A chill wind caused the blue canvas to crack overhead where Isabell Coe and 50 of her colleagues gathered around a small television set on a trestle table in Sydney's Victoria Park to watch Cathy Freeman race last night.
"It doesn't matter if Cathy wins or not," said the Aboriginal leader, settling herself on a soft couch parked on the grass. "She has already put us up there, she has already won gold for us by lighting the torch."
But it did matter. Cathy was carrying the hopes of every Aborigine in Australia on her shoulders. She was running, in her own words, for herself, her people and her country, in that order.
She was running to disprove the stereotype many Australians have of Aborigines, that they aren't up to it. She was running to rubbish the bitter words of her former manager and partner, Nick Bideau, that she would fall short of gold.
"You look at a lot of indigenous sportspeople; they have this ability to self-destruct," Bideau, now the partner of Sonia O'Sullivan and father of their child, Ciara, was quoted as saying this week.
"Come on Cathy! Come on sister girl!" called out voices from the darkness around the 20-inch TV set when the 400 metres final began. As Freeman surged forward the little group began cheering and thrusting fists in the air. There was pandemonium when she won. Several people had tears in their eyes. This was the greatest sporting moment in Australian history and it had been achieved by an Aborigine.
The lights of several TV cameras shone on the couch where Isabell Coe was clasping her hands tightly, unable to stop smiling and laughing. "She ran for her people," said Ms Coe, who has been presiding over an Aboriginal Tent Embassy, set up in the park during the Games to promote Aborigine sovereignty and an end to the "genocidal 212-year war" by white Australians against her people. "This is a big victory for us," she said. "When the spotlight is on her, it is on us, on our country."
A man shouted to the television: "Carry the flag, Cathy!" As if in response, she held up the Aboriginal flag along with the Australian colours. Some years ago Arthur Tunstall, the Australian team manager, ruled in irritation that only the Australian flag could be carried in celebrations but Freeman has ignored him. The day when the white Australian could tell the Aborigine how to behave had passed.
If Cathy Freeman was carrying on her shoulders the weight of a continent's sporting hopes and a people's aspirations, her rival in love, Sonia O'Sullivan, might have felt a similar burden of expectation an hour later with the reception she got from the Irish at Stadium Australia.
She certainly would have been left in no doubt of the hopes invested in her if she could have seen the anticipation on the faces of 4,000 Irish people gathered to watch the women's 5,000 metres final in the Irish Hospitality House at Bondi Junction.
It was standing room only in the big function room of the East League Rugby Club. Many, like Regina Hennessy of Churchtown South, Co Cork, had Tricolour transfers on their cheeks. Some were draped with Irish flags.
A huge cheer arose at the first sight of Sonia O'Sullivan on two 10 by 12 foot screens suspended from the ceiling. A scattering of boos greeted her Romanian rival Gabriela Szabo.
"Son-ya, Son-ya, Son-ya," they chanted as the race began, only pausing in intense frustration when the television cameras cut away to the women's pole-vault final. The roar which greeted the sight of Sonia surging ahead at the last lap shook the building.
But it was Sonia who fell short of gold. Even the collective willpower of the Irish nation and the partisan Irish expatriates and visitors at Bondi Junction couldn't push her past Gabriela Szabo at the finishing line.
At least the miserable Irish record in the 27th Olympiad had been redressed by a silver, and entry into the medal table. There was something to drink to at last.