As James Guy prepares to fight for Olympic medals this summer, he may think back to last year’s first lockdown when he was competing with his mother for use of the garden swimming pool.
When Boris Johnson declared a full shutdown of the country in March 2020, Guy was forced to leave Bath University’s elite sports training village and went back home to his parents’ place in Cheshire.
The Team GB athlete was then sent a 15-foot Bedfordshire pool worth £35,000 to train in, where would spend two hours each day in the pool between March and the end of May – but only when he managed to get his mother Cath out of it.
Team GB swimmer James Guy is off to Tokyo after a tumultuous year training in lockdown
Guy spent several months training in lockdown in a pool in his parents’ garden in Cheshire
The 25-year-old tells Sportsmail: ‘My mum used it as a f***ing jacuzzi half the time! It was quite a nice pool to be fair. She would go in there on the weekend with a glass of champagne and just chill out.’
Last year’s postponement of the Tokyo Games could not have come at a worse time for the Manchester-born athlete. Having just switched to the stewardship of successful swimming coach Dave McNulty, Guy was feeling his best in some years.
He recalls: ‘I set myself a goal. All in, 2020 was going to be my year. My diet, nutrition, sleep, time away from the pool, everything was just bang on point. I was training really really well, whatever Dave gave me in the pool – the challenging sessions – I just did it.
‘Obviously when it got cancelled I was upset, I wanted to live my Olympic dream and go again. Deep down it affected me a little bit, but then I realised I had one more year to get everything right again and keep working.’
The Manchester-born swimmer had to fight off his mother who used the pool as a jacuzzi
Having his family look over him while training is not an irregular feeling for Guy. Sport and competitiveness has run through his family over several generations.
His grandfather George was a successful boxer in India in the 1950s, while his only son Andrew, James’ father, is a former army instructor – and the unrelenting influence behind the swimmer’s career.
In order to be closer to James when he moved to £30,000-a-year Millfield School on a sports scholarship, both Andrew and Cath sold their house near Manchester to move down to Somerset – a 250-mile relocation job to support their son in his bid to become the world’s best.
Andrew has even inspired James’ brother Luke, himself a promising swimmer as a youngster, to act as his sibling’s data analysis advisor to prepare him for races and meets.
Guy comes from a strict family – his father is an ex-army trainer and his grandad was a boxer
‘My dad would get me up at 4.10am and drive me to the pool,’ Guy remembers. ‘It was a big commitment at a young age, about nine or ten. And I’d just do it, not even question it, and that was my own choice.
‘He did push me hard mentally and it worked. He would look over at me in the stands with a stopwatch and pen. He was absolutely a keen parent, wanting their child to do well. Usually the child quits but I chose to keep going.
‘It was my choice to swim and he said, “I want to push you to be the best in the world.” If you asked my Dad if he ever thought James would become a world champion, he would’ve said yes.’
Indeed, despite concerns about being just 5ft 5in in his early teens, Guy shot up not only to 6ft 2in but to the very top of the swimming world. A victory in the 2015 World Aquatics Championships in the 200m freestyle made him the favourite for a gold medal in that category for Rio 2016.
Guy’s father forced him up at 4.10am every morning to train in the pool and reach the top
But the then-20-year-old allowed the pre-Games hype to get the better of him, with the Team GB star finishing in fourth place in the Olympic final – an agonising 0.2 seconds off a medal.
‘I just put too much pressure on myself,’ he claims. ‘It wasn’t the old James Guy that everyone knew. Getting fourth was a sign from God that things just weren’t meant to be.
‘I remember touching fourth and I was devastated. I remember going up to the stands and crying to my mum and dad. I was 20 years-old and heartbroken.
‘Fourth at the Olympic Games is a huge achievement but I thought I was going there to medal. Being the world champion the year before, to come fourth is the worst place to finish.’
Guy went into Rio 2016 as the 200m free world champion but was just 0.2s off a medal
The dejected Guy needed to pick himself off the floor in time for the 4x200m freestyle relay the following day – but this time another family member came to the swimmer’s rescue.
‘I called my grandma,’ he recalls. ‘I told her my head’s gone. She said, “What will be will be. Just enjoy it, your grandad would be so proud of you.” I then just switched and came back. My grandma really pulled my head around big time.’
In that relay final, Guy was tasked with swimming the final leg against Team USA’s Michael Phelps in the Olympic legend’s penultimate career race. Great Britain were in third or fourth place by the time Guy entered the water – the Manchester swimmer hauled his nation to a silver medal with a time faster than Phelps’.
Guy (far right) responded by winning the 4×200 freestyle silver and the 4×100 medley silver
It was his first ever medal at the Olympics and a second followed just a few days later in the 4×100 medley metre relay. Guy helped Team GB break the European record to claim another silver – which acted as more of a consolation to Guy’s freestyle heartbreak a few days before.
