Sydney, July 17: Olympic 400 metres champion Cathy Freeman has retired from athletics. The Australian had indicated that she would compete in the 4x400m relay at the World Championships in Paris and also hoped to defend her 400m title in Athens next year.

But the 30-year-old said her heart was no longer in the sport. "I still retain my passion to keep fit, train and run but just my will to be the best athlete I can be is no longer in me," she told reporters. "Retirement is it, this is it." Freeman revealed that she had agonised over the decision to call time on her career. "It's up there with one of the toughest decisions I've had to make. It's the only passion in my life," she said. "To reach a point in my life where it no longer brings me that kind of fulfilment and joy is hard to accept.

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"Reality is setting in. It's time for me to accept the fact that I no longer want to try and be the best athlete I can be as much as what I used to. "Sydney was such an amazing mountain and to reach the pinnacle of that mountain and have those moments was so amazing.

"I don't think I'll ever get to experience that again, to achieve a childhood dream that I've wanted since I was 10 in the form of an Olympic gold medal, I'm happy with that."



Australia's head athletics coach Keith Connor said he was disappointed Freeman would not be competing in Paris. "It's very sad news for the team and for us in athletics, very sad news that she's retiring. But it also puts an end to speculation as to what she was going to do."



Freeman, an Aborigine, courted controversy early in her career when she won gold at the Commonwealth Games in Victoria and draped herself in the aboriginal flag. She was rebuked by officials then, but following her famous victory in Sydney she was feted as an Australian heroine.


Freeman took a year off in 2001 after her Olympic success but suffered a thigh injury on her return. After her husband Sandy Bodecker was diagnosed with cancer, she pulled out of the individual 400m at the Commonwealth Games in Manchester in 2002, but won gold in the 4x400m relay.



This year she has been in mixed form with a defeat to 400m hurdler Jana Pittman and a poor showing in an international meeting in Oregon but she did win her ninth Australian 400m title.



However, she pulled out of the IAAF Villeneuve d'Ascq meeting last month due to a lack of preparation and the decision fuelled speculation about her future.


Bureau Report