Olivia Allison and her duet partner Jenna Randall qualified for the Olympics last month. Here is her diary of how they did it.

Olivia's Beijing photos on Flickr

On the 30 March we flew to Macau for a 12-day training camp, with time to acclimatise before our Olympic qualifying event in Beijing.

In the first week of the camp we continued our physical training programme, doing whole swims and laps with weights and then began to focus more on the overall performance and quality of our routine.

The weather was quite humid and damp some days but on our day off it was very sunny!

We did competition simulations to clarify our plan, so we knew exactly what we needed to do especially if something unexpected were to happen. We did one of these with the Macau Synchro team who were also going to the qualifier.

While we were in Beijing we gave in our phones to our coaches to practise for the Olympics as we want to avoid having any distractions so we can focus fully on what we need to do.

Seeing the Water Cube and getting to swim in it was a fantastic experience and perfect preparation for the Olympics. The building is pretty impressive and very original and when everything is put into place it will hopefully be unforgettable.

The audience is on both sides so it’s like being on a stage when you walk out. I was excited to swim and do a good performance, though I felt a little more pressure than usual because this meant that we could potentially compete at the most prestigious sporting event in the world.

It’s the ultimate place to represent your country and compete against the top countries and athletes in the sport.

I avoid thinking too much about the outcome of the performance because that’s when things stop going to plan.

It’s important to think about the process, we have our focuses and corrections from training that we need to achieve in the routine, and the nervous and excited energy just has to be channelled into giving the routine that extra sparkle for the judges.

We wanted to come top 16 at the qualifying event and we came 15th so exceeded our goal and technically qualified in the first round but unfortunately tied with Mexico and so had to swim again.

We decided that it would be just another great chance to swim in the Olympic pool in front of the judges and prove that we were meant to be in the first group.

We had another fantastic swim, coming first out of the second group and beating two of the marks set by countries that qualified in the first round. We had positive feedback and everyone was impressed with how much we’ve managed to improved in the last few months.