PARIS, France — Amid the rigours of preparing for Paris 2024, Adam Peaty sat down with Team GB swimming teammate James Guy to watch a film. They turned on “American Gangster,” and when Denzel Washington delivered one of the film’s famous lines, it resonated with him. “It says the loudest man in the room is the weakest man,” Peaty tells reporters, seeing a lesson for his own life.
“It’s so true because I don’t have to shout from the rooftop to say I’m good or I’m going to do this.”
Peaty is already mentally on the starting block, where the rewards on offer to him are higher than ever before. There is history at stake: Should he again defend his 100-metre breaststroke Olympic title on Sunday, he will become only the second male swimmer ever to win the same three races at three consecutive Games.
The other guy? Michael Phelps.
“I know in my own ability what I’m capable of,” Peaty adds, sounding every bit like someone who has been there and done it.
So, why do some doubt him this year? There’s a hunter in the water, looking to capitalise on any sign of weakness. China’s torpedo-like Qin Haiyang — the holder of all three breaststroke world titles in 2023 — who, while unable to beat Peaty in his prime, is definitely quick enough to snatch his title. Then there is Peaty himself, who isn’t as fast as he once was and only returned to the pool in February after taking a break from the sport to protect his mental health.
It all builds for one of the most transfixing events of the Games: Will Peaty do it again? Will his size 12 feet, 38cm biceps and his 117cm chest provide enough forward thrust to deliver another gold, more adulation, more history?
Yet, those are not the fundamental questions here, and they are not the ones Peaty has asked himself. Those are more existential and delve far deeper. “My relationship with a gold medal now is I know that it won’t solve any of the problems that I want it to,” Peaty says.
Really, the question is how much does Peaty want to win again, and what will it bring him even if he does?
“I had a FaceTime call with my son, George, who’s nearly four years old and he goes: ‘Daddy, are you the fastest boy?’ My purpose now is to prove that I’m the fastest boy to my son,” Peaty says.
“He only sees it as you win or lose and you’ll forget it after a day. For me, I want to prove that you can come back from potentially the lowest of the lows of my whole career and you can turn it around within potentially 14 months, which is a very short timeframe, and still overcome the odds of what everyone else is doing because the sport is only going to get faster.”
It’s been a long road since he stood atop the podium in Tokyo. He didn’t touch the water for a month afterwards as he recovered from the mental toll. He even took part in the BBC’s “Strictly Come Dancing.” But, despite that break, he realises now that he returned to the pool too soon, and with it brought severe burnout.
He sat out the 2022 World Championships after breaking his foot, and when he returned at the Commonwealth Games in his home city of Birmingham, he lost a 100-metre final for the first time in eight years. He didn’t even make the podium. Four months later, he lost both the 50m and the 100m at the short course World Championships in Melbourne as his confidence and motivation thinned.
He became trapped in what he describes as a “self-destructive spiral” as he suffered with depression and the breakdown of his relationship with the mother of his son, George.
Things came to a head last March when he withdrew from racing, citing mental health struggles, and in his time away he questioned whether he wanted to continue swimming.
In an interview with The Times a month later, he further revealed his issues with alcohol, describing it as a “devil on his shoulder.” He also spoke of the loneliness that comes with trying to stay on top.
All the while, he continued training for Paris. “The physical preparation goes on so my body will be ready to fight again when my heart and mind have caught up,” he said. He finally returned in February for the world championships in Doha. Now he says he has renewed motivation and a much fresher perspective.
“I’ve had my own cards dealt,” Peaty says. “Trying to come through those and trying to come through being a dad at the same time and all these other things going on in my life that I’m finally at peace with. But it cost a lot to get here in a sense that I was willing to pay that cost. But I’m excited to see what we can do.”
It will take less than one minute — from the dive into the water to his fingertips hitting the wall — for a lot of questions to be answered.
It will show his son if he really is still the fastest breaststroker in the world. It will determine his place among the greats of the sport. It will either break one of Phelps’ most daunting records or enshrine it for years to come.
Mostly, it will either put a gold medal around Peaty’s neck or it won’t, and how he reconciles with either of those eventualities will show how far he has come much more than a stopwatch ever could.
“When you have children, when you hug them, you realise that it is something greater than anything can ever provide,” he says. “So for me, if I touch the wall and it’s not the result I want, I’ll be disappointed. But in 2021 and way before that, I’d be almost tearing myself apart that my life isn’t worth living because you’ve lost and that isn’t sustainable because it’s not an attitude to have.
“It’s not what a champion I guess shows, but I’ve had to come full circle on that approach. I’m not defined as a human by that. Maybe an athlete and maybe other people will define me that way, but for me, I’ll still have my family.
“They’re healthy, they’re happy, and the sun always rises the next morning no matter what. That’s not defeatist in any sense. That just gives me peace.”