Emma McKeon is an Olympic icon, an Australian swimming legend, and now a Swammer. At the Paris 2024 Olympics, McKeon became one of only 2 women in swimming to ever win 14 Olympic medals over her career, joining Katie Ledecky who accomplished the same feat at the same meet. SwimSwam caught up with McKeon after she had enjoyed some well-earned rest, recovery, and travel since Paris.
The Aussie shared what her life has looked like since stepping away from swimming but also reflected on the leadup to her final meet. McKeon revealed that just 2-3 weeks out from Paris, she was contemplating not even going due to the severity of pain she was having in her shoulders. However, she was able to manage her injury through the Games and walk away with a gold, silver, and bronze, securing her legacy as one of the greatest Olympians ever.
In the SwimSwam Podcast dive deeper into the sport you love with insider conversations about swimming. Hosted by Coleman Hodges and Gold Medal Mel Stewart, SwimSwam welcomes both the biggest names in swimming that you already know, and rising stars that you need to get to know, as we break down the past, present, and future of aquatic sports.
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Music: Otis McDonald
www.otismacmusic.com
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
Wow, that prep for Paris sounds excruciating. And after the 51.94 split in the relay heat, in the final she had to hold off the fastest American to be able to hand Meg a lead.
Talk about overcoming adversity to get the job done for the team.
Why do Americans always comment on why Australia is so good at swimming despite our population? The answer is obvious and always has been… swimming is ingrained in our culture. Nearly everyone here knows how to swim well and enjoy the water. 90% of the population live within 100km of the coast. It is the same reason Norway excel in cross country skiing for example. It is a deeply embedded part of our society.
USA are good at many sports mainly due to their large population and financial backing not necessarily because they have a deep embedded culture in any particular sport.
This is such a weird thing to get upset about. Saying we’re good at swimming relative to our population is a positive.
Also your stats are just incorrect. Latest stats suggest over 25% of Australian adults either can’t swim or are very weak swimmers, and 40% of children cannot swim or are weak swimmers when they finish primary school.
USA also has 237x as many public pools as Australia, or 18x more per capita. Seems pretty ingrained in culture.
And that silly Titmus keeps taking year long holidays.
She’s only done one of those. Her other breaks were 2-3 months.
Individually, she is the 8th most successful female swimmer of all time by Olympic medals. Not a bad effort for someone who’s only been to 2 Olympics and keeps “taking holidays”
Silly is self reflective in that comment….
Great interview Coleman! I’ve not heard Emma talk in detail about the lead in to Paris before now. Love her grit and determination- she performed so well in Paris, especially in the 4×100.
Her butterfly splits were good too- especially the 55.86 in the mixed relay.
Sounds terrible to be honest. I had no idea it got so bad. Makes me appreciate her performance in Paris even more.
Yeah, I’d heard Bohly talk after trials about some of the difficulties, and it makes more sense of some other comments I’d heard about Bronte being likely to get the finals swim. After the first staging camp there was no way you would have thought that Emma would be on the final squad.
When Shannon Rollason talked on his podcast just after leaving the staging camp he seemed to think Bronte was guaranteed a finals spot. That’s why I was so shocked when Emma split a 51 in the heats
Gotta say your interview style is so warm and open that it clearly makes athletes really comfortable to open up. And obviously makes for really enjoyable interviews as a viewer. Love your work 👏🏻
Thank you very much 🙂 Glad you enjoyed. Emma is a national treasure, always honored to have a chat with her.
How can anyone downvote this?
I don’t have any data but hypotheticals:
-Swimmers who finished 2nd to her at the Olympics
-People who don’t believe in national treasure (socialists)
-Introverts who don’t enjoy having chats with anyone
-People with other swimming podcasts
-People who don’t like Coleman because he changes his hairstyle too often
-People who just don’t like SwimSwam
-Misclicks
-Contrarians
-Probably gonna get more downvotes now just because people want to push your buttons
“People who don’t believe in national treasure (socialists)”
Respectfully, America’s national parks and public lands, some of our greatest national treasures, are less respected believed in by Trump and his cronies than by any socialist.
Well I guess we just have different definitions of “treasure” then.
It was more of a rhetorical question, but your answers are very funny.