Aussie world champ Peter Hawes hints retirement from 2-lap game

Peter also excels at creating board games.

Elite tracksters retire all the time. Masters trackos never say never. But in a rare report, Dr. Peter Hawes of Australia, an M60 middle-distancer, told his local paper: “It’s hard because you want to keep running, but as a doctor, I can feel when my body has had enough and I think that time is here. People said after I won my first race at the world championships to make sure I defend it, because it’s in Australia, and I did that. It was a special feeling winning it in front of a home crowd but the first one in Sacramento is just a memorable moment that I won’t forget.” Peter won the M55 800 at Sacto worlds in 2:07.87 and the M60 crown at Perth in 2:18.46. I have friends who simply step aside and don’t make an announcement. But given our cohort habit of comebacks, I just wait. (Irene Obera and Phil Raschker have “retired” and returned.) If Peter can’t train or compete at his preferred level, it’s understandable. And he’s achieved the “going out at the top” goal many aspire to. How do y’all decide when it’s time?

Here’s the story, in case the link goes south:

YOU may not know him – he’s not on television running against Usain Bolt, or chasing an Olympic gold medal.

He is just a retired doctor from Hawthorne.

But there is much more to this retired doctor than you think.

Peter Hawes is a two-time Masters 800m world champion, who is just about to finish his career on top.

Hawkes recently claimed his second 800m Masters world championship in Perth, after winning his first in Sacramento in the US in 2011, and is contemplating hanging the spikes up.

“It’s hard because you want to keep running, but as a doctor, I can feel when my body has had enough and I think that time is here,” Hawes, 60, said.

“People said after I won my first race at the world championships to make sure I defend it, because it’s in Australia, and I did that.

“It was a special feeling winning it in front of a home crowd but the first one in Sacramento is just a memorable moment that I won’t forget.”

Hawes is not retired just yet but if he makes the decision, he will spend more time working on his hobby of creating board games.

He has six published games so far, and even won Strategy Game of the Year in the US in 2014.

“It’s always been a hobby of mine and something I really enjoy doing,” Hawes said.