Olympic summer athletes who retired in 2023
Some are Olympic champions, others participated in the Games, but all have left their mark on their discipline in one way or another. Here is a non-exhaustive list of athletes who retired in 2023.
Carmelo Anthony, Megan Rapinoe, Peter Sagan, Tessa Worley... some, or all, of these names probably mean something to you, since they are a part of the big Olympic athletes family.
They now have something else in common: these champions have decided to bow out of their sports in 2023.
Here's a list of some athletes who have left their mark on their sport and who we won't see again in international competition.
Olympic champions stepping out of the arena in 2023
Not just an Olympic champion, Megan Rapinoe represented an entire country, an entire community, as she fought for a strong and important message – equal rights for everyone – throughout her playing career.
No longer to be seen on a football field, the American's trailblazing role will no doubt continue.
Disruptor moments for the greater good include joining NFL player Colin Kaepernick in taking the knee during matches to draw attention to racial inequality, leading the charge for equal pay for female football players in the US, and advocating for the LGBTQ+ community.
The California native also won Olympic gold in 2012, in London, and bronze in Tokyo last time out, while in 2016, her team finished fifth. The 38-year-old American is also a double world champion in 2015 and 2019.
He is the only three-time Olympic champion in basketball. In four appearances – 2004 in Athens, 2008 in Beijing, 2012 in London and 2016 in Rio, he won four medals in the US jersey with bronze in Greece, the sole time away from top spot.
A legend of his sport, Carmelo Anthony is more than a champion.
“I would be very happy walking away from the game knowing that I’ve given the game everything I have, knowing I played on a high level at every level: high school, college, won in college and three gold medals," said the New Yorker after helping the USA defeat Serbia 96-66 in the final at Rio 2016, a victory that sealed his golden hat-trick. "I can look back on it when my career is over — if I don’t have an NBA championship ring — and say I had a great career.”
And he's done it.
On 22 May, Anthony announced that he would no longer play, yet his name will forever remain in the annals of basketball history.
As he steps away, the American who has - almost - won everything, has many accolades, including part of the top 10 best scorers in NBA history, alongside some of the sport's greatest names.
With 28,289 points, Anthony is ranked ninth in the men's list at the time of retirement, behind the likes of Shaquille O'Neal, Kobe Bryant, Michael Jordan and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, a ranking topped by one LeBron James on 39,257 as of February this year.
Anthony and Karl Malone are the only ones in the list not to have won the prestigious American championship; nevertheless, iconic status is assured.
Mo Farah took part in three Olympic Games, winning an extraordinary four athletics gold medals, the most memorable of which was at his home Games at London 2012.
The long-distance and middle-distance specialist, won both 5,000m and 10,000m in 2012 and in 2016, but it was the night of 4 August that will stick long in the memory.
Deemed Super Saturday, Farah claimed gold on the track in an astonishing 44 minutes for British athletics that saw compatriots Jessica Ennis claim gold in the hetpathlon and Greg Rutherford top the long jump standings before Farah played his part, winding up to a strong finish in the 10,000m that had the crowd roaring for the full 27 and a half minutes it took him to complete the distance.
In April, at the age of 40, Farah ran the last marathon of his career, in London in his adopted country, symbollic for the athlete of Somali origin, who only revealed the truth about the conditions of his arrival in England in a BBC documentary in 2022. Entitled 'The Real Mo Farah', the now 40-year-old said he was trafficked to the UK as a child, making his achievements all the more extraordinary.
In November, the six-time world champion was announced as the first ever global Goodwill Ambassador of the International Organisation for Migration.
Versatile cyclist, Annemiek van Vleuten won Olympic gold in Tokyo in the time trial, and silver in the road race. The latter was a happy comeback story for the Dutch rider who had fallen in 2016, in Rio, when she was leading the event.
The tumble on the final descent of the Vista Chinesa was nasty, resulting in three fractured vertebrae and a concussion, but Van Vleuten was quick to reassure fans she was okay on social media.
A third participation in the Olympic Games was quite the return, and van Vleuten leaves the sport as an Olympic gold medallist, two-time world champion, and winner of all three of the women's cycling Grand tour equivalents, including claiming the inaugural Tour de France Femmes in 2022.
