Australia's fastest woman reveals why a single breadcrumb could ruin her dream of excelling at the Olympics
- Aussie sprinter Torrie Lewis has coeliac disease
- The 19-year-old is extra vigilant when it comes to her diet
- She will compete at the Olympic Games this year
Torrie Lewis has explained how one single breadcumb could shatter her Olympics campaign.
Lewis, 19, is Australia's fastest woman and has high hopes of cometing well in Paris when the Games roll around at the end of next month.
But a scare in the lead-up to the World Relay Championships in the Bahamas last month served as a warning that Lewis must be more vigilant than most athletes when it comes to what goes in her body.
Lewis has coeliac disease, which is an auto-immune disorder that is triggered when you eat gluten, which is typically found in grains like wheat, rye and barley.
Inadvertently eating a breadcumb, then, could lead to a severe immune response in her body.
Torrie Lewis has explained how a single breadcrumb could ruin her Olympics dream
Lewis is travelling to Paris next month to compete for Australia
'Leading up to competitions, I won't eat out if I can help it,' Lewis said on the En Route To Paris podcast.
'I always try to do home-cooked meals where I just know where everything is processed and everything like that.
'I actually think I got a bit of cross-contamination in Miami before the Bahamas.
'I brought my own bread and the hotel said they had a toaster in the back that hadn't been used, so they took it to toast that.
'But I got really sick that day and the week leading up to like the World Relays.
'Just a crumb can kind of derail all this training so it is really frustrating and a little bit worrying.
'I just try to stay on top of it as much as possible and eat what I know is safe.'
Lewis will lead the 4x100m relay team and compete in the 200m, which she recently won titles in at Australian and Oceania level.
She says she long held ambitions of being an Olympian thanks to her mother's influence.
She has coeliac disease, which means she cannot eat any gluten
'The reason I always wanted to be an Olympian is my mum just always loved sports,' Lewis said.
'Whenever the Olympics or world championships was on, she was glued to the TV and just loved it.
'I guess I always just kind of wanted to be in (sport) because she loved it.
'But my first sport was gymnastics and I wanted to do gymnastics in the Olympics.
'I had to stop gymnastics because I was diagnosed with coeliac (disease).
'But running is the next best thing because she loves that and kind of made me love it, too.'
