Ian Thorpe is coming out in a big way. Australia's most decorated Olympic swimmer is set to come out as gay during an Australian television interview on Sunday, July 13, the Sunday Telegraph reports.
Thorpe, 31, sat down with British TV personality Sir Michael Parkinson recently for a tell-all interview. In a 25-second teaser video, Parkinson is seen asking Thorpe: "You've always said that you're not gay—is all that true?"
Speculation swirled back in 2007 that Thorpe was in a long-term relationship with fellow Olympic swimmer Amanda Beard. Her management, however, denied the claim two years later. "Take out the word relationship and put in the word friendship and that's exactly what it was," Beard reportedly told her agent via news.com.au.
Thorpe has won five gold medals and 11 world championship victories. In April, he made headlines again when he was hospitalized for a serious infection following a second shoulder operation. In an update, his agent James Erskine told Us Weekly "he is not in intensive care, and his spirits are good" at the time.
