The nation’s most prestigious sporting organisation has eight new members, with the Sport  Australia Hall of Fame today proudly announcing a stellar group of 2024 Inductees including sailing’s back-to-back gold medallist, Liesl Tesch AM.

Those in this elite and newly expanded group, including sailing star Tesch, are Australia’s most revered and respected sporting champions; individuals whose collective results on the greatest sporting stages and across the spectrum may not always have attracted headlines but share a common dignity, integrity, courage and humility. 

As one of Australia’s greatest Paralympians, Tesch AM excelled in two vastly different sports and inspired a generation of able-bodied athletes and athletes with a disability. Having become an incomplete paraplegic – unable to use her lower legs – in a mountain bike accident as a 19-year-old, Tesch initially found her athletic calling in wheelchair basketball, representing  Australia in that discipline at five Paralympics.

Sailing was her next sporting challenge, and Tesch combined with Daniel Fitzgibbon to win two gold medals in the Two Person Sailing SKUD 18 at the London 2012 Paralympics and Rio 2016 Paralympics, the latter her seventh.

“It’s something that I would never have expected, because this is a space of people who are our national heroes and role models, and I don’t reflect on myself as that at all,” said Tesch.

“I’m just a person going about my life doing the best I can. It’s like I’m going to a place outside of my league. So it’s an amazing honour and something that makes me reflect on my life and my contribution, possibly with tears in my eyes, because it’s not where I see myself. 

“I’m just a person having a  crack at life, and having a really good time along the way. I’m still shaking my head. Like, ‘little old me’,” she said.

The other new Athlete Members are three-time world surfing champion Mick Fanning AO; former Kookaburras’ captain Mark Knowles OAM; lawn bowls trailblazer Karen Murphy AM; Olympic hurdles gold medallist Sally Pearson OAM and motor sport superstar Mark Skaife OAM.

The Inductees will be honoured at the Sport Australia Hall of Fame Gala Dinner, which returns  from a four-year hiatus to the Crown Palladium, Melbourne, on November 18.

The honour roll of Inductees into the Sport Australia Hall of Fame features the nation’s biggest  sporting names and champions, including Sir Donald Bradman AC, Dawn Fraser AC MBE,  Cathy Freeman OAM, Ian Thorpe AM, Wally Lewis AM, Shane Gould OAM MBE, Rod Laver AC MBE and Tim Cahill AO.

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