‘I don’t think anyone understands’

TEARFUL Adam Ramsay-Peaty claims the next two years will be the “hardest climb” of his career as he eyes one final Olympics moment.

It is two years out from the LA Games but in the 100 metres breaststroke, Peaty is nowhere near where he wants to be.

A Commonwealth Games bronze medal on Saturday night was greeted with disapproval and annoyance as he cried backstage and tried to work out what exactly went wrong.

Peaty – the world-record holder and two-time Olympic champion in this discipline – is at a crossroads where he has to fathom what the next 24 months look like.

Having been through mental health battles and fallen out of love with the sport, reaching the top again could be the biggest fight he will ever face in the pool.

Peaty, aiming for his fourth Games in 2028, said: “There have been a multitude of things at play over the last few years – burnout, breaking my foot, fighting against something that you love. It’s been hard.

“Coming back to where I am now and making the decision to go for LA, I think this is going to be the hardest climb I’ve ever faced and the hardest test.

“It’s really hard to see the summit because it’s so hard. I don’t think anyone understands.”

In an emotional chat – he is known as a bloke who wears his heart on his sleeve – the 31-year-old said he cried because “I know how hard I work, I know the s* I’ve been through”.

Peaty – who finished behind Australian champion Sam Williamson and Jersey runner-up Filip Nowacki – is planning a debrief once the Glasgow Games are done.

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Not that he has long to work things out as he has the European Championships in Paris from August 10–16.

Wife Holly – who is expecting their first child – was in the Tollcross Centre stands and in a lovely moment, Peaty gently kissed her stomach after the swim.

This was the first time in official competition his name on the start sheet went down as Ramsay-Peaty but he did not live up to his sporting name as he was denied gold and silver, having produced a slow time of 59.65 seconds.

Last December, he got hitched to Holly, daughter of chef Gordon Ramsay, at Bath Abbey last December.

That glitzy celebrity ceremony was attended by former England captain David Beckham but was marred by an ongoing family feud with Peaty’s mother.

Though he did not say specifically what the “s*” was that he had been through – he talked about unacceptable online hate he had received – the family issue is part of the subtext to months of bottled-up, pent-up frustration.

Peaty said: “Emotions can cloud things, and the pain probably gets a little bit easier over the next few days.

“I don’t really know what went wrong in that race. The heats, the semi-finals and the final, I haven’t really felt super strong.

“In the final, I just felt really weak. So, I don’t really know. I was fitter in April with less training, which doesn’t really make sense.

“Maybe I’m on a plan that I don’t fully understand, and maybe it’ll take another two years to find the right way.

“There are just a lot of personal and professional things that I need to pull together and work out what’s important.

“And what the long-term goal is for my happiness and for my immediate family’s happiness as well.

“It’s not a good time – we know that. When your world record is three seconds away, we’ve got to seriously ask what’s going wrong because that’s not me.

“We need to look at it, interrogate it, look at the data, and ask whether it was an issue with race pace, fitness, or something else.”

On Sunday, 14 hours after that final, Peaty was back in action in the 50 metres breaststroke and won heat six in a time of 27.27 seconds – the fifth fastest mark out of 58 competitors.