By John Lohn<\/p>\n
MELBOURNE, Australia, March 29. ONE day after Australian National Team Coach Alan Thompson said Grant Hackett would contest the 1500 freestyle, where he's the four-time defending champion, a final decision has not been made. At a press conference, Hackett said he would wait just before the Saturday prelims of the metric mile before deciding on whether or not to swim.<\/p>\n
"I am not feeling fantastic," Hackett said. "I've been honest with the way I've come in, and I haven't been 100 percent fit. I didn't think it was this bad, but I've had to be honest with myself in the last 24 hours. I'm not worried about my health, but I'm not gonna stand here and make excuses."<\/p>\n
Hackett was the bronze medalist in the 400 free on the first night of action and placed seventh in the 800 freestyle, where he's the world-record holder. Aside from shoulder surgery, Hackett has also dealt with changes in his personal life. He recently switched coaches from Denis Cotterell, his long-time mentor, to Ian Pope to make life easier in terms of workout commutes. Hackett is planning an upcoming wedding to an Australian singing star. Those factors have not allowed the two-time Olympic champ in the 1500 free to train at optimum power.<\/p>\n
If Hackett races, it's unlikely he'll be in the mix for medals due to the likes of American Larsen Jensen, Korea's Tae Hwan Park, Great Britain's David Davies and Aussie Craig Stevens being in the field.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
By John Lohn MELBOURNE, Australia, March 29. ONE day after Australian National Team Coach Alan Thompson said Grant Hackett would contest the 1500 freestyle, where he's the four-time defending champion,<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"dois","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[10,4],"tags":[53777],"class_list":["post-14409","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-world","category-zzzzzzzzz","tag-2007-fina-world-championships"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"yoast_head":"\r\n