Australian Olympic, long-distance swimmer, Grant Hackett is announcing his retirement from swimming at Australia’s Swimmer of the Year awards banquet this evening. The 28-year-old has seven Olympic Medals to his name, including three Golds. Hackett competed in the Sydney, Athens, and Beijing Games. He is best known for winning the 1500m freestyle in 2000 and 2004. He finished second in that event in Beijing.

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Grant Hackett Retiring

Germany’s Britta Steffen topped Dara Torres of the United States by just .01 seconds in the women’s 50m freestyle event, the “splash and dash.” Sixteen-year-old Cate Campbell of Australia finished third for the Bronze Medal.

This is the second Gold Medal of the meet for Steffen, who won the 100m freestyle event on Friday.

Less than 1/2 hour later, the US women (with Dara Torres as anchor) gave it their all, but finished second to the Gold Medal-winning Australian women in the 4×100m medley. The Australians (Emily Seebohm, Leisel Jones, Jessicah Schipper, and Lisbeth Trickett) set a new world record at 3:52.69. The Chinese team finished third for the Bronze Medal.

In the men’s 1500m freestyle event, Tunisa’s Oussama Mellouli won over defending Gold Medalist Grant Hackett of Australia. Canada’s Ryan Cochrane finished third for the Bronze Medal.

Finally, the last event of the 2008 Olympic swimming meet, the men’s 4×100m medley, gave Michael Phelps his historic eighth Gold Medal in one meet and continued the Americans dominance of this event. The United States has won the 4×100 medley all eleven times that the event has been a part of the Games. Team USA (Phelps, Aaron Piersol, Brendan Hansen, and Jason Lezak) set a new world record of 3:29.34 with their win. The Silver Medal went to the Australians and the Bronze Medal was awarded to the Japanese team.

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Scenes from the Water Cube – August 17