Bill Sweetenham: the supercoach standing tall

Gold Coast-based former national swimming coach Bill Sweetenham discusses his experience with a chronic leg wound.

Bill Sweetenham AM (75) has been a leading force in world swimming for more than 50 years.

He’s coached at five Olympic Games, mentored 27 Olympic and World Championship medallists, and developed nine world record holders.

His leadership shaped elite swim programs in Australia, Great Britain, USA, Spain, Canada, Singapore, Hong Kong and Argentina, and helped launch stars like Ian Thorpe and Grant Hackett.

Sweetenham began coaching in his hometown Mount Isa, before moving to Brisbane, where he trained champions like Michelle Ford, Stephen Holland and Tracey Wickham.

In the 1980s, he built a powerhouse at the Australian Institute of Sport, later heading to Old Blighty to boost British Swimming’s global stocks in the early 2000s as their National Performance Director.

His honours include Australian Coach of the Year, an Order of Australia Medal, a Churchill Fellowship, and induction into the International Swimming Hall of Fame.

But behind that storied career lies another story – one that began on a staircase in Perth and nearly ended on the side of a German autobahn.

Two tumbles that turned everything

Bill Sweetenham’s leg injury is the kind of story that sounds too extreme to be true – until you sit with him for a coffee near his home at Paradise Point and hear him tell it.

“My first accident was in 1981, after Tracey Wickham broke the 1500 world record in Perth, and I may be biased, but I do not believe a better world record has ever been set,” he says.

“It was blizzard conditions poolside and at the same time I heard my house in Brisbane had been burgled. I was walking down the steps at Beatty Park wearing Dr. Scholl clogs – don’t ask why – and I tripped, snapping my leg just above the ankle.”

But it was a second leg injury in 1983, that would irreversibly alter the trajectory of his life.

Sweetenham was in Germany for a meet between Sweden and Germany, accompanying an AIS squad.

It was a blistering 38 degrees and riding in the back of a retired police Kombi van on a road outside Karlsruhe, he leaned over to close the sliding door that had come open on a bumpy cobblestone road.

In a freak and fast sequence of mechanical failure and bad timing, the rear seat gave way, and Sweetenham was thrown from the van.

“I hit a signpost and ended up face down in a fertilised field. My leg was impaled in the ground, hanging by the skin. There was a mushroom-sized clump of mud sitting on the exposed bone and my ankle was where my knee should’ve been,” he recalls.

Incredibly a helicopter that just happened to be flying overhead landed at the scene, but as his travelling companions freed his leg from the hole it had made in the ground, the rotor wash blew more dirt and fertiliser into the wound.

The prognosis wasn’t good, he had eight operations over the next 13 weeks in Karlsruhe Hospital, and he was told the leg would almost certainly need to be amputated.

“But I wouldn’t let them take it,” he said. “I’ve had over 20 major surgeries since, and I’ve been managing the wound for 42 years now despite the bone deteriorating and being slowly eaten away as if it has white ants,” he says.

The leg that wouldn’t be lost

Despite decades of pain and medical complexity, Sweetenham never let the injury define him – he’s continued coaching, consulting, and travelling the world.

“I made a decision early on, my leg was going to have to keep up with me, I wasn’t going to let it dictate my life,” he says.

That mindset has taken him far – literally. In recent years, Sweetenham has developed a passion for Africa, travelling regularly with a small crew that includes at various times exercise physiologist David Pyne and his university sport lecturer wife Naroa, and a pharmacologist/doctor couple, Larry and Kim Laursen.

“They are friends who share my passion, look after the wildlife and sometimes look after me,” he says.

Sweetenham has written books about endangered species and formed friendships with African sporting leaders like swim coach Rocco Meiring who famously coached dual Olympic gold medallist and world record holder Tatjana Schoenmaker.

“I just got back from another trip to Africa, and I’ll be off again soon,” he says.

His wife Cheryl, his childhood sweetheart from Mt Isa and partner of more than 50 years, is content to let him roam.

“She came with me a couple of times early on, but she says there are no shops where I go, so she’s happy to stay at home most times,” he laughed.

The team that keeps him kicking

As determined as Sweetenham is, he knows he couldn’t have kept moving without exceptional medical support.

“I’ve had great doctors around the world,” he said. “But none better than Dr Stephen Yelland and nurse practitioner Nicola Morley at Bundall Medical Centre.

“Honestly, without them and the Gold Coast University Hospital’s vascular team I wouldn’t still be upright, I wouldn’t be travelling, I wouldn’t be living the life I’m living.”

For the past eight years, every six weeks or so, Morley has been helping him manage the chronic wound.

“She understands that I need to live as normal a life as possible,” he says. “The infection will always be there; we’re just keeping it in check.

“Nicola and Stephen treat the person ahead of the wound, and that’s a rare skill,” he says.

Father of three forty-something grown up children, Tim, Ben and Karen, Sweetenham has stared into the abyss more than once.

He’s defied amputation, serious infections, and the ever-present risk of systemic complications, but with expert care and unwavering grit, he’s still on his feet, and still making plans.

“Nicola and Stephen have kept me out of hospital for years and their deep knowledge of wound management literally keeps me on my feet,” he says.

No excuses, no regrets and still a leg to stand on

If you ask Sweetenham how he’s accomplished so much while carrying such a burden, he’ll tell you it’s about mindset.

“I’ve learnt that in all adversity, there’s potential for triumph, it just depends how you think.”

That philosophy has powered a career that spans continents and champions, and it’s helped him teach more than 50,000 children to swim.

Even now, the man who built his legacy poolside continues to inspire with his wisdom, resilience, and refusal to be beaten by anything life throws at him.

“I don’t do self-pity; I do what’s in front of me, and then I go again,” he says.

Chronic Wound Consumables Scheme

The Australian Government’s Chronic Wound Consumables Scheme (CWCS) covers the cost of wound care consumables for older Australians with diabetes and chronic wounds.

Recipients include people aged 65 and over- or First Nations people aged 50 and over- who are living with diabetes and a chronic wound.

The scheme fully covers essential items such as dressings, bandages, and adhesives to support healing.