It all started with Australians taunting Americans with air guitars at the 2000 Sydney Olympics, and now the Australian team has found a new way to irritate their rivals with just one word.
The rivalry between the United States and Australia in swimming is intense, and the United States historically dominates the Olympic Games.
But a new chapter is being written in Paris, highlighted by Australian champion Ariarne Titmus’s triumph over two-time American rival Katie Ledecky.
In total, American swimmers have won 257 golds and 579 medals in total, while Australia follows with 69 golds and 212 medals in total.
However, the gap has been closing, especially at the 2020 Tokyo Games, where Australia almost equaled the United States’ medal tally.
The rivalry began before the 2000 Sydney Olympics, when the Australian team celebrated a victory over the US by playing air guitar.
This was in response to American swimmer Gary Hall Jr., who proclaimed before his historic relay that they were going to crush the Australians “like guitars.”
The biannual Duel in the Pool event began in 2003, pitting the best swimmers from both countries against each other, and returned to its roots in 2022 in Sydney.
The dramatic rivalry between Australia and the United States in the pool began when the Australian relay team brought out the air guitars to mark a victory at the 2000 Sydney Olympics.
Australian champion Cate Campbell caused a stir ahead of the Olympics by criticising the US national anthem.
The tide began to turn when the Australian team secured bragging rights with a dominant performance at the 2023 World Championships in Fukuoka, Japan, winning 15 gold medals compared to the U.S. team’s seven.
Australians were upset that NBC’s Peacock showed rankings based on total medal count, favoring the U.S., rather than the standard rankings by gold medals won, which favored Australia.
Australian swimming champion Cate Campbell then added fuel to the fire by denouncing them and attacking their beloved national anthem.
“On the first night of competition we didn’t have to listen to the national anthem throughout the stadium. I can’t express how happy I was about that,” she said just before the Olympics.
“If I hear that song again it will be too soon.”
“Bring on Paris,” Campbell added. “That’s all I have to say to America. Stop being sore losers.”
If mocking their greatest heroes and national anthem wasn’t enough, Australians have been using a single word in Paris to further escalate the rivalry.
That word? Girt.
The infamous word from the Australian national anthem literally means “surrounded” or “enclosed by the sea”.
Privately, Australian swimmers have used it as a mantra, a rallying cry against their American rivals to remind them and their opposition that Australians are basically born in the water.
American writer and producer Franklin Leonard discovered this when he took to social media to ask: “Why is Australia so good at swimming?”
One aptly named profile, called “Loz,” simply replied: “We are literally surrounded by the sea.”
Leonard became furious and said: “There are many nations surrounded by water. This is not a good solution.”
“In Australia it is considered a moral mistake not to teach children to swim,” another local responded to the American identity.
Ariarne Titmus was a major part of the Australian gold rush that arose from being “surrounded by the sea”.
The Americans weren’t happy when Katie Ledecky lost twice to Titmus, and they’re even less happy with the reasoning behind why Australia is so good at swimming.
Some Australian fans took pleasure in reminding Americans that their nation of 333 million people isn’t even “surrounded” by the sea because of its land borders with Canada and Mexico.
“Are you even surrounded by the sea, bro?” posted one Australian.
“If we were surrounded by land, we would crush them there too,” said another.
“It’s amazing that someone turned ‘girt’ into a flexible expression,” another added.
“Americans are so mad because Australia is better at Olympic swimming, they’re sooooo good like you guys aren’t even prepared, how can you think for a second that you’re good competition?” asked another.
Some even made reference to the disappearance of former Australian Prime Minister Harold Holt, who vanished forever after going swimming in 1967.
‘Australia is so surrounded by sea that one of our prime ministers went to the beach for a swim and was never seen again – we later named several local pools after him.’