Neil Brooks

Neil Brooks was born in England, but immigrated to Australia with his family when he was 4-years-old. Thought to be the most promising Australian freestyle sprinter at the start of 1980s, his talent was never fully deployed as, known for his rebellious nature, Brooks often found himself in conflict with swimming officials. He débuted at the 1976 Australian championships at 13-years-old and first medaled at those championships in 1978, narrowly missing out on selection to the 1978 Australian Commonwealth Games team. Brooks débuted at international level at a 1979 World Cup meet and in 1980 was selected to the Australian Olympic team by finishing second behind Mark Tonelli in the 100 freestyle at the 1980 Australian Championships.

The peak of his swimming career probably came at the medley relay final at the Moscow Olympics, when Brooks caught and then passed the 200 freestyle gold medalist Soviet Sergey Koplyakov during the anchor leg to seal a narrow victory for Australia, which remains the only time that the United States has not won this event at the Olympics through 2016.

Following the Olympics, Brooks was expelled from the Australian Institute of Sport for disciplinary reasons, so he accepted a swimming scholarship at the University of Arkansas, studying journalism. At the 1982 Commonwealth Games, Brooks won three gold medals – 100 freestyle, 4x100 m freestyle relay and medley relay, which earned him Western Australia’s Sportsman of the Year title. He competed at his second Olympics in 1984, and competing only in relays, won silver in the 4x100 free relay and bronze in medley relay. He graduated from Arkansas in 1985, and then last competed internationally at the 1986 Commonwealth Games, where he won gold in the 4x1 free relay and silver in the 100 free. Brooks was expelled from the Australian national team after being suspended for his drinking binge during the return trip, so he retired from competitive swimming.

After his retirement, Brooks entered the media. He worked with Seven Network, commenting on Australian Football League matches and read the sports segment on the weekday evening news. He was also the commentator at the 1988, 1992 and 1996 Summer Olympics and, aside from covering swimming and water polo, he also commentated on volleyball and in 1998, commented on various Alpine skiing events at the Nagano Winter Olympics.

Brooks also hosted Brooksy’s Footy Show, a Western Australian travel/holiday show called Wild West, and in the lead-up to the Sydney Olympics, co-hosted “The Games” with Tracey Holmes. However, Brooks’ career began to unravel in the late-90s as he became addicted to alcohol, leading to a series of on-screen incidents. He once read the sports news segment while inebriated, and was then involved in a drunken argument with Nine Network’s Australian rules football pundit Sam Newman. In early 1999, Seven suspended him from on-screen duties for six weeks after he made comments that they deemed to be “tasteless and offensive”. In an interview with a magazine that had not been authorized by Seven Network, he was asked what event he was looking forward to most at the 2000 Olympics in Sydney, and replied “The after-Olympics piss-up”. Brooks was eventually sacked, denying him the opportunity to commentate on the swimming events at the 2000 Olympics.

In fall 2000, Brooks was declared bankrupt by the Federal Court in Perth after failing to repay a debt to BankWest. In May 2001, the police raided his Perth home and found a metre-high cannabis plant, which Brooks claimed belonged to a friend. After relocating to South Australia in 2003, he established a lifestyle magazine called Local, run entirely by he and his wife. He later became a partner in Nitro Energy Drink Company, which was involved in motorsport sponsorship. However, the firm suffered from financial trouble and he had a falling out with his business partner, so Brooks was removed from the board and the company was put into administration.

Personal Best: 100 m freestyle – 50.36 (1984).