Greg van Avermaet announced in early May that he would retire in 2023.
Considered one of the greatest classics riders of his generation, Van Avermaet won gold in the men's road cycling competition at Rio 2016, becoming the second Belgian in history to become Olympic champion in the discipline, telling Olympics.com, “It was the most beautiful moment of my career”.
Having claimed two individual stage wins in the Tour de France and worn the famed Yellow Jersey for eleven days during the 2016 and 2018 Tours, that is quite the statement.
Chen Long has participated in the Olympic Games three times, winning all three medal colors: bronze in 2012, gold in 2016 and silver in 2020.
Considered one of the best ever to play badminton, the athlete from People's Republic of China won the World Championships for the first time in 2014, seizing the world No 1 position for the first time the same year.
He did not relinquish that position for 76 consecutive weeks.
“This is a difficult moment for me. It’s so hard to say goodbye,” Chen wrote on Weibo in May when announcing the reitrement decision.
“At this special moment, I’m really full of emotion.
“Badminton is the love of my life. I was lucky enough to wear the national shirt and play for my country, because not all dreams come true in life,” he added.
It was with tears, at home in Rio, that Bruno Schmidt raised his gold medal to the sky in celebration on Brazil's iconic Copacabana Beach.
The emotional image is ingrained in the world of Olympic beach volleyball, after Schmidt and teammate Alison Cerutti won the men's event in front of a home crowd, in the final against Italy.
The defense of the Olympic title, at Tokyo 2020, delayed to 2021, was scuppered after Schmidt spent 13 days in hospital at the beginning of 2021, including five in intensive care, because of a lung condition from a COVID-19 infection.
Schmidt played for one more season, but didn't consider himself a high-performance athlete. He finally hung up his singlet in January as he stepped away from the sand to don court shoes in his new career in law.
Olympic silver medallists bowing out in 2023
Mahiedine Mekhissi-Benabbad announced in January, in the columns of the French newspaper L'Équipe, that he was ending his career, after several injuries in recent years.
The Frenchman, a specialist in the 3,000m steeplechase, had been on three podiums at the Olympic Games, winning silver in 2008 and 2012, and bronze in 2016.
“I felt it was time to say stop. Quite simply. If I ran, it was to be world champion, Olympic champion, to win medals, to break records. To achieve these goals, if you don't have the desire, there's no point in continuing... I wanted to move on, to do something else with my life,” he declared.
At 31, Dafne Schippers announced last September that she was ending her career.
Three Olympic participations and a silver medal in 2016 are her record at the Games, but her name appears at the top of the rankings in many other competitions.
Crowned world champion twice in the 200m (2015 in Beijing and 2017 in London), the Dutch track athlete is also a four-time European champion (100m and 200m in 2014, and the 100m – 4x100m in 2016).
Hampered by injuries, Schippers called time on her career after not competing for more than a year.
"The race stops here,” Schippers wrote in a post on Instagram. “As an athlete, you always know this day will come, that at one point, your career will be a moment in time – a collection of memories and hopefully medals.”
That's exactly what Schippers has achieved, and now will finally be at home long enough to build a trophy cabinet to house them all, she revealed.
Olympic bronze for Italian footballer who's leaving pitch for the last time
One of the best Italian defenders in the history of football also bowed out in 2023.
Giorgio Chiellini won bronze with Squadra Azzurra in 2004, in Athens.
Since then, he has shone under the colors of Italy (winning the Euros in 2020) and with Juventus (with nine Serie A titles, five Italian Cup titles and playing in two Champions League finals.
Brazilian judokas Maria Portela and Maria Suelen Altheman, who both stepped on the Olympic tatamis in 2012, 2016 and 2020, have also bowed out. Britain's Gemma Howell, the 2022 European judo champion in the –63kg category, and two-time Olympian, was hoping to make it to a third Olympic Games, however her body finally said enough following 11 surgeries. A career in teaching awaits.
Howell's compatriot, middle-distance specialist, Laura Weightman left the track behind as an athlete but will continue in a coaching role. Great news for the next generation of athletes who will reap the experience of the runner who reached two Olympic 1500m finals.
