Aiming high, yet right

Jean-Loup Chappelet, professor in sport management at the Swiss Graduate School of Public Administration (IDHEAP) in Lausanne, provides a finely shaded answer: “Of course, we could talk of a post-Olympic blues but it relates to the sport as well. When you reach the top at the Olympics, it’s hard to stay there, especially in a sport like swimming. It’s not very rewarding and it’s a tremendous deal of work.” When announcing her retirement, Muffat told the French sports daily L’Equipe: “I knew becoming an Olympic champion in 2016 would be 100 times more complicated.”

“The Olympics are the pinnacle of swimming,” Chappelet says. Australian swimmer Patrick Murphy, a double Olympic medallist who retired after the Beijing Games, confirms: “Every elite swimmer targets the Olympic gold, not that he or she swims for that but that’s the ultimate dream. To reach the top in swimming takes a long time and that’s probably the challenge.”


400m Olympic champion Camille Muffat (FRA) - photo credit: Giorgio Scala/deepbluemedia

Swimmers thus base their training on the quadrennial Olympic cycle. “The aim must be right because four more years makes it eight,” adds Chappelet. Another difficulty is how the crowned champion deals with his newly-acquired status, from which higher expectations and greater pressure inevitably stem. A telling example is that of France’s Laure Manaudou who has struggled (and still is) with her swimming icon status.

Muffat, who spent half of her life in the pool, told FINA: “To end up a cycle and go for another four years can be complicated when one has medalled at the Olympics. It’s even more the case in France, where champions are few compared with other big nations and where an Olympic title or medal is already exceptional and rare.”

In London, France was Europe’s number one and third overall on the medals table (4 gold, 2 silver and 1 bronze) behind swimming powerhouses USA and China. Muffat called her decision a “choice of maturity”, and maybe is it a way towards protecting her new status, a fortiori.

Athletes die twice

A journalist from L’Equipe wrote on Muffat’s retirement: “No one becomes an Olympic champion by chance. No more than you turn your back on your passion.” On one hand, to win an Olympic medal, fail to make a semi-final or repeated injury inevitably put top swimmers in front of choices. On the other, various factors influence their decision on leaving the sport, like moving on in their life or start a family. 

It’s a common saying that athletes die twice, the first time being when they leave, in our case, competitive swimming. “Once on top, it’s very hard to stay there, and how much not only physically but also emotionally it takes. Sometimes athletes don’t want that,” says Murphy, a member of the FINA Athletes Committee.

“I remember when I was towards the end of my career that physically I just couldn’t do it anymore, and mentally I was just so drained that I had to give it away,” adds Murphy.

Even so, there seems to be a misconception on what is too soon to hang up one’s goggles: “In London, some had been in the sport for a very long time, like Leisel Jones [the Australian swimmer was 14 when she qualified for her first Olympics in Sydney]. Even though they were not necessarily relatively old, like Camille Muffat, the fact that they were swimming at international level for 10, 15 years is probably more of an indication than their age,” the former swimmer notes.


Breaststroke ace Leisel Jones (AUS) - photo credit: Giorgio Scala/deepbluemedia

A swimmer who has spent so many years in the pool is looking for a “new stimulus”, says Murphy, like an innovative training technique, a change in the way of swimming or a new coach. Olympic medallists Federica Pellegrini, James Magnussen and Yannick Agnel have all recently split from their coaches to hopefully send them in the right direction in swimming faster, keep enjoying it and keep them in the sport.

“Sometimes, they can’t find that stimulus outside of sport and that’s what brings them back out of potential retirement,” Murphy continues. American Michael Phelps, who retired after the London Games having won a record 18 Olympic titles and returned to competition 18 months later, seems to be a case in point. Some, however, have reached their goal and are happy to step away afterwards.

Championing retirement

At the beginning, there’s a dream, a vision: become an Olympic champion. Very soon, the young swimmer will spend several hours in the pool. “All sports involving sliding or gliding, such as ice skating, cross-country skiing or swimming, have a pitfall: they ask for an early orientation and specialisation,” explains Georges-André Carrel, technical manager of the Lausanne University Club Volleyball.

“One must watch over the young athlete’s entire environment so that it doesn’t cost him too much in terms of imbalance for his future. The surrounding staff must use the athlete’s intrinsic motivations – not glory, excellence or money – at his health’s expense,” adds Carrel. The performance indicators, a common practice in most sports today, reinforce that tendency.


Most-decorated Olympic athlete Michael Phelps (USA) - photo credit: Giorgio Scala/deepbluemedia

According to Carrel, the athlete who swims from dawn to dusk doesn’t prepare tomorrow. If he doesn’t allow himself a breath of oxygen by getting out of the pool, his balance is at risk since high-level sport is a factor of imbalance. “Diversifying and resourcing his passion will keep him afloat,” the former national coach says. Friendship, studies and music are the kinds of activities that help athletes reconnect with ‘real’ life.

When winning an Olympic medal, the athlete reaches his goal. It’s an extraordinary emotion but of short length. When one has swum like Phelps from age 7 to 29, along the way, what has he learned?

“It would be dramatic to say that what he has gone through to become an Olympic champion has not been learned, that it is non-transferable into a future emotional, social and intellectual life,” says Carrel.

“Elite sport is not just a moment. Culturally, humanly, one remains a high-level athlete,” insists Carrel. Australian swimmer Murphy agrees with this view: “Yes, you want to be the best in your sport but what type of person you are outside of the sport is as important.” That’s probably what draws the line between excellence in sport and success in life.