Susie O'Neill

Infobox Swimmer
swimmername= Susie O'Neill


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fullname = Susan O'Neill
nicknames = Madame Butterfly
nationality = AUS
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birthdate = birth date and age|df=yes|1973|8|2
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Susan ("Susie") O'Neill (born August 2 1973) is an Australian former competitive swimmer from Brisbane, Queensland, who was famously nicknamed "Madame Butterfly". She won the 200 m butterfly at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics and the 200 m freestyle in Sydney. She trained under Scott Volkers at the Commercial Swimming Club in Brisbane.

After winning a gold and a silver medal in her first attendance at a competition at the 1990 Commonwealth Games, O'Neill never failed to win a medal at any international meet she attended, right up until her final Olympics in front of a home crowd in Australia. At the 2000 Australia Trials before the Sydney Olympics, she broke the 19-year old world record of Mary T. Meagher in the women's 200m butterfly, but was beaten at the Sydney games by American Misty Hyman, a relative unknown.

O'Neill was educated at Lourdes Hill College in Brisbane. She is now married to Cliff Fairley and a mother of two children, Alix and William. She commentated at the 2006 Commonwealth Games in Melbourne for the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. She was the Oceania athletes' representative on the International Olympic Committee to 2005, when she resigned her membership (and was replaced by Barbara Kendall).

On 10 March 2007, O'Neill was honoured by having the temporary swimming pool in the Rod Laver Arena in Melbourne named after her for the duration of the 12th FINA World Championships, the site of the swimming events.

External links

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* [http://www.abc.net.au/queensland/stories/s1424221.htm Olympic Swimmer Susie O'Neill] - ABC Queensland (Australian Broadcasting Corporation website)
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