In an exclusive interview, the five-time gold medallist also opens up about his relationship with Michael Phelps and why he isn’t buying into the phony war of words with the US.
Add articles to your saved list and come back to them any time.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.
Thorpe tells me this from a town just outside of Barcelona where he is preparing for the Paris Games, which start next week. “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.”
“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.
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“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.
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