NSW Champions of Sport – Matthew Levy OAM

Join us as we celebrate the past winners of the NSW Sports Awards spanning over 20 years of sporting excellence and achievement – as we countdown to the inaugural NSW Champions of Sport, where, for the first time, the induction of new entrants into the NSW Hall of Champions will be combined with the NSW Sports Awards in one gala ceremony. 

In the lead up to the event, we will look back to our past crowned NSW Athlete of the Year and NSW Athlete of the Year with a Disability winners as they share their great joys and triumphs as well as life post their ‘dream year’ with successes both on and off the field.

Matthew Levy OAM
Sport: Swimming
Events: Freestyle, butterfly, medley
NSW Athlete of the Year with a Disability: 2014

Matthew Levy started competitive swimming in 2000 and first represented Australia in 2003, where he broke the 200m Freestyle Short Course world record. At just 17 years of age he made his Paralympic debut in Athens in 2004, coming fifth in the 50m and 100m Freestyle finals.

The tides turned in 2008 in Beijing – where Matthew won his first gold in a Paralympic campaign in the 4x100m Freestyle Relay. Just two years later he won a total of five medals including another gold in the 4x100m Freestyle Relay at the 2010 IPC Swimming World Championships.  

Matthew was then selected for the 2012 Paralympics in London where he again won gold in the 4x100m Freestyle Relay, plus one silver and three bronze medals at the Games – which Matt himself labels the best performance of his career.

In 2013 he represented Australia at the 2013 IPC Swimming World Championships in Montreal where he won two gold medals in the 200m Individual Medley S7 Class and the 4x100m Freestyle Relay.

Matthew, who has worked at Westpac for the last seven and a half years when he is not swimming, was named the Sport NSW Athlete of the Year with a Disability in 2014. The award came on the back of his outstanding achievements at the Brazil Championships and the Para Pan Pacific Swimming Championships in California. In Brazil he won four gold medals for the 50m and 100m Freestyle, 50m Butterfly and 200m Individual Medley.  At the Para Pan Pacific event he won gold in six different events which included Freestyle, Butterfly, Individual Medley and Relay events – a truly remarkable achievement.

In 2015 Matthew attended the IPC Swimming World Championships in Glasgow and secured two silver and two bronze medals, bringing his personal medal tally at World Championships to 12.

In an incredible achievement Matthew qualified for his fourth Paralympics in Rio De Janeiro in 2016 and took home bronze in the 200m Medley SM7. And the good news is, he is not finished yet. Matthew is currently preparing for next year’s home Commonwealth Games and is looking to push on to a fifth Paralympics in Tokyo in 2020.

The cream of NSW Sports stars from both past and present will be celebrated at the NSW Champions of Sport Ceremony to be held at Rosehill Gardens on Monday 27 November 2017.

For more information on the NSW Champions of Sport Ceremony and to secure your seat visit: www.sportnsw.com.au/2017ChampionsofSport