British legend Adam Peaty has seemingly done it all, owning multiple Olympic gold medals, capturing World Records and establishing himself as the most dominant men’s breaststroker in history.
But the 27-year-old father of one is not content to rest on his laurels as the 2022 Commonwealth Games in his home nation of England are on the horizon. Peaty is one of ten English athletes already named to the initial squad for the Commonwealth Games, along with other Olympic medalists to the tune of Tom Dean and Molly Renshaw.
Yes, Peaty will be sticking to his bread-and-butter 50m and 100m breaststroke events for the Games set for Birmingham in late July, but the Mel Marshall-trained ace is also reportedly trying the 200m breast on for size.
“I’m going to probably swim the 200m at trials, just to see how it goes,” reports The Daily Mail.
“That will be like an expedition race. I’ve no idea what time I will do. I’ve not done the 200m at trials since 2016 when I went out in 59 seconds and came back in a coffin!”
Peaty owns a personal best 200m breast time of 2:08.34, a mark he put up at the 2015 British Swimming Championships. That performance renders him GBR’s 5th fastest performer to date in the event.
The 2016 swim to which Peaty refers landed him a much slower result of 2:11.71, comprised of the painful splits of 1:00.68/1:11.03.
Currently, the top 200m breaststroke swimmers for Great Britain include James Wilby and Ross Murdoch, who have been as speedy as 2:07.91 and 2:08.58 over the past 18 months.
On his motivation for potentially racing the 200m, Peaty told The Daily Mail, “You’ve got to keep it fresh. What has worked well for me in the past was to do the 200m just for endurance training.
I need to be uncomfortable in a scenario where I am not winning. That is something I have learned over the last few months off.”
Peaty recognizes that, from a Commonwealth Games perspective, “The Australians are much better at that long distance breaststroke and it’s going to be a packed field, but I’ll see how that goes.” The reigning Olympic champion Zac Stubblety-Cook hails from down under, as does 2020 Olympian and former world record holder Mattew Wilson.
However, Peaty appears to be in a good place heading into this next training cycle headed to Paris 2024. He reflects on having competed on the British celebrity dance television show Strictly Come Dancing and simply being ‘Adam Peaty‘ out of the water.
“It was obviously a risk to take so much time off but I am so glad I did. It is so important to take that time away, just to think, to drink beer and wine, and just be normal.”
The man is already back in the pool and has documented some of his grueling dry land workouts on social media as well. For all intents and purposes, the ‘Project Immortal’ pursuer looks to not have missed a beat.
“I’m not as unfit as I thought I would feel. I thought January was going to be messy trying to get my fitness back, but it only took a week to get really good times again.
I feel like I have got a second wind now.”
And the entire world of breaststroke swimming shudders.
We’ve reached out to Peaty for comment and will update this article accordingly.
Peaty does a lot of work with his tempo and it feels pretty specific to the 100. But that said, he is definitely a long course swimmer and really makes his move in the middle of the pool which can translate well to the 200
I feel like his raw speed obviously opens up higher possibilities in the 200 than most swimmers. So I am interested to see it. And its tricky to predict since tapering does such wonders for a 200breast, especially for sprinters who sort of round up to that event, so he’d really need to try it tapered for us to really know what he is capable of. I think he would surprise himself if he had dove in for a 200 in Rio or Tokyo.
another stage in his project immortal? get a little more endurance?
He’s been looking a little less bulky lately. Maybe it’s part of his plan to step up a distance.
“Came back in a coffin” is my new favorite phrase.
Mel used that in an interview in the early 90’s, after a 200 fly race. He might have been talking about his 1988 Games swim.
It’s quoting Peaty but obviously it’s not a new saying.
Good for him but his last few LCM outings at 200 have been a long way off top level. That 2.08 he did was seven years ago. Will be exciting to see what he can do now.
We shall see but I think nothing better than 2:08.00 will be seen
Has his calls to the international swimming Alliance been reacted to in regards to speaking out against this new ISL and Fina schedule neglecting athletes?