Paris 2024: James Guy feeling 21 again thanks to training change as he hunts for gold medals at Olympic Games
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Published 21/06/2024 at 20:18 GMT
Olympic champion James Guy is loving life at Millfield and feeling back to his best ahead of a third Games. The 28-year-old swapped the Aquatics GB Performance Centre in Bath for training at Millfield and said his swimming is "back to where it would have been when I was 21." Paris will be Guy's third Olympic Games and will hope for more success after winning two golds in Tokyo.
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James Guy has said he feels 21 again as a training change has reinvigorated him ahead of Paris 2024, his third Olympic Games.
The 28-year-old made a bold call to swap the Aquatics GB Performance Centre in Bath for Millfield, and join team-mate Matt Richards there a year out from the Games.
Guy is hunting more gold after winning two in the relay in Tokyo but admitted that he felt his performances in the pool were lagging, and knew something had to change before Paris.
The decorated swimmer added a European Short Course silver in the 200m freestyle to his impressive resume last December, his first individual podium in the event since 2016.
And the Bury-born swimmer, who has five Olympic medals in total, is hopeful he can still improve in time for the Games.
"What I am doing in the pool, I am really happy with and the main thing for me is making sure that I am fit enough and best prepared that I can be for an Olympic Games," Guy said. "I am on track for that.
"I have changed programmes in the last 12 months, so having that and switching up has made things more exciting and being in a new environment and new place. I have really enjoyed that."
Guy had spent nearly seven years in Bath at one of the country's elite swimming hubs but confessed he switched scenery for a new "stimulus" with Paris on the horizon.
"I'd lost my confidence when I was at Bath and regressing slowly in my events. Especially my freestyle wasn't where it should be," he added.
"Now I am doing a lot more of what I did when I was younger, a lot of endurance work and I feel that is really paying off now.
"It is so frustrating, because you are working so hard every single day and you are wondering 'What is the problem? Why isn't this working?'
"Then you can get frustrated with the sport, you are not enjoying it anymore, you want to quit and all these things going through your head - you are getting older, and it is not doing the right work.
"It is frustrating, you wonder if your time is coming up, because what do you do? It was a just case of changing programmes because the work wasn't really working anymore.
"This year my freestyle is back to where it would have been when I was 21 and I am happy with where I am, and my career now will end with my new coach."
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Guy is hoping he has timed his rise back to the top to perfection, as he targets more glory this summer with the eyes of the world watching.
The Brit will join Richards, Tom Dean and Duncan Scott in the men's freestyle relay quartet in Paris, where they will look to defend the 4x200m gold they won in Tokyo.
The 28-year-old is in no doubt that the Olympics is the biggest stage of all and is determined to create a sporting legacy, even if there is no monetary reward on offer like in sports such as athletics.
"For us the Olympic Games is always the pinnacle of the meets, I feel like the whole world watches the Olympic Games, whereas the swimming world only watches the World Championships," Guy added.
"It is very important to get right because it is once every four years, whereas Worlds and Europeans is every two.
"You might only ever be able to get two Olympics, but to get three is cool. I feel that the Olympic Games is a little higher than anything else.
"We don't get any prize money, so for us at the Olympics the main thing is creating a legacy of winning medals.
"I feel like it is good in some ways and bad in others, because you want to do it for yourself and your country, create a legacy and not doing it for the wrong things.
"UK Sport help us out massively, which we are very grateful for, they are now offering money in athletics which is a great idea, but we are not in that situation.
"I think we are very, very lucky to have a UK Sport, I have been on funding for the last 10 years now. I have been able to have my mortgage with it, going on training camps, without it I wouldn't be where I am today."
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