10-time Olympic swimming medalist Caeleb Dressel is happy to be back on his Florida farm after the 2024 Paris Olympic Games. His Olympic results were mixed. He fought hard, earning more golds, but he didn’t have the Olympics he wanted. At a minimum, he’s just glad he did it, went to Paris, because there were two moments when he thought he might not go at all.
Dressel thought a repeat of the 2022 World Championship would happen, when he abruptly left in the middle of the competition.
After making The U.S. Olympic Team at the U.S. Olympic Trials, in the middle of that Indy meet, Dressel considered pulling out. Mentally he was battling it–at war in his own head. His wife, parents, and therapist were all there, all supporting him. So, he pushed on.
After the U.S. Olympic Trials, Dressel considered pulling out again. He wondered if it would be better to give other, up and coming swimmers a shot at the Paris Olympic stage. Dressel battled these thoughts, ruminating over them. At one point, he considered only swimming the Olympic relays. It all made sense in his head. We now know Dressel completed his Olympic schedule, and in this podcast he gives a beat-by-beat account of what he experienced. It’s real, raw, and courageously vulnerable.
Dressel also covers that he was misquoted or taken out of context in the recent AP Report that said he’d compete until LA2028. Dressel is considering it, even reaching out to older Olympic gold medalists for advice. He unpacks this with a lot of detail.
Dressel has not done the full Olympic debrief with Coach Anthony Nesty yet. That will happen in the next few weeks, and that will be the start of what his competitive swimming future looks like, or if there will be a competitive future.
Dressel would love to be in Rowdy Gains’ NBC chair. A swim nerd at heart, Dressel would love to be a swimming analyst.
Dressel wants to provide no cost content to kids. He’s a little uncomfortable with the traditional clinic business. He would like provide no cost eduction to swimmers to gain real insight into what it takes to swim fast.
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This is a Gold Medal Media production presented by SwimOutlet.com. Host Gold Medal Mel Stewart is a 3-time Olympic medalist and the co-founder of SwimSwam.com, a Swimming News website.
Opinions, beliefs and viewpoints of the interviewed guests do not necessarily reflect the opinions, beliefs, and viewpoints of the hosts, SwimSwam Partners, LLC and/or SwimSwam advertising partners.