Most swimmers have a love-hate relationship with their sport. On one hand, they love the glory and mateship that comes with being part of an Australian team. On the other, they hate the years of staring at a black line in training, the missed adolescence, the intense scrutiny and pressure.
Choose your sporting dream carefully.
Ian Thorpe retired twice, first in 2006 at the age of 24, then in 2012 after he failed to make the Australian team for the London Games, yet those divergent emotions about his chosen sport never go away.
At last month’s Olympic trials in Brisbane, he was an expert caller for Channel Nine but could feel familiar tensions on the pool deck.
Ian Thorpe will commentate at the Olympic Games, which starts next week.Credit: Nine
“I love it and I hate it,” Thorpe, 41, says. “Please report this with respect, but the trials are an awful procedure our athletes must go through. You’re either good enough or not good enough on one particular day.
“You need to be your best no matter what, in conditions that aren’t determined by you. That’s what’s required to make the most of all those years of work that you’ve done. That’s what we do at our selection trials.
“Most people would never do it. When you know that, and you’ve lived through it yourself, you’re trying to show that in your commentary.”
Thorpe tells me this from a town just outside of Barcelona where he is preparing for the Paris Games, which start next week.
While the Australian swim team has enough star power in its own right, few can outsparkle the five-time Olympic gold medallist. He’ll be front and centre of the nation’s consciousness as he provides expert analysis for Nine – publisher of this masthead – when the meet starts on Saturday, July 27.
As an athlete, Thorpe prepared for an Olympics in the pool or gym. As a commentator, he pores over news, stats and records from around the world.
“I do a tremendous amount of research, but you don’t hear most of it,” he says. “But that’s what I need to do for me to feel comfortable doing live TV. If I need to fill for a minute, I know I can sit there and do the job that’s required.”
Australian audiences first heard Thorpe’s commentary in 2021 when he called swimming at the Tokyo Games, although he worked for the BBC in London in 2012 and Indian TV in Rio de Janeiro in 2016, reaching more than a billion viewers.
“Is commentary something to which I’ve been a duck water? You’re learning on the job,” he concedes. “I know that I need to appeal to most people, rather than just swimming fans. Some of them will think they know more than I do. For some, whatever I have to say will go over their heads.”
Thorpe treads carefully in our interview – as he does in his commentary – because he understands better than anyone what’s expected of an Australian swimmer at the Olympic Games. We count our success in gold medals and how many we win in comparison to the US.
“There is a level of expectation, being an Australian swimmer, that doesn’t exist anywhere else in the world,” Thorpe says. “Ask Michael Phelps about it: he’ll tell you that the Australian media is the harshest, most brutal in the world. You know why? Because Australian swimmers perform so well. A third to half of the gold medals we win at an Olympic Games comes from swimmers.
“We can get carried away when we have such brilliant athletes. The exposure they have is unlike anywhere else in the world. That’s something an American team and countries in Europe don’t have to contend with.”
Australian teammates (from left) Ashley Callus, Chris Fydler, Michael Klim and Ian Thorpe celebrate after winning gold and setting a new world record in the men’s 4X100m freestyle relay event at the Sydney Olympics in 2000.Credit: Rod Taylor
Thorpe references Phelps at a time when people aren’t entirely certain about their relationship.
In the lead-up to the US trials last month, broadcaster NBC showed Phelps a video clip of Cate Campbell’s comments following last year’s world championships in which she slammed The Star-Spangled Banner and US fans ringing “that infernal cowbell” in celebration.
“If somebody said that to me, I would lose it,” Phelps said. “I would literally make them eat every word they just said about me. Because people have done it. Chad Le Clos? Thorpe? You guys have all talked shit about me and I had the last laugh.”
Thorpe has no clue what I’m talking about when I raise Phelps’ remarks, but quickly understands when provided context.
“I think it’s in reference to 2008,” he says.
Thorpe had questioned if Phelps could win eight gold medals at the Beijing Games, as some had predicted.
US swimmer Michael Phelps (right) celebrates alongside Ian Thorpe during the medal ceremony for the men’s swimming 4x200m freestyle relay event at the 2004 Olympic Games in Athens. Credit: Getty Images
“My concern was he’d go away with seven gold medals, not eight,” he continues. “I looked at the men’s 4x100m free and thought the French would win. I didn’t want seven gold medals for Michael Phelps to be a disappointment. I knew that he would struggle in the 100m fly at that meet. He won both those races and I was rapt that Michael did it. I still think he’s the best Olympian ever and I’m mates with him. He did something that really was out of this world.”
Has he reached out to Phelps to clear the air?
“Michael and I will have lunch in Paris. If someone thinks I was throwing shade at Michael, I don’t think that’s credible … The war of words with the US, that’s not for me. I actually dislike all of that. Their performances in the pool speak volumes. I say that as a proud Australian. Our trials were phenomenal. Equally, so were the Americans’.
“People may have said we’ll win this, do that … I don’t see it that way. Firstly, in comparison to the US trials, we’re on par. Add the rest of the world to that. This Australian team will be tremendously successful. But, if we’re saying it’s against one nation, people will be sorely disappointed.”
And what if a competitor doesn’t live up to the lofty expectations set by the public, their coach, themselves? It’s not commonly known, but Thorpe mentors many swimmers without making a fuss about it. He’ll do the same in Paris.
“I make myself available for the athletes,” he says. “It’s like being an uncle: all the fun and none of the responsibility. I’m open to any of the athletes.
“I have to separate what I do in commentary with a private conversation that I have with any athlete. But I’m absolutely here for every one of them. Sometimes, I can’t hide it. I don’t want to. I am invested in them as much as I possibly can be.”
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