“I couldn’t see anyone in the crowd while I was swimming, and just concentrated on pretending I was at the beach and in the ocean to make people believe the story. The Deep Sea section of the ceremony was my favourite because I love going to the beach. It was amazing to be up there, 25m off the ground, and so much fun. Even in my first audition I wasn’t scared when they lifted us up to test our nerves, then took us up a bit higher into the stadium.” (2000)

“It was a great honour to be part of the ceremony and perform in the stadium, and also to meet some of my idols like John Farnham and Olivia Newton-John.” (2000)

“The biggest buzz is when I fly up. The audience has no idea because it has been such a big secret.” (2000)

“I was so excited to get out there, I mean it had been months and months of auditions and preparations for the whole team, you know David Atkins and Ric Birch and everyone, and I was just praying that it wasn’t too windy, ’cause I wasn’t gonna be able to fly if it was too windy.” (2004)

“I was actually chosen, it’s a bit scary to say it now, but just at the beginning of September. Yeah, a couple of weeks before! So obviously my first audition was in March and then it was an ‘elimination process’ I suppose you’d call it, just of flying and singing and dancing, but we never knew to the full extent of the actual role.” (2004)

“It’d been – for everyone, even backstage and that – we’d all worked together for so long that it was really like another rehearsal for us, you know we just got out there, we were so prepared, and just got out there and strutted our stuff I suppose.” (2004)

“The day went so fast. It just flew by. So I just kind of took each step as it came, and David came and spoke to me before and said good luck and everything, and then it was ‘Go, go, go!’ and I was walking out into the middle of the field.” (2004)

“It was pretty well set in stone. I think all the extras had been working for about four years on the whole thing but I’d only been working for a couple of weeks. So it was kind of me just fitting into place.” (2004)

“I got the call with the Games just weeks away. There was no time to be nervous. I had to learn all the songs, and how to fly. I wasn’t terrified, not even when I was being hoisted into the sky, just excited.” (2006)

“I didn’t have to keep it a secret from my parents but I kind of decided I would just so it would be, you know, an experience for them as much as it was for the rest of the world, and I didn’t tell them. All they knew was that I was flying, because of generic nexium health and safety. They had no idea! They were telling my grandparents to watch and they were like, ‘Are we gonna see her or is she just gonna be running ‘round like all the other kids?’ So I did keep it a secret for everyone but it was great because they got to experience it firsthand like everyone else.” (2006)

“I feel blessed to still have that support, and that people still remember me from the Olympics. I never want to discard that or say I don’t want to be known as that little girl, because that was the beginning for me and a lot of people.” (2007)

“It was fifteen days before the Olympics and my parents had booked a trip for our whole family to actually leave Sydney, and go to Singapore, to get out ’cause we live quite close the the stadium and we thought, ‘It’s gonna be really busy!’ So we were packing up and leaving and my mum kinda said to David Atkins, ‘You either tell us today or we’re going on our holiday,’ cause we can’t get a refund! So he kinda sat us down in a little office after the rehearsal and um, said, ‘And Nikki, you’ve got the role.’ And I kinda just went blank, I was like, ‘Okay.’” (2009)

“I guess that [the opening ceremony] was such a proud moment for our country as a whole and I’m happy… to be put in, you know side-by-side with that is absolutely amazing. It’s something that’s always gonna be with me and I’m happy for it to be mentioned all the time, absolutely!” (2010)

“It was such a whirlwind at that time. To come back and be able to celebrate it with the volunteers, who were the heart and soul of the opening ceremony for me and my involvement in the Olympics, will be fantastic. I’ve had an incredible ten years, and it’s all because of that one night on September the 15th. So, incredible journey, and I’m just really proud to be part of the [10th anniversary] celebration on next Wednesday.” (2010)

“The only time I got nervous was right at the beginning where I had to walk out and I had to hit centre mark right in the middle of the stadium, and there was no markings on the floor so basically it was done by feel and rehearsals of where I’d found centre, ‘cause if I didn’t hit the centre spot I couldn’t have flown, ‘cause the cables couldn’t come down. That was the only thing I was nervous about. Once I hit centre I was like, ‘This is easy! This is great!’ and I didn’t even think about people watching.” (2010)

“I think that was a great thing that David Atkins and Ric Birch did with me, they didn’t really put the pressure on that so many people would be watching. They just said, ‘Go out, make us proud,’ you know, ‘There’s everybody in the stadium.’ They forgot to tell me that it was being filmed for the world.” (2010)

“First of all they took us to a little warehouse and they just took us off the ground, then they brought us out to the stadium and took us a little higher off the ground, and I went down and I said to David Atkins, ‘Is that as high as you’re gonna take me tonight? ‘Cause that’s kinda boring,’ and he went, ‘OK, take her up!’ And he took me right up, and I think, you know, he tells me that that was the moment he knew I’d have no fear about flying.” (2010)