Speaker 1: Let's start with a story from the distant past. The
Speaker 1: twenty twenty two Australian Open Melbourne was on the tail
Speaker 1: end of a series of COVID lockdowns and the only
Speaker 1: thing that would lift the city spirits was a week
Speaker 1: of getting sun burnt, booing loudly and drinking prosecco.
Speaker 2: But that tournament had an even better.
Speaker 1: Treat in store for us, one we hadn't seen in
Speaker 1: more than forty years. Hey, I'm Tony Armstrong and you're
Speaker 1: listening to the ballroom where we celebrate the winners, the
Speaker 1: losers and the weird stuff between. Today it's the overachieving
Speaker 1: legends who couldn't choose which sport to be a championaip
Speaker 1: from a plucky four year old picking up a racket
Speaker 1: in Ips, Which Queensland. Ash Barty took something of an
Speaker 1: unorthodox path to tennis glory. While she's one of this
Speaker 1: country's most revered and beloved players now, she also made
Speaker 1: an impressive mark on the gentlewoman's game cricket. When she
Speaker 1: debuted in the first season of the Women's Big Bash League,
Speaker 1: Ash was already.
Speaker 2: A junior Wimbledon champ. In her first cricket.
Speaker 1: Match, she scored sixty three not out from sixty deliveries,
Speaker 1: earning herself a spot on the Brisbane heat side. But
Speaker 1: it wasn't long before the courts beckoned. Ash left cricket
Speaker 1: after only one season. Then she simply became number one
Speaker 1: in the world on the tennis circuit.
Speaker 2: She spent one.
Speaker 1: Hundred and fourteen consecutive weeks there, the fourth longest run
Speaker 1: in WTA history, and of course became the first local
Speaker 1: to win the Australian Open in four decades. But Ash's
Speaker 1: far from the only athlete to kick a different ball
Speaker 1: or use a different bat these days. A combination of
Speaker 1: accessibility and general athletic prowess means more and more pros
Speaker 1: are switching it up. Australia has a great tradition of
Speaker 1: multi sport champs. At the turn of last century, a
Speaker 1: true all rounder was a bloke who played cricket in
Speaker 1: the summer and footy in the winter. There's a huge
Speaker 1: list of these legends. As far back as eighteen eighty two,
Speaker 1: George Coulthard was playing for the Carlton Footy Club and
Speaker 1: playing Australian Test cricket. Later, Alfred Buller Ryan played Sheffield
Speaker 1: Shield for South Australia under Bradman's captaincy and was twice
Speaker 1: best in fires for the South Adelaide Football Club. Keith
Speaker 1: Miller played cricket until he was drafted as a World
Speaker 1: War II fighter pilot.
Speaker 2: He was a member of the Invincibles, the Aussie cricket.
Speaker 1: Side who went undefeated on a tour of England, and
Speaker 1: he played fifty games in the VFL for Saint Kilda.
Speaker 1: Miller was even in the original Cricket Hall of Fame.
Speaker 1: So you know there's acento. But who are the most
Speaker 1: noteworthy multi sport athletes. Well, they're all legends in my eyes,
Speaker 1: but these are some of my picks. This first example
Speaker 1: didn't just play two different sports. He did something even
Speaker 1: more impressive. Is that the word I'm looking for? Impressive?
Speaker 1: Oh right, it's actually traitorous. Brad Thorne is the only
Speaker 1: player ever to suit up for both the Kangaroos in
Speaker 1: rugby league and the All Blacks in rugby union. He
Speaker 1: was born in New Zealand but played rugby league in
Speaker 1: Australia as a young man. He went on to play
Speaker 1: twenty one seasons, winning four titles with the Brisbane Broncos
Speaker 1: and twice emerging victorious in the state of Origin for Queensland,
Speaker 1: among other titles. In two thousand and one, he began
Speaker 1: a switcher roo career that took him to New Zealand
Speaker 1: to play rugby union for the All Blacks, then back
Speaker 1: to league here, then back to union again. He won
Speaker 1: fifty nine international caps for the All Blacks and was
Speaker 1: on the twenty eleven World Cup winning side, four hundred
Speaker 1: and sixty games of rugby and seventeen major trophies in total.
