Media courtesy of Swimming Canada. James Sutherland contributed to this report.
It was only one month ago that Summer McIntosh broke 3 world records and approached 2 more at the 2025 Canadian World Trials in Victoria. After one of the single best performances at a competition in history, McIntosh has gotten back to work, preparing for Singapore at the end of the month. Today, McIntosh sat down with the media and fielded questions about Katie Ledecky, training with Fred Vergnoux and Bob Bowman, and chasing 5 Olympic gold medals in LA.
regarding the Ledecky matchup coming in the 800 free: Swimswam’s recent article on comparing their stroke count was very telling. If I remember correctly, Summer did the 800 in something like 50 less strokes than Ledecky and she was less than 2 seconds of the WR. Those metrics lead me to believe she has a lot left in the tank on that race. Being a team USA and huge KD fan, I am always rooting for KD, but it is impossible to not respect and like Summer, especially after listening to how well she handled that interview.
Wow. I can’t imagine a better ambassador for the sport than her. Not only an amazing swimmer, but her well spoken and detailed answers from so many different people was striking. She is so good for the sport of swimming.
Agree 100% with your comments on Summer. The downvotes are dismaying.
Enjoyed the questions from all of the journalists. I particularly liked Brittany Maclean asking Summer specifically about the 400 free.
It will be interesting to see how Summer reacts to the double on the first day. I have a feeling that if she wins the 400 free it will be a relief for her to finally get the monkey off of her back when it comes to this event on the international stage like the Olympics and World Championships LC. Summer will have to be at her absolute best to win because one would have to assume that the form Katie Ledecky showed at Fort Lauderdale and later at the US trials was an athlete who is reaching levels… Read more »
Thanks for recording the entire conference, please keep up the great work uploading to all podcast platforms!!! Makes it so easy to listen on the go without needing YouTube or the website 🙂
5 individual golds would be awesome. Who has done 4 or 5 on the world stage before besides Phelps? Katie did 2,4,8,1500 in 2015ish right?
And I’m so happy Michael called her, she’s such a fan and it’s nice to see that he still cares a little about the sport.
Honest q, asked as a reluctant summer fan: what (else) does she need to do to be GOAT female swimmer ?
I’m going to say Ledecky is the current female GOAT, in which case, looking at strictly major medal counts:
Ledecky:
Summer:
I’d say winning about twice as many golds as she has now over the next 4-8 years would put her in the conversation.
Plus whatever more Ledecky adds between now and 2028 (which I presume will be her signoff)
Wondering how those numbers would look if you compared their achievements only up to their 18th birthday for each?
Put her into the conversation? She’s not there yet? Come on man. Of course Summer will surpass her as the GOAT.
Summer will definitely earn more medals with her range of events.
Katie swims freestyle.
Technically, you’re right. Katie on paper is the GOAT. Yet the reason so many already think of Summer as the GOAT is because Katie has nothing on her in terms of versatility of events. Of course Summer will surpass her as the GOAT. It’s only a matter of time.
And what happens when Summer beats Katie and takes the 8fr WR? That’s definitely happening.
Without Summer in the game, Katie would have never broken her 8fr WR again.
Summer is becoming everything to… Read more »
“Will definitely earn more medals.”
“Of course Summer will surpass her as the GOAT.”
Statements like this about an 18 year old, given swimming’s history, reveals more about your patriotism than Coleman’s, I think.
Summer has everyone beat in terms of her versatility, by far.
Mad talent in 3 of 4 strokes and steadily improving in all of them.
She’s gutsy. How often do swimmers choose to race a much longer distance than their norm at this stage of career, on top of 4 other individual events?
I don’t like to predict the future but it is clear that Summer is currently setting the swimming world on fire, and it is super exciting to see. The naysayers will just have to accept it.
The only remaining metric is longevity. Ledecky has done it more, and more in a row. Summer has hit the peak (as many swimmers have, like Missy and Katinka), but Ledecky hit the peak and did it for a decade. If Summer can keep doing what she’s doing, she can stack the stats to do it.
On the other hand, what does Katie Ledecky need to do to maintain her status as the female GOAT?
If Ledecky takes the 400, 800, and 1500 through to LA2028, it will be very hard for anybody to catch her in that conversation ever. The 1500 seems like a good bet. She’s still the best in the world in the 800 right now. The 400 she’s in the mix.
Plenty more to do but a lot less than the answers you’ll receive here. Longevity is always vastly overrated toward how these things are viewed. There is immense focus on recency, whether we prefer to accept it or not.
For example. Faith Kiipyegon has won 3 consecutive Olympic gold at 1500 and owns the world record at 1500 and the mile. She is legendary right now and the undisputed best ever. But if Beatrice Chebet shifts to the 1500 as rumored and takes down that world record, countless track fans will shift in her direction.
That’s why the 800 is so important for McIntosh. If she continues at current projections in her core events and also takes away the 800… Read more »
I think that’s what’s behind my q.
Absolutely ledecky gets mad props for legendary longevity. And she’s a great IMer too .. but in some ways summers 400 IM alone vaults her waaay up. Not to mention her other top performances. It would be so fun to see her put together a top to bottom world dominant meet.
We’ve never seen Ledecky swim a tapered 400 IM or even concentrate on it. Now THAT would be fun to see.
I have never seen KL swim a 400 IM ever.
Interesting point you make about longevity, because I think of gymnastics, where the undisputed goat is Nadia Comaneci based on one spectacular Olympics (3 gold, 1 silver, 1 bronze). (Her 2nd Olympics were overshadowed by politics). On the other hand, Soviet gymnasts Larissa Latynina(18 medals in 3 Olympics, I believe) and Ludmilla Tourischeva (9 medals in 3 Olympics) are all but forgotten except by the most diehard gymnastics fan. Nowadays in the US, Simone Biles is called the goat (to your point on recency) but around the world it is Nadia Comaneci who is most celebrated. She greatly revolutionized the sport at one Olympics. I think the term goat is thrown around too much.
Wow tough to be grilled like this and she is so poised. Very impressive.
Agree 100%. Very poised and focused. Confident yet humble. 18 years old.
Truly impressive.
we are due for a swimswam one-on-one interview with summer… is that something we can hope for in the near future?
They always root against her. Why should she talk to the enemy?
lol what?
Summer has been interviewed twice on the podcast that Katie Hoff and Missy Franklin host. They do a wonderful job with their interviews, it’s worth checking out if you havent seen it yet. Unfiltered Waters.
what we really need is her on Social Kick (feel like it’s pretty unlikely though)
Thank you Coleman, for facilitating such a well organized interview! Summer is so poised at 18 years old, and is doing so much for the sport of swimming. It was a nice touch having journalists represented from different countries♡.
Coleman/SwimSwam didn’t facilitate this. Swimming Canada did. Coleman wasn’t even there, lol.
Although, I will say that I thought James had the most interesting question! Brittany’s was good too, a little tougher than the ones that general media usually ask.
Oh that’s hilarious. I saw Coleman’s name with the date above and thought he was the person speaking. The name display of the people are too small to see on my phone. My apologies!
Yeah didn’t mean to confuse – James and Swimming Canada are the real heroes here. I just posted it.
Please disregard above, Coleman was not in the interview, my mistake.