Australian swimmer Kaylee McKeown speaks to olympic.org about her medal-winning exploits at the Youth Olympic Games (YOG) Buenos Aires 2018, how the COVID-19 pandemic has impacted her, and her dream of competing at the Olympic Games Tokyo 2020.

Gary Hall Senior won medals at three Olympic Games and held numerous world records, but on one late-August day in 1972, it was Hall’s friend, clubmate and fellow competitor, Mark Spitz, who set the sporting world alight, as Hall explains…

Whether winning five gold medals or punching a shark, Gary Hall Junior was one of the USA’s highest-profile swimmers across three Olympic Games. That he topped the podium while also managing type 1 diabetes makes his story all the more remarkable. Now he is offering an Olympian & Paralympian Online Experience – a 60-minute one-on-one Zoom call in which he offers advice and guidance on “Competing with Type 1 with a Gold Medallist”.

Having overcome an ongoing heart condition to power his way to 100m freestyle gold at Rio 2016, it is little surprise to learn that Australian swimmer Kyle Chalmers is not allowing the current COVID-19 shutdown to cause him any unnecessary palpitations.

It is simple as far as five-time Olympic swimming champion Ian Thorpe is concerned: we must “remain positive, connect and communicate”. And with both the Australian’s sporting career and subsequent life emphasising triumph over adversity, he knows what he is talking about.

As we celebrate the one-year anniversary of the 3rd Summer Youth Olympic Games (YOG), olympic.org highlights some of the young athletes who have gone on to make their name on the global stage since shining in Buenos Aires.

Born in August 1996, a few days after the Closing Ceremony of the Atlanta Games, American Caeleb Dressel seems poised for Olympic glory in Tokyo in 2020. At the Gwangju World Championships in Korea, he once again demonstrated the extent of his talent by winning six gold medals. He has undoubtedly become the swimming world’s new leading talent.

Almost every major sports fan in the world knows swimmer Michael Phelps won a gasp-inducing eight Olympic gold medals at the Beijing 2008 Games, but far fewer will recall that the record-setting haul would never have happened without the super-human efforts of USA teammate Jason Lezak. Here, the relay specialist reflects on his role in one of the most memorable moments in Olympic history.

The first-ever women’s Olympic swimming event was the 100m freestyle, a competition that began on 8 July 1912, at the Olympic Games in Stockholm. Competing for Australasia, 22-year-old swimming sensation Fanny Durack, who had taken to the “Australian crawl” better than anyone, was in scintillating form, setting a world record in the heats and securing a comfortable victory in the final. In doing so, she claimed the first-ever women’s Olympic swimming gold medal and became Australia’s first female Olympic medallist.