Aussie Olympians of the 1980 Moscow Games to receive historic gesture: The vilification, politics and long-awaited recognition

The Australian team that defied calls for a boycott and competed at the politically-charged 1980 Moscow Olympics will finally be welcomed home in a historic gesture. SEE THE FULL LIST OF OLYMPIANS.

The 1980 Olympics: 45 years on. Picture: Supplied

Nearly half a century later than it should have happened, the Australian team that defied calls for a boycott and competed at the politically-charged 1980 Moscow Olympics will finally be welcomed home.

Shortly after lunch on July 30, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese will deliver a statement to the federal parliament, belatedly acknowledging the 121 Australian athletes as well their coaches and team officials, who went to Moscow in defiance of the government’s demands to join the United States-led protest at the Soviet Union’s invasion of Afghanistan.

The iconic image of Michelle Ford celebrating her gold in the women’s 800m freestyle at the 1980 Olympic Games in Russia. Picture: Tony Duffy/Getty Images

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese speaks to the 2024 Olympic athletes on their return home. Picture: Jason McCawley/Getty Images

As part of his speech, the Prime Minister will also welcome the team back to the country, a symbolic but poignant gesture that most of the participants thought would never happen after they got caught up in a political firestorm that altered the course of their lives and still deeply impacts them to this day.

“We were just kids. A lot of us were too young to even vote but we were proud to be representing our country at the Olympics,” swimming legend Michelle Ford said.

“It should have been the most important event of our lives but we were vilified for going.

“On the same day I won my gold medal, I received a death threat saying that if I stepped up on the blocks I was un-Australian.”

Ford was just a teenager at the time. She swam her heart out to upset her East German rivals and win gold in the 800m freestyle but has still never been formally welcomed back to Australia as most Olympians are.

Michelle Ford with her gold medal from 1980, in 2021. Picture: Supplied

She’s not alone. None of the team — 96 men and 25 women — that went to Moscow, have been properly acknowledged, until now.

Max Metzker, one of two Australian flag-bearers at the Opening Ceremony in Moscow, said he was over the moon that the team was finally being recognised, but said what they went through cannot be washed away or repeated.

“It was just horrible the way everything was turned against us,” he said.

“We were called traitors. Some people got death threats. One of the swimmers’ parents were spat on.

“My mum used to race home and get the mail before I got home just so I couldn’t read it. Up until the day she died, she would never tell me what was in those letters because it was so harmful.

“Another swimmer, who was based in the United States, got a visit from the CIA and was told to reconsider going to the Olympics with Australia because they could take his green card away.”

The bitter debate about whether the team should go to Moscow or boycott the Games divided the nation in 1980. Even church leaders were calling on the athletes to stay at home, saying they would be violating human rights by going.

As an ally of the US, the Malcolm Fraser government strongly supported joining the American boycott but the Australian Olympic Committee, known then as the Australian Olympic Federation, had the final say.

Australia's Prime Minister in 1980 was Malcolm Fraser who supported the boycott of the Moscow Games at the time. Picture: Getty

Under pressure to back the government, the 11 voting members were also divided.

AOC honorary life president John Coates said the ballot was locked at 5-5 with only Lewis Luxton to cast his vote.

Like everyone else, Luxton was torn because he was an Olympian himself, a member of the International Olympic Committee but also a Liberal Party secretary.

“Everything thought he’ll go with the government but when they got to him, he said ‘the prime minister rang me this morning. We spoke for an hour. The hide of him. I know his mother, we’re going,” Coates recalled.

For the athletes holding on to hope that they would compete in Moscow, the news that the Australian Olympic Federation was backing them was manna from heaven.

Some had already left the country, told to sneak out before the vote took place. Others were in transit.

The rowing team was on a flight to Europe when the vote was taken.

When they left the airport they were told not to wear their Australian team blazers so they carried them on board, unsure if they would ever wear them.

They only found out they had been cleared to compete when the pilot announced the result of the vote on PA, prompting the players to pull out their jackets and put them on.

“By chance, one of the passengers at the front end of the plane was (former Liberal leader) Andrew Peacock,” Coates said.

“He’d been at one of the meetings with Fraser when they were saying to the AOF, this is going to be the start of the apocalypse with the Russians going to move through the Middle East and start another world war.

“But when the announcement came through, he got some champagne and took it back to the team members to shout them a drink and wish them well.”

But the AOF vote wasn’t the end of the matter because the pressure on the team was intensifying.

A handful of sports – volleyball, equestrian, hockey, sailing and shooting – withdrew, along with some high profile individuals.

Former Olympic Chief John Coates recalls the events from 45 years ago. Picture: Jane Dempster/The Australian.

Andrew Peacock was leader of the federal Liberal Party from 1983-1985 and from 1989-1990. Picture: Supplied

This masthead understands that as part of his welcome home speech the Prime Minister will also acknowledge athletes who were prevented from going because their federations pulled out.

Champion decathlete Peter Hadfield did go.

He was adamant he wanted to compete after he was controversially left off the team for the 1976 Olympic Games in Montreal for budget reasons even though he had met all the qualifying requirements.

A high school teacher, he worked his guts out to make the team only to be approached by someone offering him the equivalent of two-thirds of his annual salary if he agreed to stay behind.

He gave it little consideration, turning down the money, saying he had worked too hard to give up on his dream of representing Australia for a few extra dollars.

