Opinion: Faster, higher, stronger - how sports research can help win gold medals

The key to Australia’s swim team continuing their domination of Olympic Games might come down to something simple as touch and go — fractions of a second.

It’s the dive, the first 15m underwater in the swim, and the fractions of a second won or lost in the underwater turns at the end of each lap.

It’s the one-percenters coaches harp on about that have delivered a record medal tally to Australia.

And, in doing so, has put the 2028 and 2032 games teams under notice that the adoring public will expect nothing less than success.

Coming off the back of Australia’s most successful Olympic Games, led by our world-beating swim team, coaches in all spheres will now look to further innovation in sports nutrition, mechanics and psychology that may further drive performance enhancement.

Some of our senior swimmers are also driving some of these innovations, with Cameron McEvoy, the 2024 Olympic 50m freestyle champion, being one example.

After disappointing results in the 2021 Olympics, McEvoy questioned the internationally accepted approach as to whether high swimming volume is beneficial for sprint swimmers.

He began to train more like a sprint cyclist. He massively reduced his time in the pool and focused more on strength and conditioning and rock climbing to maximise his muscular power.

Some of our innovative swimming coaches and sport scientists identified the start, underwater and turn phases of some of our elite and developing swimmers needed improvement to be competitive at the top.

Therefore, the Australian Institute of Sport, Queensland Academy of Sport and Swimming Australia supported a number of PhD projects (several of which have been conducted at Bond University) to improve these crucial aspects.

Analysis will begin to understand what led to such success so we can replicate those results.

New sport policy, greater levels of funding and a rise in female athletes are a few areas to consider.

The Australian Sports Commission’s “Win Well” strategy highlighted how our athletes win is just as important as the result itself.

In December 2022 the ASC celebrated that, for the first time, the country’s peak Olympic, Paralympic and Commonwealth games organisations have joined forces to launch a national strategy aimed at building success towards Brisbane 2032 and beyond.

Win Well is a foundation of the strategy and a new national commitment to balancing ambitious sporting goals with cultures that are safe, fair and supportive.

The stories behind an athlete’s success motivated the Australian team, spectators and the nation.

The stories behind the Fox sisters, Emma McKeon, and skateboarders Keegan Palmer and Arisa Trew, are only a few of the amazing chapters Australians are embracing.

These inspire the next generation of athletes vying for a place on the team in 2028 or 2032.

The particularly outstanding results of our female swimmers is something that has been observed across multiple Olympic cycles, that perhaps reflects a number of sociodemographic factors.

Of the 53 medals won by Australia, 33 were won by female athletes or teams, with 13 out of the 18 gold medals won by female athletes.

From a national perspective, it may directly and indirectly reflect the outcomes from the federally funded Female Performance and Health Initiative, established in October 2019 to improve female athlete specific knowledge and systems of support.

The Federal Government announced an additional $283 million investment to sport in June 2024.

This is the biggest high-performance sport investment ever made by an Australian Government, enabling many athletes to train full time, while supporting more staff and coaches in the lead-up to Paris 2024.

The ASC has supported and invested in female sport over the years and the results in Paris reflected this investment.

Will the research conducted as a part of this initiative provide further information to coaches and sport scientists on ways to better support the training, dietary and recovery practices of female swimmers, and how this may differ to what is optimal for males?

Justin Keogh is Associate Dean of research at Bond University’s Institute of Health and Sport. Dr Lisa Gowthorp is an Associate Professor of Sports Management at Bond University.