Stephanie Rice: Olympic swimmer opens up on dark days, professional challenges and finding faith

Australian Olympic swimmer Stephanie Rice quickly become the darling of Australia and the swimming world after her incredible performance at the Beijing Olympics in 2028.

However, despite her kick start, life quickly dived with the swimmer revealing at one point she “couldn’t see any way forward”.

Rice, who now lives in Dubai, has recently celebrated multiple incredible life milestones, finishing her MBA and marrying her now-husband Mark Lassey.

Reflecting on the wonderful moments, Rice told Q Weekend: “If you would’ve told me a year ago that I would be... married, living in Dubai with great work opportunities, I would most likely have questioned it … that is so far away from where I was at that time.

“Me, a year ago, wasn’t looking forward to anything because I was scared it would be yet another disappointment.”

Since Rice’s meteoric rise, she has spent time in Australia, the United States and India seeking to find her place in life personally and professionally.

However, COVID, and the years that followed, brought the Olympian to her darkest days.

After 2016, when Rice worked on the Rio Olympics, she spent time growing her personal brand in India. She presented on TV coverage of the Pro Kabaddi League and had plans to help Indians learn to swim.

However, the 2020 locking down of the world due to a global pandemic, put those dreams on the shelf, no longer appearing viable.

She returned to Australia to try and reboot her career on Aussie soil, but faced continuous setbacks from contracts not eventuating.

“I feel like you get one disappointment and another one and another one and after a while you stop thinking things are going to work out,” she told Q Weekend.

“I couldn’t see a way forward.”

The Olympian chose to pursue her MBA, something Rice again faced a setback with after suffering a personal injury.

By the end of 2023, Rice found herself turning to her sister in an attempt to bring joy back to her life, with her sibling suggesting she attend a church service with her.

“I was like, I don’t know if faith is the answer, I had no idea, but I knew it wasn’t what I was doing so I was open to trying something else,” she says.

“I was really ignorant of it, like I was not an avid supporter,” she says.

Despite saying she found the Catholic church “boring” as a child, then down-and-out swimmer found a new sense of belonging in religion, quickly throwing herself in “100 per cent”.

It’s a decision she says “saved” he life. After finding her new faith, Rice found her new husband and work opportunities to go with it.

Although Rice’s sister Courtney introduced her to a new church, Citipointe, she says some of her family don’t “understand”. “A lot of people thought I’d lost my mind or fallen under some cult or something and that’s fine,” she smiles.

For the sceptic or those who may think Rice has entered “a cult”, she has one question: “Aren’t you happy for me that I’m in a good place?”

Rice, whose husband was a pastor at Kingdomcity in Perth, will soon live together for the first time when Mr Lassey moves to Dubai.

Embarking on their new life together, Rice brings her new MBA from University of Queensland which she plans to use as she enters the eSports world further, and Mr Lassey’s three children. However, with Rice’s hope to expand the family, the splashing of baby swimmers feet may not be too far away.

“We would love to (have a family) if that’s something we’re able to do,” she said.

“Mark has three kids so if he didn’t want to have any more kids that would’ve been a really hard thing for me to weigh up because I’ve always wanted to be a mum.”