It’s a good question. Thorpe – dressed in a snappy white shirt, jeans, and black R.M Williams boots – is posing at Sydney’s Centennial Stables. Nudging him, and getting increasingly frisky as the shoot wears on, is a handsome bay gelding called Atticus.

On October 13, the former swimmer, an ambassador at The Star, will be attending The Everest – the world’s richest race on turf that sees 12 horses compete for a whopping $13 million in prize money. This year The Star has their own horse, a mare called Shoals, entered. The date is also Thorpe’s 36th birthday: nearing 40, he says, “all of a sudden you start to feel like you need to be grown up.”

So what does growing up mean when you’re one of the world’s most celebrated athletes, who found global success, and a meteoric rise to fame, at such a young age?

Born and bred in Sydney, Thorpedo, as he is nicknamed for his sheer speed (not to mention size; he’s big), was raised in the suburb of Milperra. Part of feeling “adult” for him is settling back down in his own city. In February, following a stint living in Switzerland, Thorpe purchased a two million-dollar plus house in Woollahra, where he now lives with 29-year-old partner, model Ryan Channing. “It was time for me to move home,” he shrugs. “My sister has a young family and I wanted to be around for them growing up.”

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Thorpe was drawn to the “village” feel of Woollahra, its proximity to the city and the tree-lined streets. The history was also a plus: after months looking, he settled on a contemporary town house attached to a 1860s colonial mansion. He already feels like a local. “Flat White is best for coffee,” he enthuses. “I like Bistro Moncur and Chiswick. Everyone knows the Victor Churchill is the best butcher – ask for the wagu bresaola. It’s amazing. Melt in your mouth incredible.”

“Being able to walk around... to walk to the shops. You get more value out of your life,” he adds. Often, too, he gets recognised. Most people ask for selfies.

Others stop to commend him on his work for marriage equality (he starred in an television campaign last year urging people to vote “yes” in the plebiscite). “I had so many people come up to me during that time... from every single different group you can imagine,” he says. One man, in his seventies, approached Thorpe to tell him: “Don’t think all of us oldies are voting no. I’m definitely voting yes and so are all of my church.”

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For Thorpe, a thinking man’s athlete, who likes to mull over issues, the gesture was important. “I try and live an authentic life,” he insists. “But that’s not because of what I’ve achieved – I think it’s more to do with the kind of person that I am.”

In person Thorpe is friendly, warm, and cautious. For years the media emphasised, wrongly, his heterosexuality. There was the 2001 cover for Harper’s Bazaar in which the young swimmer – looking shy and grinning sheepishly – posed in an Emporio Armani suit with models in skimpy Armani one-pieces draped over him. There was the Royal wedding, a decade later, when gossip columnists questioned whether Thorpe, still kitted out in Armani, would catch the eye of Pippa Middleton.

Now firmly “out” he courts a different kind of media attention. Thorpe is a regular gay rights campaigner. Add to that the corporate speaking gigs. And the recent launch, with cricket star Shane Watson and psychologist Jacques Dallaire, of his “performance excellence” company Beon, aimed at coaching the top one percent of business leaders. Then there’s the sponsorship deals.

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“The Star is the perfect place to go after you’ve been to the races,” Thorpe gushes with a slick enthusiasm, noting the “Lady Luck” signature cocktail on offer. With the practice and discipline of an elite sporsman he lists The Star’s giveaways: (buy the cocktail and you too can enter the prize draw!)

And yet. And yet. There’s a feeling that he is still finding his feet after years treading water. Thorpe has being open about his battles with depression and the struggles he had coming out as gay to the public in 2014. “If people say role model or icon, yeah there is an expectation that comes around that,” he tells me.

Then there are the struggles with identity and even a form of grief that comes with giving up his sporting reign.

Following a shoulder replacement, Thorpe can catch a wave but he can no longer do laps. There is a silver lining, however: “The good thing is it gives you a very clear close in a sporting career.”

Ponder Atticus. Bred to race, he fetched $250,000 as a yearling and found a home with Gai Waterhouse. As it turned out, though, the horse’s destiny lay away from the spotlight, as a training partner to the champions. Atticus, it is said, made a fortune for Waterhouse spurring her stars to glory. With his galloping days at an end he now has a quiet life with a horse-loving owner at Centennial Park stables.

Thorpe — who was always destined for fame from his time as a freakishly brilliant 14-year-old blitzing the world championships in Perth — still has his hand in the game.

In June he made headlines for calling for an end to medal targets, leading to a scathing retorts in the media for going soft.

Thorpe insists that sport is critical to the Australian psyche - and should be celebrated.

“Sport was something that helped shaped our identity and the other thing that did was war: World War I, World War II. The great thing about sport [unlike war] is that we can have a conversation about it... to be on the world stage when we were doubting ourselves, it’s a very important thing for an Australian identity.”

Yet, he has reservations. “Looking at London and looking at Rio, I think we’re underselling the value of the Olympic team by talking about medals and medals alone. I think we can be proud of these athletes because they are us as well.

“I also think we need a conversation around what is our expectation around an Olympic games – are we top ten, are we top five? Because the funding looks different for those two. At the moment we’re top ten and that looks pretty good.”

So does this star athlete, the golden swimming boy, have regrets?

He pauses. “When I look back at my career – I wish I had allowed myself to celebrate a little bit more,” he says, looking up as a horse trots past in the dappl`ed sunshine. “To take the time and reflect: ‘Wow that’s actually pretty amazing!’ Rather than thinking, ‘I’m going on a break for two weeks then I’m back to training and preparing for the next competition.’”

He smiles: “I actually tell people now to take time to have that moment. For everyone. Taking just a couple of minutes out of your schedule to actually acknowledge your successes and wins.”

For all his public campaigns – all the TV appearances and Star ambassadorships and posing with gleaming horses – Thorpe’s life will always to some degree revolve around swimming. He is often asked what he writes as his profession on visa forms.

“I write athlete. I still identify as that,” he says, smiling. “If you’re an Olympian, you’re always an Olympian.”