Why Wiffen Will Always Have A Lane At Loughborough
"It's about the welfare of the athlete. We want the very best for Dan. It's the same for many other athletes and their coaches when it feels right for a swimmer to move on. No-one takes offence." - Mike Peyrebrune
When Daniel Wiffen leaves the fast lanes at Loughborough after the World Championships in August a year after historic Irish gold and bronze at the Paris Olympics, it'll be more a case of 'Go gcífe mé arís thú' than 'slán'.
It's 'see ya', or 'see you again', not 'goodbye', while talk of 'split' is a misunderstanding and easy bait for the click beyond the craic.
Think instead: alma mater, graduation, academic and swimming, en route to the rest of life. Loughborough is a place where goodbye makes no sense for achievers who understand achievement: the door swings; it doesn't slam, and there's no lock, no key required.
Whether coming or going, you belong, and when you go after having demonstrated deep dedication day after day, season after season, like Wiffen and Felix Auböck - the speedy Austrian hare the Irishman chased in pursuit of progress - you move in either direction with the blessing, and even encouragement, of the university, its performance centre - and its staff.
The Wiffen swim twins, Daniel and Nathan, already have their academic scrolls in the bag. In the water, Nathan is off to seek his masters, while still eligible for NCAA college status with the Cal Bears at Cal-Berkeley in California.
Things are somewhat different for Daniel because he not only graduated in brain but a class apart when it came to athletic brawn; with honours and one flying colour to rule them all - Olympic gold.
The latter is in big part no only down to the work of Andi Manley, head coach at Loughborough since Mel Marshall set sail Down Under for her own new adventure after Paris 2024, and Mike Peyrebrune, coach and sports scientist, but their understanding of the difference between 'Go gcífe mé arís thú' and 'slán'.
Daniel Wiffen has earned too much money to be a college swimmer in the U.S., so he'd be training and racing Pro for whatever length of time he spends in the States. Back home, the deals flowing out from Dublin dictate the need for a more permanent anchor in Ireland, wherever he may be. He's also entering a new, 'what next' phase of his career, keen to explore shores and pastures new in ways that help keep motivation and meaning alive and kicking for the long haul.
After the defence of his 800m and 1500m freestyle World titles in Singapore, where the fight unfolds between July 27 and August 3, Daniel will be registered at Swim Ireland's Dublin performance centre, where the head coach is Steve Beckerleg, but will spend much of his time over The Pond and far beyond with his twin for some deep California Dreaming and dedication to the thing he loves on the way to the next Games.
It's tempting to say that in San Francisco, he'll be 'just up the road' from the 2028 Olympic pool. He will, if you ask an Australian or an American of similar lunch-three-hours-away-no-worries-mate mindset - but not in Irish measures: Berkeley is about 350 miles (560km or so) north of Los Angeles, while a 302-mile (486km) gets you from the furthest two points north and south on the island of Ireland.
The shift has been long in the making of possibilities, with Wiffen heading out to explore potential ports new, with the company of his twin in mind alongside prospects in the pool and the training environment. The Cal Golden Bears unit is one of the world's premier swim programs.
The men's team, currently led by head coach David Durden, with associate head coaches David Marsh and Josh Huger, is a Who's Who of fast swimming hgoin g back decades since the days of Matt Biondi and before him. This century, Ryan Murphy, Nathan Adrian, Anthony Ervin, Jack Alexy, Wiffen's sometime training partner at Loughborough, Belgium's Lucas Henveaux, Spanish backstroke and medley ace Hugo Gonzalez, Josh Prenot, Jacob Pebley, Tom Shields, Hunter Armstrong and Brooks Curry are counted in the the classes of yore, yesterday and today.
Speaking to SOS about Wiffen's next wave, Peyrebrune, at home in Loughborough while Manley is away with the Under-23s team at the European age event in Slovakia, said:
"It's a natural graduation process. The last conversation we had with Dan on the subject was one in which Andi said 'we wish you all the best to go and do whatever it is you want and need to do... the door is always open', which came as a relief to Dan. He doesn't think of it as a split, and neither do we. We've been working with him to develop the next phase of his career.
"It's about the welfare of the athlete. We want the very best for Dan. It's the same for many other athletes and their coaches when it feels right for a swimmer to move on. No-one takes offence."
Manley and Peyrebrune guided Wiffen to gold in the 800m and bronze in the 1500m in Paris last year, results that represent Swim Ireland's greatest outcome in Olympic waters. Since then, the 800m European record of 7:38.19 in which Wiffen claimed the biggest prize in his sport has been lowered to 7:38.12 by Germany's Sven Schwarz:
Craig Lord
Wiffen, 23, still holds the 800 short-course WR, at 7:20.46, and will arrive in Singapore as the defending World l/c champion in the 800m and 1500m as one of the relative few who backed up with podium swims in Paris after excelling at the Doha 2024 World Championships last year.
The journey is intense, intensive and the single-minded focus required has something of the pressure cooker about it. Adam Peaty, Kristof Milak, Caeleb Dressel, Ariarne Titmus, Kaylee McKeown, Molly O'Callaghan and many more have faced a moment when the chart may shout 'keep going', the path already taken proves its worth it, but the heart, soul, body and mind are screaming 'Time Out!"
A change is as good as a rest, the saying goes. Sometimes. At certain phases in a career, and then depending on whose career, in what circumstances and with what end. Take Kathleen Genevieve Ledecky: Yuri Suguiyama, Bruce Gemmell, Greg Meehan, Anthony Nesty. She credits them all for their part in her soaring success and story of epic longevity at the peak of endurance swimming. No offence taken, for all are key players in greatness budding, unfolding, blossoming and, sometime when, becoming the strong shoulder on which the next season's crop will rise on.
Whatever happens at Singapore Worlds until the last race of Ledecky's career, it'll be heads held high for all concerned as swimmer - her backing an orchestra of coaching, sports science, family and others in tow - continues to aspire to be the best she can be with each passing challenge: from staying ahead of Mireia Belmonte and defender Becky Adlington over 800m aged 15 at London 2012, then on to battles, some as winner, others as learner of different lessons, with Federica Pellegrini and Sarah Sjöström in the 200m, Ariarne Titmus in the 400 and 800m, Simona Quadarella in the 800m, and now, Summer McIntosh in the 400 and 800m, with Lani Pallister on the win in the 800 and 1500m, too.
Every generation has its own 'golden era' going on in one form or another - and the club above is a prime example of the extraordinary in the company of the exceptional.
Taking of McIntosh, which coach did she travel to altitude with recently? Which coach is she gravitating towards after Singapore 2025 Worlds?
And ... tap into Peyrebrune's wisdom on the topic of altitude, its ways and merits ... read on...