He has since gone from the fourth-fastest swimmer at the 200m freestyle to not even qualifying for that discipline at all. That is down to the fast pace of close friend Duncan Scott and training partner Tom Dean, who both broke the British record at the Olympic swimming trials in April.
Guy claims: ‘If I was going to get beat, that is the way I wanted to happen. It’s nice to see the 200m freestyle has moved on. I’ve been Great Britain’s top 200 free racer since 2013 – so to hand over the crown to two of the boys that I get on really well with, fair enough.
‘I’m happy they’ve done that, now they can carry the flag for a little bit – I’ve done my bit for a long time. When they need me for the 4x200m relay, they know I’m very reliable and I’ve got the experience behind me to do the business.’
Guy (third left) will not be in the 200m freestyle in Tokyo because Duncan Scott and Tom Dean (far left and second left) are too good
Both Scott and Dean are likely to compete with one another for the 200m freestyle Olympic gold medal, which is currently held by Chinese athlete Sun Yang – who saw an eight-year ban handed to him in February 2020 for failing a doping drugs test rejected by the Swiss Federal Supreme Court.
Sun could return to action should he be cleared by the Court of Arbitration in a pending anti-doping retrial later this month, but Guy is fully against the Chinese swimmer competing in Tokyo.
‘He shouldn’t be there,’ the Team GB star claims. ‘He’s got a ban and he has to serve it. If he comes back before the Olympics, then that will stir a massive uproar. A lot of people in the swimming world should back me on this in saying he shouldn’t be there. It’s just crystal clear.
Guy has spoken out against the planned reintroduction of Sun Yang (above) into swimming
‘Don’t get me wrong – take out what he’s done in failing the drug test, he’s an amazing athlete. He’s got an amazing stroke and he’s built for swimming. But at the end of the day, doing what he did is banned. It’s not supported by WADA and FINA.
‘It’s cheating. It’s not going to satisfy the athletes if he’s there racing.’
It is a bittersweet statement from Guy, who once looked up to Sun as an idol when he first emerged onto the scene. The British star was touched when Sun handed him a signed cap when they first raced at the 2013 World Championships and Guy’s 2015 200m freestyle gold means he is only one of three people to beat the Chinese champion in a major race.
Guy continues: ‘Before he came out, he was a massive hero of mine. I looked up to him – his absolute force of a stroke, the way he swam. He was the best in the world. He had that perfect technique that you don’t find very often.
Sun (second right) was handed an eight-year ban in February 2020 for failing a drugs test
‘I think he’ll be there (in Tokyo). I can’t control what he’s doing or see what he’s doing. I just care about my team-mates and my good mates in Australia and America who are really close to me.’
Those closest to Guy have indeed been dragged into the Sun debate in recent years. Close friend and Team GB team-mate Scott refused to stand on the podium with him at the 2019 World Championships due to the controversy, causing the Chinese swimmer to shout, “You’re a loser, I’m a winner” at the Briton before being hit with the doping ban.
Scott was booed by the South Korean crowd for his stance, one that Guy supported at the time.
‘We completely backed it,’ Guy maintained. ‘Duncan’s a good friend of mine and I have full respect for him doing that.’
Guy backed Duncan Scott (far right) who refused to stand with Sun on the 2019 Worlds podium
Guy’s Tokyo playbook looks rather different to five years ago in Rio, even though will once again be part of Team GB’s Olympic relay teams – including the 4×100 medley race which Britain are favourites for having won European and World Championship golds in recent years.
His individual attention now turns to butterfly, having qualified for the 100m that Team USA’s Caeleb Dressel currently dominates. The American star broke the world record with a time of 49.5 seconds at the Worlds two years ago, but Guy is confident of emerging with the gold medal.
Speaking about Dressel, Guy insists: ‘He’s the man to beat. He’s a great athlete and what he’s done is change the 100m butterfly race massively. But I know if I’m near my personal best or I’m around it then I’m in a chance for the medals.
Guy (left) is part of the Team GB 4x200m relay favourites for gold in Tokyo this summer
The 25-year-old will also compete in the 4×100 medley and 100m butterfly in Japan this year
‘Sometimes the Olympic finals aren’t that quick, it’s more about racing. The times are completely irrelevant.
‘At the end of the day it’s going to come down to who is racing the smartest and who’s doing the work. I know I’ve done the work, so it’s now about racing smart.’
This could well be Guy’s final Olympic Games, with the Briton already making strides to enter the real estate industry when he hangs up his goggles and cap for the last time.
But the Briton is now completely focused on ending his career on a high, before going on to sell high-end properties.