For every athlete who opens a “congratulations, you’re on the team” email during a Commonwealth Games selection cycle, there can still be another chapter to come.
Mia Gross’s two most recent vlogs show both sides of that experience — first the excitement of making the Australian team, then the stress of having that selection challenged.
The joy of the news
The first video captures Gross on the phone telling family and friends that she has been selected for both the individual 200m and mixed 4x400m relay.
The reactions are unfiltered: screaming, laughter and disbelief as she works through one call after another.
Gross also reflects on how different this selection feels compared with four years ago. Before her first Commonwealth Games, she underwent surgery after her appendix burst and returned to competition about ten weeks later.
This time, she says, she is “healthy and has never felt so happy”, grateful that her body has allowed her to reach another major championship.
The stress that followed
The second video deals with what happened after the initial celebration.
Gross explains that shortly after learning she had made the team, she was told another athlete had challenged her selection.
She then gives a clear explanation of how discretionary selection works, including automatic qualifying standards, the factors considered by selectors and the appeals process available to athletes who are not nominated.
Gross outlines the two forms an appeal can take and stresses that the process “is legal in nature and shouldn’t be personal”, even though she acknowledges it can sometimes feel that way.
She does not name the athlete who challenged her selection for the mixed 4x400m relay, but the National Sports Tribunal’s published determination confirms it was Alanah Yukich.
Yukich’s appeal against her non-nomination was heard alongside those of Benjamin Buckingham, Dalton Di Medio, Joshua Azzopardi and Timothy Heyes, with all five appeals dismissed on 16 June 2026.
Yukich argued that she should have been selected ahead of Gross for the mixed relay position, as well as being entered into the 400m hurdles. The Tribunal found that Australian Athletics’ Selection Committee had acted reasonably and within its discretion in preferring Gross.
Three other selected athletes — Seth O’Donnell in the 5000m, Peyton Craig in the 800m and Jemma Pollard in the 4x400m relay — were also listed as interested parties in the proceedings.
Gross is not critical of the appeals process itself, but she is open about the emotional toll of waiting for the outcome.
“It’s been a stomach-drop kind of feeling for a week and a half or two weeks, hard to describe any other way.”
Taken together, the two videos show how quickly the excitement of selection can give way to uncertainty. Gross was able to celebrate making the team, but then had to wait to find out whether that decision would stand.
