City of Perth swimmer and Open Water Marathon specialist Melissa Benson has made the decision to retire from National and International competition.

Benson, a WAIS Scholarship holder, has enjoyed an exceptionally long and successful career first representing Australia in 1998 at the Oceania Swimming Championships and subsequently going on to represent Australia at the World Swimming Championships (2003), World Open Water Championships (2004), Pan Pacific Championships (2006) and most recently at the 2009 World Cup.

As a twelve-year veteran of the WA State Open Water Team (TAG Funded) Melissa has as you can see been at the forefront of open water and marathon swimming in Western Australia for well-over a decade and in turn acted as an admirable contributor in WA’s ongoing success in “open-water”.

Benson has secured no fewer than ten Australian Open Water Swimming Championship medals in her time with our team here at “City” and her experience, foresight and wealth of knowledge will be a genuine loss to the program.

The three-time winner of SWA’s prestigious Open Water Swimmer of the Year Award Benson has not restricted her success to the marathon. Twice the recipient of the “Bernie Kelly” medal as the most outstanding performer at the State Surf Titles.

An eight-time winner of the Rotto Channel Swim of which four occasions were in the “solo” category. Benson has also claimed overall line honours, in this epic event twice, beating home the men in 2003 and again in 2008.

Benson will not disappear from swimming altogether opting to still compete at selected events locally this summer.

Melissa will now choose to occupy her time practising in her graduate career of pharmacy.