An emotional Alicia Quirk thanked Wagga for its support as she returned home as the city’s first Olympic gold medal winner.
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After arriving home from Rio along with the majority of the Australian team on Wednesday, Quirk made a flying visit home on Thursday and was greeted with a hero’s reception.
Hundreds lined the Civic Centre to get a glimpse, and a feel, of Wagga’s first gold medal.
Quirk fought back the tears as she was overwhelmed when thanking the support of her hometown.
She declared the gold medal hanging around her neck as much Wagga’s than it is her own.
“It is nice to be able to come home, spend a bit of time with my family and friend back here and celebrate this achievement with the city of Wagga,” Quirk said.
“I am very lucky.”
As part of Australia’s first women’s sevens team in the Olympics, Quirk has quickly become an inspiration to the next generation of Wagga’s budding athletes.
Many of them, mostly young girls, where lined up to saviour their moment with the Olympic champion.
It is one thing the 24-year-old said the team set out to do.
“It has been phenomenal with the amount of feedback from people back home and around the world that watched our game and said how great it was to see us play and do well,” Quirk said.
“From the get go our campaign four years ago we wanted to change the face of women’s rugby and inspire young girls to create a type of rugby that was fun, fit, fast and exciting to watch and that inspire young girls to chase their dreams and do the same things we had.”
Throughout the whirlwind experience at Rio, Quirk spent plenty of time cheering on other Australians in the stand and still doesn’t believe winning the gold medal has quite sunk in yet.
“Even when we finished it felt quite surreal that we had done it, even when we got presented our medals it seemed like it was happening in slow motion and it didn’t feel real,” she said.
“Being able in be in the Village for the remaining two weeks and actually watch other amazing athletes achieve the same feat it didn’t really seem like we had done was similiar in comparision.
“You had to remind yourself ‘hey, I have one of those too locked up in my draw’.
“Once I have a bit of time to myself it will sink in and I’ll realise what we have achieved is pretty special.”
Mayor Rod Kendall said Quirk was an ideal ambassador for Wagga.
“She is just a wonderful representative of the youth of Wagga Wagga and a great example of what sort of sportsman we do raise in this city,” Kendall said.
Quirk will continue her visit home on Friday with visits to her old schools, Henschke Primary School and Kildare Catholic College.