As if the stop-by-stop World Cup battles between elite sprinters Cate Campbell of Australia and Sarah Sjostrom of Sweden weren’t enough, now there’s the chance the pair of Olympic gold medalists will be training alongside one another in the lead-up to Tokyo 2020. According to Australian media, Campbell, otherwise known as C1, will pair up with world record holder Sjostrom in both her native nation and Europe, capitalizing on the friendship that was formed over the past racing season.
“I loved my time racing over in Europe and in Asia; I’m really race fit now and it’s something where I think the Americans and Europeans really have an advantage on us,” C1 said while racing in Queensland this week.
“There’s so much racing under their belts and it teaches you to race under any circumstance and race against the best in the world. I’ve become really good friends with all of them and there’s the possibility of training camps with Sarah (in the future).”
No details have been provided as to where or when the training collaboration will take place, whether it be in Sweden, in Turkey at Sjostrom’s Energy Standard base, or at C1’s home club at Chandler in Australia under Simon Cusack.
After a disappointing Rio Olympics where at-the-time world record holder C1 came away with zero individual medals, the 25-year-old opted out of competing at the World Championships in Budapest. Fresh off impressive performances overseas, as well as a decisive 100m freestyle win earlier this week in a world-class effort of 52.69, C1 feels ready to take on the next 2 years.
“I can say I’m a much better person after what happened in Rio and I’ll be a person a lot longer than a swimmer,” she said. “It’s made a difference mentally and physically, I feel like I’ve been reborn.”
Sjostrom is going to reap the benefits from this arrangement.
I suspect that may well prove to be the case but, looking at the wider picture, this may encourage some more AUS swimmers to widen their horizons and seek to broaden their horizons, both with regards training and seeking out greater competitive opportunities.
As for C1 herself; her capacity to swim the times to challenge SS remains unquestioned. What 2018, and moreso 2019, are likely to prove is whether she still retains the capacity to deliver against peak competition when it counts.
SS.. Better underwater, faster at 50, faster at 100, significantly better endurance.. It’s probably a good exchange for both but I doubt it wouldn’t benefit C1 more to go out of her comfort zone at this point in time. It’s a very long time until the next global champs.
Not to mention Campbell getting her 100m SC world record back just last month.