Australian swimming legend Emily Seebohm is preparing for her fourth Olympic Games in Tokyo next month, but has told Sportsday WA the milestone might not be enough.
Seebohm and Tokyo-teammate Cate Campbell will join Leisel Jones as the only Australian swimmers to ever make four Olympics, but Seebohm said she isn’t ruling out a fifth.
“I've always said I'd go to four and that's it, I'd retire,” she said.
“But now that it's only three years until the next one, I'm like ‘can I do five?’. Three years sounds way better than four years. But, do I really want to still be doing this at 32?"
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Seebohm burst onto the Olympic scene at the age of 15 at the 2008 Beijing Games.
She won a gold medal with the women’s 4x100m Medley Relay and finished ninth in the 100m backstroke.
Since then, she’s gone on to win another four Olympic medals and a total of 53 medals on the global stage - from Commonwealth Games, World Championships and more.
Despite the lengthy career, her excitement at qualifying for the Tokyo Games is still there.
"That night I was so emotional and I'm not a very emotional person at all - I barely ever cry,” she said.
“It was just something that really meant so much to me.
“I think one of the hardest things is trying to come back after failure and trying to get back to that top level that you need to be at. After missing the team (for the FINA 2019 World Championships), this was such a massive moment.
“When I get on the plane I'll know that it's real but at the moment I still think I'm dreaming."
Seebohm finished second in the 100m and 200m backstroke events at the Australian Swimming Trials earlier this month, behind teenage superstar Kaylee McKeown who broke the world record in the 100m race and the Commonwealth record in the 200m.
"It was amazing being able to be in that race when that happened,” Seebohm said.
“There was a photo going around of Kaylee when she was nine or 10 and I must have been 18 or 19. She'd gotten a photo with me at one of the meets when I was competing for Australia, and now to be on the same team together and the same events is just mind blowing."
Reflecting on her more than decade-long involvement in the Olympics, Seebohm said they have shaped the person she’s become.
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"Each of those Olympics has given me so much in my life. They've given me so many tools and different experiences," Seebohm continued.
"If I go back and think of Beijing, I just think of how young I was and how much I didn't understand what the Olympics were. I was so excited to be there that I didn't really notice it was the Olympics.
“Whereas London came along and I trained so much harder for that because I'd been on the team for so long leading up to it. There was way more pressure on that one. Then when Rio came around, I was dealing with health issues that made that really difficult.
“But I wouldn't be the same person if I didn't go through all those three Olympics in three different ways.
"Every Olympics, there's always something going on and it's always different. This one will honestly take the cake for how different it's going to be. But it's still an Olympics and it's still something we've all been training for for a very long time - obviously an extra year. I think going into this one, it will be extra special. It means so much that we're given the opportunity to be able to do this, to do what we love and compete for Australia which is honestly the best experience ever."
Swimming at the Tokyo Olympics is set to take place from 24 July to 1 August at the Tokyo Aquatics Centre.
Australia is sending a swimming team of 35 athletes.