The whirlwind ride that has been the last few months will continue for Martha Harvey on the Gold Coast this weekend.
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One of the most promising young prospects in the game, the Narrabri young gun has been named in the Rising Stars team for the opening round of the newly-launched Next Gen Sevens Series.
Announced earlier this month, the series will be played over five weeks and feature the best emerging 7s talent in the country.
Harvey won't be the only northern player lacing up the boots on Sunday with Tamworth's Claudia Nielsen in the NSW side.
Harvey is also part of the NSW program. She has been training with them since the new year, juggling her commitments with training with the Waratahs Super W side.
"It's been intense but I've loved it," she said.
The 18-year-old has been living in Sydney virtually since she finished her HSC - she headed down the Monday after her final exam - after being invited to be part of the Waratahs pre-season program.
Not expecting too much to come from it, she was looking at it more as an opportunity to get her name out there for next season, much to her surprise and delight, she now finds herself on the cusp of a potential Super W debut after making the final training squad.
Initially just training with the Waratahs before Christmas, it has become even more full-on since starting up with the 7s program.
"The 7s train Monday, Wednesday and Friday, and then the Tahs train Monday, Wednesday and Thursday, so it does clash a bit but the schedule at the moment that they've worked out is that I train Monday with 7s, and then Wednesday and Thursday with the Tahs and then Friday with the 7s," she said.
It does too mean some late nights and early mornings - with a lot of the players having work commitments training is usually outside of work hours - but Harvey is relishing just being part of that environment.
"It's been so fun, the whole experience of it all," she said.
"The girls in both squads they're just so fun and just learning a lot from them all.
"And at Tah's it's so cool because I'm training with all these Wallaroos girls who I've just watched play at the World Cup and interacting with them."
In the squad as a half-back, she couldn't ask for better mentors, with Iliseva Batibasaga and Layne Morgan the nines at the World Cup.
"It's pretty cool learning from them," she said.
Looking ahead to Sunday, the Rising Stars face NSW first-up at 10.20am. They then tackle Queensland with each of the three teams playing each other twice across the day.
It will then be onto Narrabri with the second round taking place during the Festival of Rugby. The Waratahs are also playing a trial against Queensland.
Harvey is unsure at this stage who she will be playing with but is looking forward to it, and admits it is surreal to think that at the first festival two years ago she was running around for Narrabri in the women's exhibition games.
"I've had a few pinch me moments, especially with that," she said.
"I was thinking about it the other day, it's just so weird but so cool."
