DANIEL Ford, a Year 12 student from the central New South Wales town of
Orange, is one of Australia鈥檚 lesser known Olympic champions. His bronze medal
hardly rated a mention in the media. He wasn鈥檛 included in the tickertape parade
in Sydney, and he didn鈥檛 appear at the MCG at the Australian Football League
Grand Final.
Perhaps it was because his medal had nothing to do with sport; it was for
science. He was part of the six-member Australian team at the International
Mathematics Olympiad (IMO) in India. Other teams recently represented Australia
in biology, chemistry and physics. And the competition was just as hot as
Atlanta.
Even Steve Moneghetti might baulk at being pitted against 500 other
secondary students from about 75 countries over two grueling
four-and-a-half-hour mathematics papers in two days鈥攅specially if the
arena was a hall at an atomic research establishment north of Bombay without
airconditioning in the middle of summer.
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But Ford was matter-of-fact. 鈥淭here were fans in the exam room. You had to
keep your papers pinned down.
鈥淔or the three days following the competition our answers were marked
question-by-question, and the marks went up on a huge board. It was real
nail-biting stuff. We wandered down every five minutes to check how we were
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Ford has been training for his event since 1993, when he was invited to a
National Maths Summer School after achieving a distinction in a Mathsearch
competition. Since then, as well as competing in many national maths
competitions, he has been to five 10-day IMO training camps鈥攖hree in
Melbourne and two in Sydney. 鈥淚 haven鈥檛 had many holidays.鈥�
But the training did not stop there. On the way to the competition in Bombay,
the team spent a week in Singapore to acclimatise. 鈥淚t helped us get into
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Australia has done particularly well at the science olympiads over the years.
In the past six years, 23 out of the 24 competitors in chemistry have won
medals. The biology team was placed second to China in 1993, making Australia
the highest ranking western nation in the history of the competition. This year
Ford and his colleagues won two silver and three bronze medals in mathematics
and were placed 23rd overall.
And if the competitors do not receive quite the same adulation as the
country鈥檚 sporting heroes, at least the Federal Government is on side. Late last
month, Science and Technology Minister, Peter McGuaran announced funding
of $750 000 over the next three years to assist the National Olympiad
Council to prepare teams to take part in the competitions. 鈥淭he success of our
Olympians raises young people鈥檚 awareness of science and technology. And it is
important for Australia鈥檚 future that young people are switched on to
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That seems to have been the case for Ford. He gave up a tap-dancing role in
the Orange Theatre Company鈥檚 production of 42nd Street for the chance
to represent his country in India. And he looks set to start a science degree
next year. 鈥淚鈥檓 seriously considering maths, but possibly with engineering or
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