October 27, 2008

MULTIPLE Olympic champion Grant Hackett has pulled down the curtain on one of Australia's greatest swimming careers.

The national team captain will announce his retirement at Swimming Australia's swimmer of the year awards in Sydney tonight.

Hackett, 28, has spent the last two months weighing up his future after just missing out on a history-making third straight Olympic 1500m freestyle title in Beijing.

The Victorian-based athlete dominated the 1500m for more than a decade, winning four world titles and two Olympic titles before being pipped by Tunisian Oussama Mellouli at the Water Cube in August.

He has recently taken up a job reading the weekend sports news on the Nine Network in Melbourne and pointed to a career in finance with long-time sponsor Westpac.

“I want to set the record straight and address my fellow peers and swimmers and everyone else who has contributed to my career and tell them what sort of path I will be following from now,” Hackett told the Nine Network.

Hackett said competing at the 2000 Sydney Olympics, where he pipped nemesis Kieren Perkins in the 1500m, and being part of the successful Australian team had been his career highlights.

When asked what he would miss most in retirement, Hackett replied: “The love of the competition and competing and being part of such a wonderful team environment.”

The grind of distance swimming has caught up with his aching body, he has had constant problems with his shoulders particularly since undergoing major surgery at the end of 2005.

The Gold Coast-raised swimmer has been an enormously popular figure in Australia, not just because of his sustained success in the sport but his humility out of the water.

He first rose to fame in Australia at the 1998 world championships in Perth as a 17-year-old where he was touched out in the 400m final by a 15-year-old Ian Thorpe.

They developed an intriguing rivalry and strong friendship that led Australia's swim team to the nation's best run of success since the golden days of the late 1950s and early 1960s.

Thorpe almost always had Hackett's measure over 200m and 400m but the lanky Queenslander's success in the 1500m and ability to keep on challenging the Thorpedo won him many fans.

He will be remembered fondly for managing to overcome health problems to win gold in Sydney in 2000 and Athens four years later in the 30-lap event.

Hackett finished with three Olympic gold medals, one as a 4x200m heat swimmer in 2000, but ended his career just below the likes of Thorpe and Dawn Fraser in terms of Australia's greatest swimmers.

But he is in some distinguished company alongside the likes of his former nemesis Perkins, Shane Gould and Murray Rose.

Hackett continued Australia's proud legacy in the 1500m and his world record of 14 minutes 34.56 seconds set in 2001 in Japan was mind blowing at the time.

It is only the advent of the new-age swim suits that has made it appear attainable over the coming years.