SFA met up with Australian Olympic Athlete, Amber Parkinson, prior to the Beijing Olympics.

Q: How did you qualify for the Beijing Olympics? What was the process? How many competitions, cities, best result?

For women’s epee, the qualification period began in May 07 and finished in March 08. We had to attend as many competitions as we could and earn as many points in them as we could. At the end of the cut-off period (mid–March 08) we knew whether we had qualified based on our world ranking. For the purposes of qualifying, the world is divided up into zones. So the top eight in the world in mid–March automatically qualified, then there were additional places for athletes in each zone, based on the world rankings. There were two spots outside the top eight for people in the Asia/Oceania zone and I got the second spot! 

For the full transcript go to Forum, thread ‘Amber pre Olympic Interview’

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