Australian Olympic Legend Ian Thorpe swam into Depression World

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Ian James Thorpe, born in Sydney, is the greatest ever swimmer from Australia who has 5 Olympic golds and many World Championship gold under his name. Ian was born on 13 October 1982 and he specializes in freestyle. He also competes in other styles like backstroke and medley. He is one of the pioneer in Australian swimming by winning five Olympic gold medals, out of which three gold and two silver were from the 2000 Summer Olympics. Just after that in the 2001 World Aquatics Championships, he was the first ever athlete to win 6 gold in single tournament. In total Thorpe has won 11 gold in World Championship He won the title of World Swimmer of the Year four times. He has most prolific achievement set in the Australian sports and he has been announced as the Young Australian of the Year in the year 2000.

Ian has been the world's youngest athlete when he won the gold in 1998 Perth World Championships. He more or less dominated the world 400 m freestyle championship winning the event at every event like Olympic, World, Commonwealth and Pan Pacific Swimming, etc. He is the only male who have won medals in the all different swimming combinations - 100–200–400.

He has been named "Thorpedo" because he was too fast in swimming. Ian was a large baby at birth - he weighed 4.1 kg and measured 59 cm.

Ian and his Gay announcement

Ian was being rumoured to be dating his housemate Daniel. He denied they were a couple. Before those years and after his surge to excellence, he was linked to many women and men. But he has been constantly denying all the relationships which has been rumoured. Ian Thorpe in one of the interviews when he as 16, told he is not gay. The things subsided when he proved his mettle in the world championships.

Now at the age of 31, Ian mentioned that "I'm not straight and this is only something that very recently I have talked to few people very near to me. This is my deep secret and the only thing which I had lied due to reasons best known to me."

What according to Ian Thorpe is Depression?

In the words of Thorpe "Depression is a very strange and confusing thing. We are all very much susceptible to this hormonal imbalances which causes depression. It can differ on the scale and severity, but the risk is all same everywhere. Please don’t hide it and communicate about it with others. It may be a doctor, family member, friend, or may be combination of all of them. Thorpe himself has faced and struggled with depression for major part of his life. He kept his battle with depression private and very restricted to him only. He wanted to keep things to himself and not share it with anyone.