Comply with our Olympics protection within the lead-up to the Paris Video games.
The shimmer of Caeleb Dressel’s seven gold medals might recommend in any other case, however he is aware of swimming generally is a brutal and suffocating sport.
He’s, with no shadow of a doubt, the most effective on the planet at what he does, sprinting from one finish of the pool to the opposite (and generally again). He holds the world file within the males’s 100-meter butterfly, having first snatched that historic distinction away from Michael Phelps in 2019. Then, Dressel lowered his world file within the occasion on the Tokyo Olympics — the place he gained 5 gold medals in 5 occasions.
Regardless of all of it, Dressel was depressing.
He was fixated on the place he felt he’d failed. In a single race, it was the flip. One other, the end. His head place. It didn’t matter that he’d touched the wall first time and again. It didn’t matter that he was bringing gold residence and serving to Group USA end atop the medal rely. He chased perfection. He chased instances and chased stretch targets. He hadn’t met them.
“I created a monster in myself — simply so caught up in perfectionism,” he advised former Olympians Missy Franklin and Katie Hoff on their “Unfiltered Waters” podcast. “So caught up in, ‘If I don’t see these instances, it means I’m a nasty particular person, or it means I didn’t practice laborious sufficient. If I don’t go a world file, it means … I didn’t obsess sufficient.’”
The game he’d been drawn to as a child as a result of it was so delightfully enjoyable was fairly the alternative. And it’d been that manner for years. However Dressel saved pushing himself, listening to his inside critic ripping himself aside.
Till he “broke,” he places it now. He withdrew abruptly in the course of the 2022 world championship meet in Budapest and disappeared from the game for eight months.
Dressel hasn’t gone into a lot element about that interval of his life in Gainesville, Fla., apart from to say he spent plenty of time along with his therapist. His spouse, Meghan, was there for him, too, although she additionally realized there have been plenty of conversations Dressel wanted to have inside his personal thoughts. Some days, he didn’t do a lot. Most days, he averted routes that took him previous the College of Florida pool. He didn’t wish to odor the chlorine.
He had to determine who he was past his finest instances and what made him tick exterior the pool. He needed to reorient himself, how he believed others felt about him and why they cherished him. He needed to learn to smile once more.
The method wasn’t simple, and progress hasn’t at all times been a straight line. However it’s what makes Dressel, 27, who he’s now as a swimmer and an individual (and new dad). It’s additionally why he’s again within the pool and headed to Paris, one of many headliners of Group USA and arguably a very powerful piece of the puzzle for the U.S. swim group in its efforts to win the meet by bringing residence extra gold medals than its friends. There may be exterior strain, sure. However inside his thoughts, Dressel’s greatest critic is quieter.
“It’s actually powerful,” Dressel advised The Athletic final month. “It’s embedded in me — the place you at all times wish to search for methods to get higher. I’m nonetheless doing that, however I’m not turning into obsessed and so fixated on it that I lose sight of what’s truly enjoyable with the game. It’s laborious, and it’s not like I’ve unexpectedly gotten to determine it out this 12 months. There are issues that I’m actually proud that I’ve finished in another way, like having the ability to take pleasure in components of the game with out simply crapping on myself for not being excellent.
“It’s nonetheless very a lot a piece in progress.”
Caeleb Dressel gained 5 gold medals on the Tokyo Olympics. However a 12 months later, he walked away from the game. It’s nonetheless “a piece in progress,” he mentioned of his return. (Tim Clayton / Corbis by way of Getty Photos)
Now, Dressel feels like an individual who’s found out lots about himself via remedy. One of many first issues he’ll inform you is how useful his common appointments along with his therapist have been.
“I’ve been attempting to not be so fixated on outcomes and simply merely having fun with racing and coaching — these are the 2 components of the game that I actually take pleasure in,” Dressel mentioned. “There are components of the game that I actually dislike, that I actually hate. However it’s price placing up with for the moments that I actually do take pleasure in. It’s going to be a steadiness; I’m not anticipating each a part of the game to only be one of the best factor ever for me. However I’ve actually leaned into the components of the game that I do take pleasure in.
“That’s been the primary distinction for me. I’ve at all times cherished coaching. I’ve at all times cherished being across the group. The precise racing portion, I do actually, actually take pleasure in — as quickly because the gun goes off, it’s simply merely enjoyable. So, I’ve simply been attempting to maintain it simply merely swimming. Merely swimming this 12 months.”
Dressel will merely swim the 50-meter freestyle and the 100 fly as particular person occasions on the Video games, and he’ll possible be a part of a number of relays. On the U.S. Olympic trials in Indianapolis, he completed third within the 100-free last, which value him the chance to defend his gold medal within the occasion in Paris.
However he’s joyful to be a part of the Olympic group. He’s happy with what he completed at trials to qualify for it. He’s thrilled that his toddler son, August, bought to see all of it, held in Meghan’s arms within the stands.
“Nobody can take that away,” Dressel mentioned in Indianapolis. “He’s not going to recollect it. I’ll inform him, belief me, I bought pictures so I can show it. … That was a extremely particular second. Meghan is aware of what goes into this, not simply the parenting facet of issues however she will get to see firsthand the struggles that include the game.
“The tears that include it, the frustration after which additionally the excessive factors, and attending to share that with them, as a result of they undergo that as effectively — that was actually particular, August attending to see that.”
Meghan shared a video of Dressel with child August on the Olympic coaching camp in North Carolina this month, one other second captured and saved to commemorate a once-in-a-lifetime second. They’ll be in Paris, too, alongside Dressel’s dad and mom and household. Dressel mentioned he wouldn’t be the place he’s right this moment with out their assist. And he actually wouldn’t be the place he’s with out Meghan, whom he calls the “superhero” of their household.
Parenthood is great for a lot of causes, however maybe the best lesson it teaches is one among perspective — particularly for somebody who has spent most of his life chasing instances and searching perfection that doesn’t and can’t exist.
“I don’t know if I’ll ever go a finest time ever once more, and that’s powerful to say out loud. It truly is,” Dressel mentioned. “Once you’re 19, 20, 21, you retain chipping away, chipping away, chipping away. I’m nonetheless working tougher than ever, discovering each path I can take to shave these couple of tenths. However I don’t know. I don’t know if I can do this. I’m actually good at racing. You set me in a race, I’ll make it shut, as shut as I presumably can, even when I’ve to attempt to kill myself to get there. I’ll put myself in these conditions.”
So, he doesn’t know precisely how Paris will go. However he is aware of he’s older, wiser and genuinely happier than earlier than the final Olympic Video games. Others see it, too, and never simply when he’s straddling the lane line after a race or punching the water in celebration.
“He’s at all times had that smile,” seven-time gold medalist and College of Florida coaching accomplice Katie Ledecky mentioned. “He took that point away, and when he got here again, he’s had that smile day-after-day. Simply to see his development over this previous 12 months, how he’s simply gotten higher and higher every meet — he appears to only be loving the racing, and he loves the coaching in all probability greater than the racing, and that makes everybody round him higher.”
It is going to make the most effective swimmers on the planet higher, too. And that’s why that smile is nearly as good as gold, it doesn’t matter what medal hangs round Dressel’s neck.
“I don’t know if I’ll ever go a finest time ever once more, and that’s powerful to say out loud,” Caeleb Dressel mentioned. He’ll give it a shot in Paris beginning later this month. (Maddie Meyer / Getty Photos)
(High illustration: Dan Goldfarb / The Athletic; picture: Sarah Stier / Getty Photos)
