Adam Peaty Pushing Towards New Mission at World Championships

Photo Courtesy: Erich Schlegel-USA TODAY Sports

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By David Rieder.

Barring a massive stunner, Adam Peaty will again stand atop the gold medal podium after the men’s 100 breast final at the FINA World Championships, with “God Save the Queen” playing over the arena’s loudspeaker.

Just like at the Olympics last summer in Rio, just like at the World Championships two years ago in Kazan. Most likely, even repeating his prelims time of 58.21 would be plenty to finish first by a comfortable margin. No one else besides Peaty has ever been quicker.

But Peaty insists that this meet is different. He won’t just race the 100 breast over the first two days, rest for four and then return for the medley relay. He adds the 50 breast and also the mixed 400 medley relay to his plate at the World Championships.

Peaty broke a world record in his first Olympic swim, but with so many races to come, he wasn’t ready to go full throttle in his first prelims swim in Budapest or even in the semi-finals, when he recorded the fourth-fastest time ever at 57.75.

“I wasn’t engaging emotionally,” he said. “I’ve got four or five days of constant racing with the relays, so I’m looking to win but at the same time I need the endurance to swim the 50 and then hopefully come back and put good splits up for the medley relays.”

The schedule of racing will be the same as he followed two years ago in Kazan, but back then, Peaty wasn’t a favorite, an established superstar. His first world record in the 100 breast had come earlier that year, and he had yet to prove himself capable of beating the likes of Cameron van der Burgh in the 100 breast.

Photo Courtesy: Ian MacNicol

“Before I’d be like this on the blocks,” Peaty said, bending his knees and shaking nervously, “but at the moment I’m very calm, very collected, just enjoying the atmosphere.”

At that meet in 2015, Peaty’s best performance in the 100 breast came in the semi-finals, when he set a championships record at 58.18. He would not be nearly as quick in the final, battling van der Burgh down to the final strokes before eventually getting his fingerstips to the wall first, 58.52 to 58.59.

In Kazan, Peaty had to establish himself as the best in the world in the 100 breast. In Rio, he was going for the sport’s biggest trophy. He passed both tests with flying colors.

The next piece of history he can make: Join Kosuke Kitajima as the only man to successfully defend an Olympic gold medal in the 100 breast.

But there’s still plenty of time before the Tokyo Olympics, still three years away. Between now and then—beginning in Monday’s 100 breast final in Budapest—Peaty wants to push the limits of what’s imaginable.

“It’s a very, very different mission than last year. Last year the goal was getting the gold, getting the world record. This is more like, how far can the human body go?” Peaty said.

“It’s not about racing the best guys in the world for me, personally—it’s about how far can I take my body? To go 56, you’re going to have to go very, very fast and train very, very hard.”

When Peaty first broke the world record, he chopped more than a half-second off van der Burgh’s existing record, dropping the mark from 58.46 to 57.92. Before that, few would have considered a 57-swim a legitimate possibility any time in the near future.

Peaty’s two world record-breaking swims in Rio—57.55 in prelims, 57.13 in the final and then a ridiculous 56.59 split on the 400 medley relay—have suddenly brought “56” into the conversation. That swim could happen in Budapest, but if it doesn’t, he has three more years before Tokyo.

In the year since Rio, Peaty has had the image of a lion inked on his left arm above the letters “MMXVI.”

“It’s a British lion, very patriotic,” Peaty said. “The numbers mean 2016, and that’s a year that meant a lot to me.”

There’s no reason to believe that Peaty, still only 22, won’t continue his dominance or improvement over the next three quads. He may not be sneaking up on anyone in the lead-up to 2020, but there’s no reason to believe that year won’t be just as special for him—and for Britain—as 2016.

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