From poor mining town to Hall of Fame: former Hong Kong swimming coach Bill Sweetenham’s pure masterstroke to be inducted in Fort Lauderdale
Australian ‘national treasure’, who helped produce 27 medallists at the Olympic Games and World Championships, remembers his time in Hong Kong in the early 1990s
Bill Sweetenham has reached the pinnacle of his profession as one of the world’s top swimming coaches whose expertise has helped hopefuls become Olympic medallists in an incredible career spanning over five decades.
Now it’s payback time – a pure masterstroke – for the Australian, who will be inducted in the International Swimming Hall of Fame this weekend in a glittering ceremony in Fort Lauderdale, Florida on Saturday night.
“Yes, Saturday night will represent a very special night and time in my life as was my inclusion two years back when I became the first non-American to be inducted into the International Swim Coaches Hall of Fame,” Sweetenham told South China Morning Post.
“I really am humbled with my inclusion into the International Swimming Hall of Fame [ISHOF] and the International Swim Coaches Hall of Fame [ISCHOF] ... My wife [Cheryl] and family have unselfishly supported me during my journey of coaching many great young people in so many different countries over a 50-year-plus period. I have enjoyed this opportunity and continue to do so today.”
Sweetenham has certainly come a long way since he first took up a coaching job while growing up in poverty in a mining town called Mount Isa, Queensland to rise to become a dedicated swimming guru that took him to 11 Olympic Games – five of them as head coach – producing 27 medallists at the Olympics and World Championships. Among the most famous athletes he groomed were Olympic champions Ian Thorpe and Grant Hackett.