In an Instagram post today, 23-year-old Olympic finalist Jordan Crooks announced that he is taking a break from competitive swimming.
He wrote, “Thank you to the Cayman Islands, the University of Tennessee, family, and friends who’ve supported this swimming journey. For now, I’ll be stepping away from competing. Looking forward to exploring all that life has to offer. Till we meet again.”
In an interview with SwimSwam in early April, Crooks alluded to this break but stopped short of calling it a retirement, saying, “For now, I’m just going to take a step back and focus on school and just live in the NARP (non-athletic regular person) life and relax for a little bit. Get the body and the mind right, and we’ll see what the future holds. No idea what it does hold for now, but just kind of enjoying basking in what we’ve been able to accomplish this year and being super grateful for our four years at Tennessee. Wouldn’t have wanted to do it anywhere else, and we’ll see where life takes me soon.”
When we asked if he would continue swimming and potentially pursue another Olympic Games, he said, “That’s a million-dollar question that we’re still trying to figure out, but we’ll see. We’ll see where it goes. You can never rule it out, and I’m not 100% sure what we’ll do, but I’ll be here in Knoxville for the future, just kind of figuring things out one day at a time. But for now, back to the school grind.”
Crooks had an amazing sign-off to collegiate swimming at the recent NCAA Championships. He reclaimed the NCAA title in the 50 freestyle with a time of 17.91, then improved his lifetime best to 17.82 while leading off Tennessee’s victorious 200 free relay, building on their NCAA record-setting performance from the previous month at the SEC Championships.
His 17.82 was the final 50 free of his college career, adding one more sub-18 second swim to his record of six times breaking the barrier, the most in history. The only other swimmer to come close is Caeleb Dressel, who holds the all-time record of 17.63, having broken 18 seconds twice.
After a 6th–place finish in the 200 free, Crooks exploded during the prelims of the 100. He broke Dressel’s 2018 record of 39.90, swimming a 39.83 and becoming the second man to go sub-40. In the finals, Crooks posted 40.06 and took 2nd to rival Josh Liendo’s own sub-40 second swim (39.99). Crooks also threw down the fastest relay split in history (39.36) in the last swim of his college career, anchoring Tennessee to an NCAA record and the team’s second relay title of the meet.
The Matt Kredich-trained sprinter made history at the 2024 Short Course World Championships, becoming the first man to break the 20-second barrier in the 50 SCM free (19.90)—a feat many of the biggest sprinters in the sport’s history came up just short of achieving. It was a legendary swim from Crooks in the Budapest semifinals as he lowered the 20.08 world record he set in prelims. The next evening, he defended his world title with a time of 20.19, adding a second medal to his haul after taking bronze in the 100 free.
At the Paris Olympics, he made history as the first Caymanian to reach an Olympic swimming final, touching 8th in the 50 free. He set a national record of 21.51 in the prelims, then posted 21.54 in the semifinals and 21.64 in the final. Prior to Paris, he didn’t have much international experience on the long-course stage, but did finish 6th in the 50 free and 7th in the 100 free at the 2023 Worlds in Fukuoka.
bro realized that in the Olympic 50:
A. no wall for a flipturn
B he can’t take 74 underwaters and 6 strokes
C they only give out medals at finals and nobody gives a f*** about your prelims results
Legit and serious question that I hope you truly answer, why the hate? He’s a swimmer and a human. Not sure why you have such a problem with someone who simply did their absolute best with the talents they have. Turned out pretty great to me!
If you could though, why is your post so negative?
He looks like he could walk onto the football team. Good luck young man.
Hope to see this guy in LA
Swimming has a problem. So hard and so little financial incentive to keep up the insanely hard work. The percentage of elite swimmers that burn out or have mental health challenges has got to be among the highest of any sport.
A big problem is that it there is only one competition in swimming that is truly incentivized as the ultimate win: the Olympics where you only get a chance every 4 years while other sports have the Super Bowl, Stanley cup finals, etc every year to prove yourself at the ultimate level. The sport needs to do better at incentivizing the prestige of more common meets like world championships, etc. Take another sport like table tennis which isn’t a super popular sport but does a great job incentivizing other competitions like the World Cup and World championships at a level similar to the Olympics since winning all 3 makes for the “grand slam”.
Agreed, but the thing is swim training is 1,000 times harder and more physically painful than ping pong. The only comparable work/pain sport I can think of is football, but the top 200 football guys every class make millions. In contrast, basketball guys can just play around and become multi-millionaires at age 19.
But in my opinion its not necessarily about the money. It’s about the brutal amount of work. Katie is the exception. Missy, Regan, Caeleb, Michael and tons of others including Jordan are the norm.
Jordan Crooks is the bathtub merchant that all the GW haters hoped she would be
That being said, he’s a damn good one and the NCAA record in the 100 still shocked me more than so many other swims. Hope he enjoys his rest
That moment when you realize you can’t win against the top dogs in the big pool, you create an excuse or fake an injury to skip the major LC meet that year, also known as the Chad Le Clos strategy.
Watch him reappear during the SC world cups in the fall as if nothing happened.
Not sustainable though, can’t hide in the bathtub for that long…
Uhhhh…he did 21.51 at the Olympics, he just did it in the wrong round. It would have won bronze if he had done it in the final.
He also didn’t create an excuse or mention an injury.
Are you good bro? Might be time to get offline for a while.
Respect. What a show of power, precision and focus.
So many swimmers or athletes in general who need a break or struggling with mental health issues. It’s very impressive. This is the main problem of big names in sport in this 21st century. Marchand and Crooks are the last examples of a long list. Enjoy your break Jordan, and you’ll come back stronger. The next world record holder in the 50 free. 🏊💪👌