Freya Colbert heads into the Olympics as a world champion – but she accepts gold is almost certainly out of reach in Paris with Summer McIntosh looming over her.
Colbert won the women’s 400 metres individual medley at the World Championships in February, albeit in a weakened field, with McIntosh among several high-profile swimmers who opted to skip the event in Doha.
The 17-year-old Canadian has been tipped to be a breakout star of the Games and she laid down a marker by lowering her own world record time at national trials in May – almost 10 seconds quicker than the personal best Colbert recorded a month earlier.
As such, Colbert would simply be happy to share a podium with her young rival.
“I don’t think like there is massive eyes on myself in particular, which I quite like,” Colbert said. “I don’t think it’s going to happen that I’ll come in with the gold.
“Initially there was a bit of anxiety going into this as a world champion but I’m not really hoping to win, I’m just hoping to make it on the podium. I don’t feel the need to have other people bigging me up.
“It wouldn’t help me and would just make me a bit more stressed. I’ve already got enough outward pressure on myself, I don’t need pressure from external sources.
“I’m under the radar in a good way and all props to Summer, she deserves all of the attention and favouritism for gold – I think something will have to go very wrong for her not to win the gold.”
The tag of being world champion weighed heavily on Colbert at first, with the 20-year-old from Grantham admitting she doubted whether she could thrive on the highest stage.
But her win in Qatar has gradually instilled some faith in her abilities and she will now aim to become Britain’s first female medallist in the pool in an individual event since Rio 2016.
“I can be quite hard on myself,” she said. “I don’t think of myself as being number one in the world because I’m really not.
“I never really believed in myself or had the most confidence I was going to be someone who was challenging for medals at the very highest level when I was growing up in swimming.
“Having that (world championships gold medal) under my belt has really helped give me the confidence boost to know I can be someone who is up there in the top five in the world pretty consistently.”