The Sydney 2000 Olympics remain one of the most memorable all-round Games spectacles in living memory, and Cathy Freeman's gold win on home soil one of the strongest synonymous image of the event.
Freeman laid down the gauntlet to Kylie Minogue ahead of the pint-sized singer's closing ceremony performance. She was iconically clad in a futuristic running suit much alike Arnold Schwarzenegger in The Running Man.
Potential fashion faux-pas' aside, Freeman complemented style with substance. She ran the 400metres in 49.13 seconds to win in front of 112,524 exuberant souls and 10 million Australians watching on television.
She had fallen short in Atlanta four years previously as she picked up the silver medal, but at the age of 27 became Australia's second Aboriginal Olympic champion after Nova Peris-Kneebone for field hockey in Atlanta.