Airdate: Geoff Huegill: Be Your Best- Hunt For Gold

Champion swimmer Geoff Huegill was in the news this week after he was one of the first on the scene of a Rottnest Island diving death.

Huegill helped guide rescuers to a vessel needing assistance after a 55 year old diver suffered an apparent heart attack. The Gold Medalist was enjoying holidays with his wife at the time.

A medivac helicopter, ambulance and police officers then rushed to the scene.

Next month the Bio channel will screen a one hour documentary, Geoff Huegill: Be Your Best- Hunt For Gold,  profiling the Olympic swimmer and his amazing comeback in the sport.

An up close and personal self portrait of a man against all the odds and finally back on the starting blocks after retreating into a self imposed exile for six years, Geoff’s life is an incredible story of courage, determination and everything that stands for being an Australian.

The Geoff “Skippy” Huegill story is a rare and remarkable journey from Australian hero to zero after self-destructing and hitting rock bottom. An inspiring story of finding that inner strength, to return to the peak of his powers in the competitive, elite level of international swimming and in the process regaining his hero status and finding his way back into the hearts of Australians.

Geoff Huegill: Be Your Best- Hunt For Gold heads back to the pool in Mackay, Queensland, where it all started for Geoff as a four year old through to his career as an Olympic Games medalist, world champion and world record holder and to the 2004 Athens Olympics when “things started to fall apart” and the moment when Geoff decided to take time off. It was in the following years that Geoff received attention through his much publicised weight gain, reaching 135kgs at his heaviest three years ago.

“I started to lose the value within myself, what I stood for, what I believed in, but most importantly what really defined me as a person. When the lights were going out so were my values.” Geoff said.

Eight years after he won his last Commonwealth title, Skippy knew he had a second chance to do it all for himself and his country at the Delhi 2010 Commonwealth Games, an extraordinary campaign bringing two gold and a silver, inspiring him to film this documentary hoping to inspire others.

“It wasn’t until I lost everything in my life that I started to realise what is most important and once I realised I had a second chance opportunity to get back, I never let fear step in my way again,” Geoff said.

As we discover what a second chance means to Geoff in and out of the pool, more hurdles and challenges face Geoff as he stares down the barrel of success or failure every butterfly stroke of the way back to hero. Geoff Huegill: Be Your Best- Hunt For Gold reveals a life behind the blocks never seen before: from Geoff’s coach, unique NSWIS (NSW Institute of Sport) and AIS (Australian Institute of Sport) staff and their technology as they track his progression in his relentless hunt for gold and more gold.

With his wife by his side and first child on the way, victory and the hunt for gold at the 2012 London Olympic Games will be so much sweeter.

“In the year 2000 I had an opportunity to stand up against the world and take them on fit and ready and that Olympic dream is still alive. In 2012 at the age of 33, I know the odds are stacked up against me, but when I step up behind the blocks in London, I am going to be hungrier, leaner and fitter. I am also going to be stepping up and fighting for Australia and fighting for all of those people that have ever wanted that second chance opportunity in life,” Geoff says.

Wednesday, February 15 at 7.30pm AEDT on Bio