By: Michael Chuang

Australian Olympic swimmer Ariarne Titmus decided to skip swimming at the world championships.

Born in Launceston, Tasmania, Titmus was in the water from an early age. When the Beijing Olympics in 2008 were ongoing, Titmus says she was “glued to the TV.” At seven, Titmus joined a local swim club and began pursuing her swimming passion. However, due to a lack of swimming facilities and professional coaches, Titmus and her family relocated to Brisbane, Australia. From there, she gradually worked her way to outperform top distance swimmer, Katie Ledecky.

When Titmus first met her coach, Boxall, they said they “never even thought about the Olympics. [They] were just getting on that journey and making sure she was getting better and better.” From the beginning, Titmus was 38 seconds behind Ledecky’s best time in the 800-meter freestyle, 16 seconds behind in the 400-meter, and eight seconds behind in the 200-meter.

Titmus achieved her first major medal at the world championships in 2017, where her relay team got bronze. After two years of intense training, she dethroned Ledecky in the 400-meter freestyle at the world championships.

Titmus describes Ledecky as her “biggest rival,” and she really wants to beat her. However, Titmus stated that, “But then as a person, I seriously respect her. I know what it’s taken to get to this level, and she’s been at this level since I was 12 years old. I respect the work that she’s put into swimming. She changed female swimming.”

Despite breaking Ledecky’s world record less than a month ago, Titmus decided to skip the world championships this year. She says she would “definitely be asleep” because the race would start at 1:30 AM in Australia. Titmus also stated that she may look up some of the results and look at the splits. However, Titmus would not pay much attention to it overall.