Georgia Portelli defied plenty of pressure, when she threw the winning discus throw for her age group at the Primary School Sports Association championships in November.
The Richmond Public School students’ throw, the first after making the top eight, needed to be a good one.
Georgia was behind some of the other girls in her age group, and needed to be in the top three, if she wanted to qualify for the Australian All Schools Athletics Championships, which starts on Friday, for the first time.
“I was feeling the pressure a lot. I just focused more of my spin instead of getting through, I guess I just focused more on my technique,” Georgia said.
“On the day, my first throw was 24 metres and I needed to get into the top eight to have a chance to make the top three.
“I threw a 29m on my third throw to go into the top eight and on my first throw in the top eight I threw a 34.86, which was the winning throw.”
The 12-year-old’s winning throw was a little short of her personal best, 36.86 metres, but she said she was ecstatic to qualify for nationals nonetheless.
“I was quite excited when I won, which meant I could go through to nationals, it was my last chance to make it in primary school,” she said.
“A few years ago I missed out on the nationals by 15 centimetres and from then I made it my goal to make the nationals.
“I was pretty upset about it. I was the third girl to throw, and then a girl on her last throw beat me.”
Georgia is also handy at shot-put. She finished fifth at the PSSA event in October, and narrowly missed out on qualifying for nationals too.
Despite the near miss, Georgia said she was determined to put in her best performance yet at the nationals.
“There are a lot of good discus throwers but I hope I'll make the top 10,” she said.
Georgia said while it was a long way off, she would like to go on and become a professional athlete, just like Australian discus thrower Dani Samuels, her sporting idol.
“I've met Dani before but I didn't say anything to her because I was too shy,” she said.