Speaker 1: Like Ash Barty, Dylan Orcott is another tennis champ who's
Speaker 1: made it to the top in a second sport. He
Speaker 1: was a member of the Australian men's national wheelchair basketball team,
Speaker 1: the Rollers. At the age of seventeen, he became their
Speaker 1: youngest gold medal winner at the two thousand and eight
Speaker 1: Beijing Paralympics, and was at the time the youngest athlete
Speaker 1: in the competition's history. He then went on to become
Speaker 1: the only man to smash a Golden Slam in tennis.
Speaker 1: That's when you win every tennis major and the Olympic
Speaker 1: Gold in a single year at a totally different sport
Speaker 1: from the Olympic gold he'd already won leave some glory
Speaker 1: for the rest of US. Mate Elise Perry at the
Speaker 1: top of her game in two sports, simultaneously playing both
Speaker 1: soccer and cricket at the same time on different days.
Speaker 2: With the Southern Stars.
Speaker 1: She won the twenty ten World twenty twenty, then went
Speaker 1: to the FIFA World Cup with the Matildas in twenty eleven,
Speaker 1: before she had even made the move to cricket full
Speaker 1: time in twenty sixteen. She also won the twenty thirteen
Speaker 1: World Cup and several ashes tests. Women's sport does have
Speaker 1: a few players like Perry. Historically, most haven't been paid
Speaker 1: enough to focus on one competition full time. That means
Speaker 1: their offseason became more of a second job situation. See
Speaker 1: also the Legendaria and Phillips, who played nine seasons of
Speaker 1: WNBA for five different teams, won a gold medal at
Speaker 1: the two thousand and six Feeber World Championship and was
Speaker 1: a co vice captain at the twenty sixteen Olympics. That
Speaker 1: all happened before she became a three time Premiership player
Speaker 1: and twice League Best in Feris, playing AFLW for the
Speaker 1: Crows before following in her dad's footsteps and moving to
Speaker 1: Port Adelaide.
Speaker 2: Phew.
Speaker 1: Now, some would argue that hitting or throwing all handballing
Speaker 1: or marking or kicking one kind of ball and then
Speaker 1: a different kind of ball isn't so hard. I mean,
Speaker 1: I can vouch for the fact that it's kind of
Speaker 1: hard to just do one sport in the first place,
Speaker 1: But for two Australian women.
Speaker 2: The shift was a totally different ballgame. I was really
Speaker 2: trying to avoid those puns here on the track.
Speaker 1: Yanna Pittman is almost unrivaled in terms of versatility. She's
Speaker 1: one of only ten athletes to win world championships at
Speaker 1: the youth, junior and senior levels, and the first Australian
Speaker 1: woman to compete in both the Summer and Winter Olympics.
Speaker 1: She's a two time world champion in four hundred meter
Speaker 1: hurdles and won Commonwealth gold in that event in both
Speaker 1: two thousand and two and two thousand and six, as
Speaker 1: well as being part of the winning four by four
Speaker 1: hundred meter relay team twice. Then in twenty fourteen, she
Speaker 1: switched it up entirely and competed in the two person
Speaker 1: bobsleigh event at Sochi, which I guess is sort of
Speaker 1: like hurdling in that you have to clear the mental
Speaker 1: hurdle of competing in an entirely different climate and shooting
Speaker 1: down a terrifying track at speeds of up to one
Speaker 1: hundred and.
Speaker 2: Thirty kilometers per hour.
Speaker 1: Finally, Nova Paris's incredible Switcher Room. A year after she
Speaker 1: won Olympic gold with the hockey ruse in nineteen ninety six,
Speaker 1: she decided to be a champion track and field athlete instead.
Speaker 2: In nineteen ninety.
Speaker 1: Eight, she became a Commonwealth gold medalist in the two
Speaker 1: hundred meters sprint and four why one hundred meter relay
Speaker 1: in Kuala Lumpur and competed at the two thousand Sydney Olympics.
Speaker 1: Then she became an Australian senator, which might be the
Speaker 1: most challenging sport of all.
Speaker 2: Thanks so much for listening to the pool Room.
Speaker 1: I'm Tony Armstrong and this has been an iHeart production.
Speaker 2: I'll speak to you soon.