Erika Fairweather is home.
After two weeks in MIQ, the 17-year-old Olympic swimming finalist and New Zealand record-holder arrived at Dunedin Airport yesterday afternoon.
She said the scale of her accomplishments in the pool at the Tokyo Aquatics Centre had become clear to her after spending long hours alone in isolation on her return to the country.
She was looking forward to a return to a normal routine, but her sights were firmly set on the Paris Olympics in 2024.
"Tokyo was just the start," Fairweather said. "I’m super stoked with how I performed over there.
"I’ve really come to terms with it. Over the last two weeks I’ve had a lot of thinking time."
Nevertheless, it was a long two weeks, Fairweather said.
She passed the time speaking to her family and among her team-mates in MIQ.
There were plenty of video chats with friends and videoconference calls to her class at Kavanagh College.
The head girl of the Dunedin co-educational secondary school laughed when she was asked if she had set the bar high for future head girls of the school.
She said she believed life would return to "somewhat normal" despite proving she belonged among the world’s best in the 400m freestyle.
"But yeah there’s definitely more of that heightened performance expectation on myself now," she said.
The freestyle specialist clocked 4min 08.01sec as she came in eighth in the 400m freestyle final at the Tokyo Olympics.
She shattered her personal best by 4sec to clock 4min 02.28sec to qualify fourth for the final.
It was the teenager’s first Olympic campaign.
Bond back to meet baby
Former Otago rower Hamish Bond shows off his gold medal - his third, won with the men’s eight at Tokyo - during a welcome home ceremony for the New Zealand Olympic Games team at Christchurch Airport yesterday.
Bond, released from MIQ after completingtwo weeks in isolation, revealed wife Lizzie had given birth to their third child, son Finlay, during his first week in MIQ.
