INDIANAPOLIS – (Editor’s note: Olympic athletes competing in the marquee sports of gymnastics, swimming and track and field train for one shot at gold every four years with little margin for error. The Associated Press followed several of those athletes during their preparations for the Paris Games, including Ryan Murphy).
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Jacksonville-area native Ryan Murphy, who grew up in Ponte Vedra Beach and swam for The Bolles School, longs to reclaim the top spot on the medal podium at the Paris Olympics.
America's backstroke star was relegated to silver and bronze in his individual races at Tokyo — a performance that still irks him just a bit.
“There’s definitely no shortage of motivation from my end,” said Murphy, who will be competing in the men's 100 and 200-meter back for the third Olympics in row. “I feel like I’ve always got a fire under my butt."
The 29-year-old Floridian, who trains at Cal-Berkeley, has been a worthy successor to the long run of backstroke success in the U.S.
Picking up the baton from giants such as John Nabor, Rick Carey, Lenny Krayzelburg, Aaron Peirsol and Matt Grevers, Murphy has left his own impressive mark.
At the Rio de Janeiro Olympics in 2016, he swept the men's backstroke events and added a third gold as part of the 4x100 medley relay.
He followed up at the pandemic-delayed Tokyo Games with a runner-up finish in the 200 and a third-place showing in the 100, to go along with another gold in the medley relay.
Murphy motivated to train harder
To win any medal at the Olympics is quite an achievement, but it wasn't good enough for the demanding Murphy.
Especially since the victories by Russia's Evgeny Rylov in both backstroke events ended an impressive American streak. The U.S. men had swept every 100 and 200 back going all the way back to the 1996 Atlanta Games — a total of 12 gold medals in a row.
“The world is getting faster," said Grevers, who came out of retirement to compete just for fun at this year's Olympic trials. "We won golds for a very long time, but the world has kind of caught up to the U.S.”
For Murphy, that pushes him to go ever harder.
“I want to win every time I touch the water, whether that’s a Monday morning practice or an Olympic finals,” he said.
While Tokyo was a bit of a disappointment, and stirred up talk of doping within the sport by Russia and other countries, Murphy's consistency over such a long period is impressive indeed. No American male has won backstroke medals over three Summer Games, which is what he hopes to achieve in the City of Light.
“I always feel more for the veterans, especially people going for their third Olympics,” said Grevers, who competed in two Summer Games but came up just short in his next two attempts to make the powerhouse U.S. team. “You have to be on your game for a very long time, and the pressure stacks each time.”
While burnout and mental issues have plagued some of the world's top swimmers, Murphy has managed to stay on top of his game for nearly a decade. In addition to six Olympic medals, he's won 17 medals, including seven golds, at long-course world championships and another 14 medals — nine of them gold — at the 25-meter worlds.
“I try to be as consistent as possible every day,” Murphy said. “I think the biggest thing in a sport like swimming, where we kind of have few opportunities to race at this level, you have to pull motivation from a lot of different parts of your life.”
Some days in training, he's just trying to get his hand to the wall faster than everyone else. Other days, he's concentrating on getting his technique as close to perfect as possible. Still others, he's fixated on sticking his routine.
Even now, after all these years, “I’m really motivated to try to improve,” he said.
Where Murphy does his best work in the pool
While it's not uncommon in swimming to bounce around from one coach to another, Murphy has maintained a more than decade-long partnership with Cal coach Dave Durden.
“The biggest thing that you want as an athlete is to know that your coach is constantly thinking about how you can improve,” Murphy said. “We want to work hard because we don’t want to let Dave down. He’s the man. I’ve got a lot of love for Dave, and it’s been a great ride."
Murphy does some of his best work on the starts and in the turns.
His reaction time off the blocks is quicker than just about anyone else in the world. And his work underwater is a sight to behold.
Throughout the U.S. Olympic trials in Indianapolis, Murphy would go into the turn trailing another backstroker. Then, a powerful kick off the wall would send his body wiggling under the surface like a speedy dolphin. Inevitably, he would be ahead when he finally popped back up nearly halfway down the 50-meter pool.
Murphy was born in Chicago but his family moved to the Jacksonville, Florida area when he was just a youngster. While he spends much of his time these days on the West Coast, he maintains close ties to his adopted hometown of Ponte Vedra Beach, especially through his love of the NFL’s Jacksonville Jaguars.
He’s already looking forward to the new season, with quarterback Trevor Lawrence — who recently signed a long-term deal — looking to lead the Jaguars back to the playoffs after they just missed out a year ago.
“They have some more tall weapons on offense, so we’ll see how it goes," Murphy said.
Of course, his primary focus remains at the pool, Murphy isn't sure how long he wants to compete, but he's not ready to ponder his legacy.
There's still races to win, medals to collect.
“I’ve always thought that I’ll appreciate my career a little bit more when I’m done swimming, and I can kind of zoom out," Murphy said. "For right now, I’m really zoomed in on everything I’m doing on a day-to-day basis.”
But the 39-year-old Grevers, with his competitive career behind him, is in a position to look at the big picture.
He couldn't have picked a better guy to carry on America's backstroke tradition.
“We're in great hands,” Grevers said. “He's just an incredible guy, an incredibly strong leader. Professional, charismatic, he's got all the traits you're looking for. To know that he's kind of protecting and upholding the backstroke legacy for the U.S., it feels great.
"We couldn't be in better hands."
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AP Summer Olympics: https://apnews.com/hub/2024-paris-olympic-games