Exclusive: Luck of the Irish Skips Olympic Rookie Eamon Sullivan. Aussie Men’s 400m Freestyle Relay in Need of Speed in 2005.

Story & Photo by Stephen J. Thomas

PERTH, Australia, January 18. FOUR months ago, the then 18-year-old West Aussie rookie Eamon Sullivan found himself taking his place on the Aussie men’s 400m freestyle relay team in Athens for the Olympic final alongside the three vastly more experienced names of Ian Thorpe, Michael Klim and Todd Pearson.

His teammates had all collected double gold as part of the victorious Aussie sweep of the freestyle relays at the Sydney Olympics. Sullivan, the youngest male on the team, had edged out another of the Sydney gold medallists, Ashley Callus, with a faster time in the prelims to make the final. Not bad for a lad who had had only two World Cup swims and a couple of prelims at the Janet Evans meet in 2004 to count towards his entire international experience.

At the Olympic trials last March, Sullivan surprised himself, his coach Grant Stoelwinder and particularly his parents, John and Pam (who did not make the trip to the Trials because they didn’t think he would be a show), when he finished fourth in the 100m freestyle final behind Thorpe, Callus and club-mate and mentor Pearson, edging out a comebacking Michael Klim. The team finished well out of the medals but for Sullivan it was the biggest moment of his short career.

The ‘Irish’ connection is somewhat tenuous for the easygoing Aussie-born sprinter. “I know the name is very Irish but as far as the family knows, we probably have some relatives back in Ireland but we haven’t got round to looking into it,” he told SwimInfo.

On his return Down Under, Sullivan failed to make the team for the World Short Course Champs in Indianapolis despite clocking a PR 48.78 at Trials – tough selection criteria meant he missed the team – in a time that would have placed seventh in the 100m final. The Aussie sprint relay in Indy had none of the finals team from Athens, with Casey Flouch, Andrew Mewing, Jeff English and Nick Sprenger finishing in fifth place, over five seconds adrift of winners USA. Of course, Sprenger, better known for middle-distance, was part of the 800 free relay team that took silver behind the USA in Athens.

A beach holiday in October at the now tsunami-devastated Thai resort of Phuket with Olympic teammates Adam Lucas and Jim Piper had Sullivan ready to resume his climb up the world sprint rankings. However, the luck of the Irish ended there when a few weeks back into training he suffered a recurrence of a hip injury that required minor surgery just over a year ago. The injury described as a labral tear – more common in the shoulder joint – occurred when the cartilage tore away from the lining of his hip leaving the head of the femur to rub against the torn cartilage causing considerable pain.

At first he avoided kicking at training but the constant use of paddles upset his shoulder, so he spent the holidays out of the water. A leading Melbourne specialist scheduled him for surgery last week and the diagnosis suggested the pain was caused by scar tissue around the original operation, which has been rectified by the further surgery.

“I hope to back in full training in about three weeks,” Sullivan explained. “I’m doing a gym session each day at first, then back in the pool working on technique and gradually building up to a full session. We will just have to see how it goes with World Champs Trials not far off (mid-March),” he explained.

Looking at the bigger picture for the World Champs, it is very likely the Aussies will be sending an inexperienced 400 free team in July. Of the other guys from Athens: Todd Pearson has retired; Michael Klim has not competed since Athens; although he has been in training, the veteran of three Olympics is giving his troublesome shoulder plenty of time to recover before getting back into racing; and of course star player Ian Thorpe has been evasive about his likely competitive plans for 2005 with the Trials just eight weeks away. The Aussies will be looking to Sullivan and the guys from Indy to turn-up the speed in the coming months.

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