Mr Duncan Free OAM

Duncan Free has all the jokes about rowing being the only sport where you backwards to go forwards. But when you're as good as him, frankly, it doesn't matter.

Free was a champion of Australian rowing for 20 years from 1991, the country's leading sculler for more than a decade, and arguably the most talented and well-rounded oarsman of his generation.

He reached the pinnacle of his sport at the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games when he paired with Drew Ginn to win gold in the coxless pair no less than 17 years after he debuted on the world stage.

This was the highlight of a career in which the Tasmanian-born oarsman competed in four Olympic Games and 10 consecutive world championships after moving to the Gold Coast as a 10-year-old in 1983.

The son of Reg Free, a former Australian rowing representative and Tasmanian Sports Hall of Famer, Duncan won an Olympic bronze medal in the quad sculls at Atlanta in 1996, and world championship bronze medals in double sculls in 1997 and quad sculls in 1999.

After narrowly missing a medal in the quad sculls in Sydney in 2000 and Athens in 2004 he made the big switch to sweep rowing to win consecutive world titles with Ginn in the coxless pair in 2006-07, sharing the coveted International Crew of the Year award with Ginn in 2007 before their unforgettable triumph in Beijing.

He was on track for a fifth Olympic appearance in London in 2012 until he was forced into retirement after being hit by a car while cycling on the Gold Coast in 2011.

A man who combined phenomenal athleticism with enormous power, outstanding technical precision and great tactical nous, the third rowing inductee to the Queensland Sport Hall of Fame and the first since Adair Ferguson and Gary Lynagh in 2009.