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by Ron Fimrite
She was one of the great Olympic champions, the only swimmer to win the same event—the 100-meter freestyle—in three consecutive Olympics (1956, '60 and '64), but Australia's Dawn Fraser was equally well known for making waves out of the water. She came to competitive swimming relatively late in her youth and won her last Olympic gold at 27, an age considered doddering in a sport in which careers barely survive pubescence. And though she trained diligently enough when the mood seized her, she was no ascetic. Asked what was next on her agenda after she became, on Oct. 27, 1962, the first woman to break the 60-second barrier in the 100 free, Fraser glibly replied, "Oh, go to a party. Have a beer. Probably get tight."
In three straight Olympics, the irrepressible Fraser was unbeatable in the 100 free.
photograph by
In fact, she pretty much drank and ate whatever she wanted, proudly proclaiming herself "the best beer drinker in Australia." Such pronouncements did not endear her to the swimming establishment, but Fraser was always and above all else her own woman. "One of the reasons I've lasted so long as I have," she once explained, "is that I have not let the sport change my life. I let myself go once in a while."
Letting herself go sometimes led to trouble. During the 1960 Rome Games she was chastened for, among other offenses, refusing to wear the official Australian warmup suit when accepting her gold medal, smacking a teammate with a pillow during an argument and rejecting a plea to swim an unscheduled relay lap because she had just finished lunch. At the 1964 Tokyo Games she refused to wear the official team swimsuit because she said it didn't fit, marched in the opening ceremonies after team officials instructed her to rest for her event the next day and, finally, snitched a souvenir flag from a display in front of the Imperial Palace. The theft, little more than a prank, was the final straw for the Australian Swimming Union, which ordered her suspended from all competition for 10 years. The suspension was lifted inside four years, but Fraser, who had married, given birth to a daughter and divorced in the meantime, had retired by then.
She was born in the Sydney suburb of Balmain, the youngest of eight children. No more than a recreational swimmer until her mid-teens, she was discovered at a public pool by swimming coach Harry Gallagher. She quit school at 15 to help support her family and to train with Gallagher. Four years later she won her first gold medal, setting an Olympic record of 1:02.0 at the 1956 Melbourne Games. She lowered that mark to 1:01.2, then a world record, in Rome. Two years later she cracked the 60-second barrier, and then, at the Australian national championships on Feb. 29, 1964, she shattered it, swimming the 100 in a world record 58.9 seconds.
Eight days later her career nearly came to a tragic close. Driving home from a party (at which she said she had not drunk) with her mother, her sister and a friend in her car, she was unable to avoid a truck parked on a highway near the Sydney airport. The collision killed her mother and left Dawn with a chipped vertebra in her neck. Despondent and with her back in a steel brace for two months, she virtually abandoned any thought of ever swimming again. But she recovered physically, and with the help of her family and a psychiatrist friend, she emerged from her depression. Then on Oct. 13, 1964, Fraser pulled off the unprecedented feat of winning her third straight Olympic gold in the 100 free, successfully staving off a finishing rush by a 15-year-old American, Sharon Stouder, to set yet another Games record, of 59.5. Since then the women's 100 free, a race that will be held tonight at the Georgia Tech Aquatic Center, has not been won by an Australian.
Even after she retired from competitive swimming, Fraser did not abandon her sport or the Olympic movement, with which to this day she remains actively involved. She coached young swimmers for years and served on the committee that secured the 2000 Summer Games for Sydney. And for one so impolitic during her athletic career, she surprised friends and fans alike by being elected in 1990 to the parliament of her home state, New South Wales. But then, as she once remarked in her competitive days, "Maybe I can't be told what to do, but I can be asked."
SI Olympic Dailies
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