Peter Hadfield competing in the Pole Vault at the 1982 Commonwealth Games in Brisbane. Picture: Ron Iredale

“I wasn’t a political animal but I became an advocate for sending the team even though I guess some people probably thought we’re being a little bit selfish by defying the government of the day?” he said.

“But the feeling was that while we were being asked to take the full brunt of the protest about the Soviet Afghan invasion, nothing else was being done.

“We were selling wheat and wool and minerals, particularly rutile, which they make weapons of war from, to the Russians.

“So we felt that there was a lot of hypocrisy and us boycotting wouldn’t achieve anything.”

Not only was Hadfield attacked for his stance, his family also copped it.

“It was just toxic, it was really horrible,” he said. “And you have to remember, a lot of the guys and girls in the team were 14, 15, 16 year-old kids, who were receiving death threats, being portrayed in the media as traitors. And it wasn’t just them.

“I was only recently married at the time and had a young son but my wife was just mercilessly vilified by a whole heap of people because they didn’t have the guts to approach me directly.

“And these were in times prior to social media so any vilification or death threats happening were face-to-face or people ringing on the school telephone, abusing and threatening to kill someone just because they wanted to represent their country.”

When the team got to Moscow, they were told not to carry the Australian flag at the ceremony. Instead, Metzker and Denise Boyd marched holding the Olympic flag, which was a protest against the Soviet Union.

Australians Denise Boyd, (L) Max Metzker lead the team into the Moscow Olympics opening ceremony in 1980. Picture: Supplied

Afghanistan also marched under the Olympic flag but did not join the boycott.

The Australian team performed well, winning two gold, two silver and five bronze medals.

Metzker won bronze in the 1500m freestyle, competing in the same race in which Soviet great Vladimir Salnikov became the first swimmer to break the magical 15-minute barrier.

Ford was the only individual to win gold but said it was a bittersweet moment.

“The hardest thing for me was to tell my parents not to come to Moscow. Like many parents, they had their tickets to go and watch the Olympics but I said to them, ‘don’t come because I’d be too worried about what’s happening to you.

“It was such a scary time because it felt like people were after you and were going to hurt you. People were fanatical about it. Neighbours were fighting over this, it was such a terrible moment in Australian sporting history because it actually tore the country apart.”

The aftermath of Moscow was distressing for Michelle Ford. Picture: Supplied

There was no ticker tape for the team when the Games finished and they returned home. And the government, which normally holds a reception at parliament, didn’t invite the team to any functions.

Too emotionally exhausted to grasp the immediate impact of being snubbed, it wasn’t until years later that many of the athletes began to feel the despair of rejection, as they watched other teams welcomed back with open arms and feted at anniversaries.

It began to eat away at their self esteem and morale so in 2020, some 1980 Moscow team members organised their own reunion where they began to share their sense of injustice.

Then Ford wrote a book with British investigative author Craig Lord, entitled Turning the Tide, on the lasting impact of East Germany’s doping regime on clean athletes in which she called for the government to recognise the 1980 Australian team.

Along with Hadfield and Metzker they began lobbying the Albanese government and found a strong ally in the AOC’s newly appointed chief executive Mark Arbib, a former labor federal sports minister, who helped set up a committee that quietly began to accelerate things in the background, culminating in the July 30 recognition.

Newly appointed AOC CEO Mark Arbib speaks to the media in April. Picture: Matt King/Getty Images for the AOC

“The credit goes to the committee who have worked so hard on behalf of the Moscow Olympians to make this happen. It’s a tribute to their efforts,” Arbib said.

“It’s been fantastic to see the Prime Minister and the Opposition Leader moving together to take this overdue action which will be an opportunity to celebrate some incredible Australians.”

This ceremony in Canberra will take place at the same time the Moscow Games were being held 45 years ago. Metzer said he can’t wait.

“We are flabbergasted at the support we’ve had. It’s absolutely beyond our expectations and is going to be very emotional,” he said.

“I’m very big on mental health and I’ve seen how individuals have been affected. I’m just shocked at how many of the badged Olympians that went still hold it deep in their head about not being welcomed or thanked.”

Hadfield was also elated by the development.

1980 Olympian Peter Hadfield at home, in Gymea Bay. Picture: Justin Lloyd.

“I’m absolutely delighted it’s happening and this parliamentary recognition is just the first step because it’s been a long time,” he said. “We’ve waited 45 years but it’s been worth the wait.”

Many of the athletes who went to the Soviet Union have made plans to travel to Canberra with their families to take part in the celebrations. But not all of them.

The 45 year wait for reconciliation has come too late for some. More than a dozen have already died while others are still so traumatised by the abuse, threats and vilification they were subjected to that they don’t want to be involved for fear it will reopen old wounds.

For a country that prides itself on having sent athletes to every modern Summer Olympics since 1896, it remains a dark episode that is finally seeing some light.

“I’m not sure anyone can really fathom what this means and what it will do to help heal a lot of the scars,” Ford said.

“This is something we need because is so sad that people have been living 45 years with this mental anguish about what happened back then.

“To be welcomed back is going to be emotional. There’s going to be applause. There’s going to be relief. There’s going to be rejoicing.”

Originally published as Aussie Olympians of the 1980 Moscow Games to receive historic gesture: The vilification, politics and long-awaited recognition