTAL	163	97	259

Note: Jenny Owens represented Australia in both Alpine skiing and Freestyle skiing

And despite comprising well under half of our Winter Olympic participants (37 per cent), our women have punched well above their weight compared to the men. They have produced 7 of our 15 medals (including 3 of 5 gold) and provided our best results in 7 of the 13 disciplines in which Australia has competed: Alpine skiing, biathlon, bobsleigh, skeleton, luge, cross-country skiing and snowboarding.

Australia’s women’s medallists

Athlete	Sport	Event	Year
Gold (3)
Alisa Camplin	Freestyle skiing	Aerials	2002
Torah Bright	Snowboarding	Halfpipe	2010
Lydia Lassila	Freestyle skiing	Aerials	2010
Silver (1)
Torah Bright	Snowboarding	Halfpipe	2014
Bronze (3)
Zali Steggall	Alpine skiing	Slalom	1998
Alisa Camplin	Freestyle skiing	Aerials	2006
Lydia Lassila	Freestyle skiing	Aerials	2014

Youngest women’s competitors

Age	Athlete	Sport/Discipline	Event	Year
14 years, 281 days	Aileen Shaw	Figure skating	Ladies’ singles	1960
15 years, 137 days	Britt Cox	Freestyle skiing	Ladies’ moguls	2010
16 years, 227 days	Tracy Brook	Figure skating	Ladies’ singles	1988

Oldest women’s competitors

Age	Athlete	Sport/Discipline	Event	Year
37 years, 49 days	Jacqui Cooper	Freestyle skiing	Aerials	2010
35 years, 161 days	Kerryn Pethybridge-Rim	Cross country skiing	7.5km	1998
34 years, 282 days	Maria Despas	Freestyle skiing	Moguls	2002

So back to the original question. Who will be Australia’s 100^th female Winter Olympian?

Well, it’s not that simple.

As Bill Mallon wrote in an Olympstats blog last year https://olympstats.com/2021/07/22/who-is-an-olympian/ somewhat surprisingly, the International Olympic Committee has no strict definition for an Olympian. Furthermore, the World Olympians Association has changed its definition a number of times and National Olympic Committees (including Australia’s) often have different policies about who is an Olympian.

The definition all depends on at which moment an athlete “becomes” an Olympian. Is it when they are selected, sometimes months before the Games? Should it be when they receive their accreditation or enter the Olympic Village? Do they become an Olympian if they march at the opening ceremony? When their name appears on the entry list or the start list for an event? What if they participate in official training at the Olympic venue – compulsory in sports such as bobsleigh, luge and skiing – but withdraw (say, due to injury) and don’t make it to the start line? Should competitors who took part in demonstration events or sports be counted?

In my opinion, only athletes who have competed in sports on the official program should be counted as Olympians. Furthermore, an athlete becomes an Olympian the moment an official fires the starter’s pistol or blows the whistle to start the game (or they are substituted onto the field of play in a team sport) for the event proper. Athletes who do not start an event or only take part in training should not be counted.

So, with apologies to Alpine skier Ondine McGlashan who went to Sarajevo in 1984 but withdrew before competition began, Tarsha Ebbern (ski ballet 1988) and Kylie Gill (aerials 1992) who competed in demonstration (non-medal) events, and Tess Coady who withdrew from the Big Air after an injury sustained in a training run in PyeongChang in 2018, a total of 96 women have competed for Australia at the Winter Olympics.

Here’s how the 100^th is set to unfold in Beijing, bar any mishaps or late schedule changes:

• #97: Tahli Gill will be the first Australian woman in action with curling’s mixed doubles getting underway three days before the opening ceremony (Wednesday, February 2)
• #98: Qualification for the women’s moguls takes place the day before the opening ceremony (Thursday, February 3), with Sophie Ash the only one of four Australians in the event set to make her Olympic debut
• #99: Tess Coady is set to make her Olympic debut in women’s snowboard slopestyle qualifying on the morning of day 1 (Saturday, February 5). Note that the Australian Olympic Committee recognises Tess as having competed at PyeongChang 2018 despite withdrawing due to injury before the event began. She does not appear in the official results.
• #100: The first qualification run of the women’s freestyle Big Air gets underway at 9.30am Beijing time on day 3 (Monday, February 7) with Abi Harrigan set to claim a unique place in Australian Olympic history.
• #101: Abi will be followed shortly after (from 10.15am on day 3) by Alpine skier Katie Parker in the women’s Giant Slalom.

And a big shout out to Australia’s first female Winter Olympian Gwen Molony, who who is still going strong at 89.