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ON THE FLY: Mitch Larkin shows his butterfly technique. Photo Courtesy: Delly Carr (Swimming Australia)<\/p><\/div>\n
And one of the burning questions \u00a0still to be answered is what events will former two-time world champion and Olympic silver medallist chose as he prepares for the Trials \u2013 his specialist 200m backstroke where he won silver in Rio or the resurrected 200 individual medley (the event he won at the Commonwealth Games and took silver at the Pan Pacs) \u2013 scheduled for the same day on the Tokyo program?<\/p>\n
A tough double \u2013 one that not even the great Ryan Lochte <\/strong>could pull off \u2013 and one that Larkin won\u2019t contemplate \u2013 he\u2019s putting all his eggs in one basket.<\/p>\n For Larkin, preparing his sights on a third Olympics, the jury is still out, on which side of the coin he\u2019ll choose.<\/p>\n \u201cI haven\u2019t made a decision, honestly, but I sat down with (my coach) Dean Boxall in November and we said we need to do some breaststroke work early in the season, do some filming, do some technical aspects, which will allow me to set up the potential to swim the medley and everything has come to plan really nicely,\u201d said Larkin, also sidestepping the raindrops, but looking in superb shape.<\/p>\n TWEAKING TIME: Mitch Larkin has spent time tweaking his breaststroke. Photo Courtesy: Becca Wyant.<\/p><\/div>\n \u201cI’ve done a little bit of medley work pre-season which is fun, it\u2019s sort of back to my ground roots, and plenty of 4x400IM sets which are nice and gruelling and that certainly builds the aerobic fitness and that was the plan.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019ll probably race a couple of meets at NSW States (March 13-15) and Sydney Open (May 15-17) as well and swim the medley and the backstroke and probably make a decision shortly after.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s a very difficult double. Ryan (Lochte) is probably the only person who\u2019s attempted it in recent years and I think unfortunately it cost himself an individual gold medal in those events.<\/p>\n \u201cDean and I we\u2019ve always been of the opinion that one better swim is better than two average swims. So for me there\u2019s no question of doing both so I\u2019m definitely going to put all my eggs in one basket.<\/p>\n \u201cIt definitely is a tough double, it burns the legs, the medley\u2019s very skillful, it\u2019s almost sprinting four 50s because you’re changing strokes and the 200m back is leg dominant as well, there\u2019s obviously the underwater work.<\/p>\n FRESH LEGS: A must for IM success. Photo Courtesy: Patrick B. Kraemer<\/p><\/div>\n \u201cThe medley is such a tough event you need to have fresh legs, you need to be able to dump all that glucose quite heavily and as a result my speed was just compressed that small amount and I\u00a0 wasn’t able to just go when the guys went<\/p>\n \u201cBut I think I\u2019ve got enough experience that I\u2019m not worried at all, I’ve swum plenty of good medleys in my time and plenty of good backstroke and it\u2019s just about tweaking that and I think the plan was to make mistakes last year and learn from them and make sure there\u2019s no errors this year so we\u2019re not guessing between the Trials and hopefully the Olympics.\u201d<\/p>\n Larkin said he had learnt a lot of lessons in his celebrated career \u2013 particularly from 2015 when he was crowned dual World Champion in the 100 and 20m backstroke in Kazan, winning the Swimming World<\/em> Male Swimmer of the Year.<\/p>\n \u201cIt was a fantastic year and I\u2019m so grateful for it but I sort of said straight away it was probably the best thing and the worst thing at the time going into the Olympics as the favourite, all eyes are on you. It is quite daunting so this time around it\u2019s completely different,\u201d said Larkin.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m a lot more freer and obviously know people are going to watch our trials quite closely and look at the result from there and whilst I\u2019m not favourite certainly people will have an eye on me still.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s exciting and gives me a lot of confidence. I\u2019ve done some fantastic work in the pool this year and looking forward to what happens and maybe the year\u2019s that follow.\u201d<\/p>\n And his thoughts on Olympic gold?<\/p>\n OLYMPIC GOLD MEDALLISTS: Mitch Larkin inspired by Ian Thorpe and Grant Hackett, pictured here with Athens head coach Leigh Nugent. Photo Courtesy: Swimming Australia.<\/p><\/div>\n \u201cIt means everything, for me, I grew up watching the 2000 Sydney Olympics and the likes of Grant Hackett and Ian Thorpe and the list goes on, there\u2019s so many, you see them on the podium and as a young aspiring swimmer, that\u2019s all you want and I guess that\u2019s where the dream begins,\u201d said Larkin.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s been a long time coming and I probably went into Rio knowing this was my best opportunity to come away with Olympic gold medal and I got silver.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019ve grown and changed since then. If you had of told me in 2016 you would retire without an Olympic gold I would have been pretty upset but now that thought doesn’t upset me as much knowing I\u2019ve given everything I can in the sport and I\u2019ve taken a lot more away than just individual medals, which I\u2019m pretty proud of.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen you look at an Olympic final you\u2019ve got eight guys and they\u2019ve all trained basically as hard, they\u2019re all skillful, they\u2019re all technical, they\u2019re all gifted, they’re all the same it\u2019s just about who can handle the challenges of an Olympics, the beds are different, you’re not used to the food, it can be a little bit challenging so for me we\u2019re changing small things in my technique.<\/p>\n \u201cI slightly enter back of hand on my left hand, which I have done for years,\u00a0I don\u2019t finish my right hand just as smoothly as I do on my left so we\u2019re talking fractions of a second, fractions of a point of a second, and that\u2019s the difference.<\/p>\n \u201cThere\u2019s small tweaks to my breakout, that we\u2019re repeating in training 1,000 times a week just so that come race day it is smooth.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s exciting once you do reach that pinnacle of sport and you\u2019re physically fit, you’re not getting big shifts or big improvements aerobically or speed wise, it\u2019s those small one percenters that makes the difference.\u201d<\/p>\n WORKING ON THE ONE PERCENTERS: Mitch Larkin knows the one percentages are the difference between gold, silver and bronze. Photo Courtesy: Delly Carr (Swimming Australia).<\/p><\/div>\n And win lose or draw in Tokyo\u2026Mitch Larkin, who will be 27 come the Olympics, is far from done.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/strong>\u201cI love the sport, my body\u2019s held together, I love swimming, I\u2019ve got a new enthusiasm with Dean,\u201d said larkin.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s scary to think how old I m especially this week (at this Camp) when guys who haven\u2019t even finished school yet and I graduated a few years ago\u00a0but touch wood I\u2019d love to do another Olympics for sure.\u201d<\/p>\n And it sure seems like he\u2019s right on track for Boxall in his corner for a third Games in Tokyo, whether it\u2019s the 200IM or the 200m backstroke, you know he will be ready.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" It\u2019s been a long hot summer in Australia and despite a cooling downpour on the Gold Coast this morning things are certainly hotting up again in pools right round the<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7938,"featured_media":384711,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"dois","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[3,10],"tags":[121615,2468,2458,121614,34441,19138],"class_list":["post-418536","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured","category-world","tag-deasn-boxall","tag-grant-hackett","tag-ian-thorpe","tag-michazel-bohl","tag-mitch-larkin","tag-ryan-lochte"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"yoast_head":"\r\n![\"mitchell-larkin-\"](\"https:\/\/vmrw8k5h.tinifycdn.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/mitchell-larkin-200-individual-medley-prelims-world-championships_3-700x500.jpg\")
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