Lydia Lassila knows what it's like to succeed at a Olympic Winter Games.
Her gold medal in Vancouver is now 16 years ago and was the second such achievement by an Aussie in aerial skiing since Alisa Camplin-Warner in 2002.
Wide World of Sports spoke with Lassila last year in the lead-up to the Milano-Cortina Games and when it was put to her how long it'd been, she had one word: "crazy".
Watch the Winter Olympic Games Milano Cortina 2026 live and free on Channel 9 and 9Now. Plus, every event live & on demand, every medal in 4K, and exclusive international coverage on Stan Sport.
"You just close your eyes for a moment and can take yourself back there and re-live the moment," she said.
"Which is nice that I still have the marbles to go back there and remember every single part of it.
"To reflect is a gift really, to have those memories locked away somewhere and be able to draw on them is really nice."
Lasilla beamed throughout that exchange. The feeling of accomplishment and reaching the Everest of your sport has limited comparison.
She does enough keynote speeches and presentations to ensure the memory isn't hard to forget.
The vision appears during those speeches, followed by her jumping heights us mere mortals can only dream of.
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But that wasn't a dream for Lasilla. It was a reality.
"After winning the medal, it's just a whirlwind. You're in relief, you're in disbelief, you've done something you said you thought or believed you could do and proven it to yourself and to others," she recounted.
"And then you're just so tired as well, right? So there's all the mental load, the fears, the excitement and anticipation of building up to the event like that and it's kind of like this pressure valve's released and it takes a while to settle."
That moment for Lasilla is part of a long Australian legacy in the sport.
The pioneering athlete was Kirstie Marshall who was a consistent Olympics competitor in the 1990s. Jacqui Cooper also completed in five Olympics from the '90s to 2010.
Australia will have five aerial skiers at Milano Cortina in Laura Peel, Danielle Scott, Abbey Willcox, Airleigh Frigo and Reilly Flanagan. Although Peel is now under an injury cloud.
The seeds of this came in 2008 when Cooper was tasked with finding gymnasts who could switch. Scott and Peel were part of that recruitment drive.
Before Cooper was given that task, Lasilla was a quality example of a gymnast who could excel.
"I was a bit of an experiment … and that model still works in aerial skiing and it's something that they still follow but have refined a lot," she said.
"You brought the work ethic and acrobatic awareness and the skills you've learnt in gymnastics and they translated really well into learning how to ski and learning how to flip on skis."
Asked to compare from her time, Lasilla was quick to assure it was nothing like now.
She compared it to the iPhone.
"The newer versions are just more sleek and more polished," she said.
Those athletes now have all the resources in the world, and it's why we can only dream of more medals.
"I think we've really dialled in on the program now," she said.
"We've got some great coaching staff, we've got facilities now in Brisbane that Aussie athletes can train on during the summer months, so I think everything from physical preparation to mental preparation to logistics and being able to train in the best places and the best facilities in the world sets up a great foundation for these athletes to then do the work.
"There's no shortcutting that, but they've got access to all the resources that they need to be great athletes, so they've got everything from nutrition to medical care to psychological care to physical support."
She describes it as "the perfect recipe".
Hopefully those are the ingredients that create gold.
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