Kyle Chalmers’ dream of three Olympic Games almost crippled by back injury

A 100 metres freestyle win at the Australian Olympic swimming trials secured Kyle Chalmers a ticket to his third Games. But he almost didn’t make it to the starting blocks.

Kyle Chalmers has revealed a serious back injury almost crippled his Olympic dreams with the sprint king relying upon cortisone injections just to even qualify for the Australian team.

Just 12 days ago Chalmers was in excruciating pain having taken a day off from his gardening labourer job on the Sunshine Coast, with four visits per day to the Australian team physiotherapist just enough to get the 25-year-old onto the blocks for the Olympic trials in Brisbane.

Chalmers rated his qualification onto his third Olympic team the most emotional of his career, given his well-publicised injury history including ankle, shoulder and heart surgery plus mental health battles.

Chalmers battled a back injury in the lead up to the Australian Olympic swimming trials. Picture: David Gray / AFP

But it was a day on the couch which almost brought it all undone. He woke up stiff after a day off the tools and suffered back spasms at training.

“I tried to do a dive and it just all spasm and locked up,” Chalmers said.

“So I saw the physios and doctors and the best thing I could do was to get four cortisones in my lower back and try to get moving again.

“Obviously I’ve had ankle and shoulder problems in my career, but when you have one of them, you can kind of use your other three limbs to get around it. Whereas the back is the controller of everything.

“I’m just grateful to be here racing today and be back on the mend. I know that I can get it right in six weeks time but having only 10 days is probably not a huge amount of time, really.

“Today’s actually the best day it’s felt … I’ve been seeing the physio four times a day since I’ve been here just trying to loosen everything off and activate everything so that I’m able to swim and yeah, I think I’ve put on a pretty brave face to be able to get through but it’s definitely been quite challenging just getting in and out of bed and starting the day and it’s just something that kind of sticks in the back of your mind.”

Despite the injury, Chalmers maintained his domestic dominance and will head to Paris with a three-year unbeaten streak in the 100m freestyle that stretches back to the 2021 Tokyo Olympics when he was beaten by a fingernail in a thrilling final with US star Caeleb Dressel.

Chalmers after his defeat to Dressel in 2021. Picture: Xavier Laine/Getty Images

Since then Chalmers has won the 2023 world title, 2023 world short course title and the 2022 Commonwealth Games title on the international stage in a supreme winning streak that proves why the 25-year-old is a huge gold medal threat in Paris.

At a national level he is undefeated for over a decade, a reign he extended again on Thursday night as he led home the Olympic trials in Brisbane in a time of 47.75 seconds.

Chalmers won the race ahead of William Yang (48.08s), Flynn Southam (48.11s), Jack Cartwright (48.49s), Kai Taylor (48.57s) and Zac Incerti (48.73s).

The time was well outside Chalmers’ best performance and almost a full second shy of China’s Pan Zhanle world record of 46.80s which means despite his winning streak the Aussie champion will head to Paris as somewhat of an underdog.

But as Chalmers has proven time and again, international meets are won not by the fastest man in the pool but the best racer.

And when it comes to Paris, Chalmers is putting it all on the line in the pursuit of a second 100m freestyle Olympic crown to bookend his career.

“Mentally, emotionally, I’m in a very, very good spot,” he said.

“I think that I’m able to rise above the adversity and the challenges that have been thrown at me.

“And that’s only because of you know, it’s happened so many times throughout my career that I’ve had to rise above something.”

Originally published as Kyle Chalmers’ dream of three Olympic Games almost crippled by back injury