Sporting Life

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Hackett a TV star? No sweat!

We know about his swimming ability and we have seen him look equally as formidable as the face of Pierre Cardin. Now meet Grant Hackett, outstanding TV special comments man.

The 1500 metres world champion had never done commentary work before but got his first chance in Melbourne on Sunday night when Fox Sports invited him help call his favourite event after he was forced to miss it because of last week’s health scare in Sydney.

Not only did Hackett jump at the chance, but he proved to be so good at the caper that Fox dropped a scheduled commercial break midway through the race so viewers could hear more of what he had to say. Which was no mean effort considering that the absence of Hackett threatened to turn the race into very much a ho-hum affair. But the eloquent and knowledgeable 23-year-old stunned even his co-commentators John Casey and Nicole Livingstone, explaining the race tactics, at which points of the gruelling event the different types of pain kick in and even rattling off most of the swimmers’ personal-best splits as if they were his own.

And we even learned something new about the champ himself - he revealed that during his races, he can even distinguish his sweat from the water. Channel Nine already has Hackett on its payroll as one of its stable of sports stars. Given the events of Sunday night, it would seem the network will have more in store for him when he eventually retires from the sport.

Judges can’t split Hackett, Thorpe

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They have produced many thrilling duels in the pool, but last night the judges could not split Ian Thorpe and Grant Hackett, as both were awarded the 2003 swimmer-of-the-year award in Melbourne.

It is the first time in the 14-year history of the award that two swimmers have shared the honour.

For Thorpe, the joint win means he is swimmer of the year for the fifth successive time, becoming the first person to achieve that feat. Hackett, so often forced to settle for second behind Thorpe, finally got to stand on the “winner’s dais”, albeit alongside his great friend and adversary.

This year Hackett won his third consecutive world 1500-metre freestyle title, at the world championships in Barcelona, as well as winning the 800m freestyle. Thorpe also won his third consecutive world title in Spain in the 400m freestyle, as well as the 200m freestyle. The pair also teamed up for gold in the 4 x 200m freestyle relay.

Thorpe and Hackett each won three gold, one silver and one bronze medal in Barcelona.

“When it came down to the overall performances then the judges could not split Ian and Grant,” Australian Swimming chief executive Glenn Tasker said. “Ian has led the world in the 200m and 400m freestyle since his breakthrough year at the world championships in 1998 and continued that domination this year. Grant has been with him for every lap of that journey and his performances not only in Barcelona but also in the Duel In the Pool in Indianapolis were outstanding.

“It cannot be easy for him coming back down in distance to race Ian and concentrating on his pet event, the 1500m, and maintaining what is an amazing unbeaten record in the 1500m since 1996.

“There is no doubt that for 2003 both Ian and Grant deserve to share swimmer of the year.”

Thorpe also collected three other prizes - as the swimmer of the year in individual medley, middle-distance freestyle and sprint events.

Hackett also won the distance-swimmer-of-the-year award, an award he has won on seven consecutive occasions.

Other winners were: Chantel Wolfenden (swimmer with a disability), Todd Pearson (swimmers’ swimmer), Ian Pope (coach), Matt Welsh (male shortcourse, backstroke and butterfly), Libby Lenton (female shortcourse and discovery of the year). Phil Rogers and Dyana Calub received awards for services to Australian swimming.