Cate Campbell latest Australian star to pass on world championships

Cate Campbell, the 100m freestyle world-record holder, will not race at the world championships in July, according to the Australian.

Campbell would join fellow veterans James Magnussen and the Belinda Hocking in bowing out from the world meet in Budapest. Magnussen, a two-time world 100m free champ, is taking a one-year break. Hocking, who swam backstroke at three Olympics, retired.

Madeline Groves, the Rio Olympic 200m butterfly silver medalist, is also not going to compete at worlds, according to the report.

Campbell, 24, has been a mainstay since earning two 2008 Olympic bronze medals at age 16. She broke the 100m free world record two months before the Rio Olympics, entering the Games with a shot at three gold medals.

She came home with one gold in the 4x100m free relay and missed the podium in both the 50m and 100m frees, later revealing that she swam with a hernia.

Campbell will race throughout this year, just not at worlds, because she needs a bit of a break to continue on to a possible fourth Olympics in 2020, according to the newspaper.

“I’m just making sure I get my body right and my mind right because I do want to continue through to 2018, and at the moment, 2020,’’ she said, according to the Australian. “I’ve battled injuries pretty much my whole career, and my injuries aren’t just an issue in the swimming pool. I wake up a couple of times every night because I’m sore from my neck and it carries over into day to day life.”

With Campbell out, the top 100m free sprinters looking ahead to worlds are co-Olympic champions Simone Manuel of the U.S. and Penny Oleksiak of Canada, plus Campbell’s sister, the 2015 World champion Bronte Campbell, and Sweden’s Sarah Sjostrom, the only woman to earn 100m free medals at both the 2015 Worlds (silver) and 2016 Olympics (bronze).

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