Tokyo Olympics, swimming: Ariarne Titmus cleared to return after shoulder injury

As US distance queen Katie Ledecky waits in the wings, Aussie star Ariarne Titmus is about to resume her Tokyo Olympic preparation after a ‘frustrating’ stint out of the pool.

Katie Ledecky and Ariarne Titmus. Picture: Quinn Rooney/Getty Images

Ariarne Titmus, one of Australian swimming’s biggest hopes for this year’s Tokyo Olympics, has been secretly working with Wayne Bennett’s fitness guru to get her gold-medal dreams back on track.

While speculation about her injured shoulder has been swirling around Australian pool decks since her mysterious absence from a pre-Olympic training camp, the true extent of her problems have remained a closely-kept secret — until now.

Finally given the all-clear to make her return to racing at this week’s Australian championships at the Gold Coast after skipping several key warm-up events, Titmus and her coach Dean Boxall have broken their silence on the ill-timed health scare, revealing the extraordinary treatment and rehabilitation she has undergone to get back in shape.

Ariarne Titmus is getting back in shape after a shoulder injury. Picture: David Fell

Prime among these has been recruiting Jeremy Hickmans, the famed Queensland fitness trainer who worked alongside Bennett for over a decade, winning NRL premierships with Brisbane and St George Illawarra, before he was unceremoniously dumped by the Broncos after the supercoach’s messy departure to South Sydney.

The Broncos’ loss has been swimming’s gain after Boxall reached out to Hickmans for help in preparing his squad of swimmers for the Olympics, in particular the careful management of Titmus’ shoulder.

“We’ve got some unbelievable people involved, like Peter Wells, who’s been an Olympic physio for three Olympics and Jeremy Hickmans, who was Wayne Bennett’s right-hand man,” Boxall told News Corp.

“He’s my strength and conditioning coach, and really looking after the rehab, and they’ve done a remarkable job.”

Already facing what most swimming experts agree is the toughest challenge in the sport — taking on American superstar Katie Ledecky — there’s no escaping the realisation that three months spent out of full training is a setback for Titmus.

Wayne Bennett’s go-to fitness man Jeremy Hickmans is helping Ariarne Titmus prepare for the Tokyo Olympics. Picture: Matt King/Getty Images

But “Arnie” says she’s not using that as an excuse and is confident her shoulder has now completely healed, leaving her just over 100 days to get herself back in mint condition.

“It’s been frustrating more than anything because I’ve not been able to do the work I feel that I need to do to be at my best,” Titmus said.

“But I’ve had an amazing team around me and we’ve done the best we could to get it under control.

“I feel like I’m definitely getting back on track and if I can do everything the best I can, I feel like, if I can get to Tokyo, I can be in great form.”

An emerging star in her own right, Titmus stunned the sports world when she beat the seemingly invincible Ledecky to win the 400m freestyle gold medal at the 2019 world championships in South Korea.

The now 20-year-old also won a relay gold, plus a silver medal in the 200m and a bronze in the 800m, and everything seemed to be going perfectly until she felt a twinge in her upper shoulder while racing at last year’s Queensland state championships.

She immediately withdrew from her other events and was sent for scans, which revealed she had injured her subscapulaire tendon, the largest of the four rotator cuff muscles.

Ariarne Titmus will compete at the Australian championships at the Gold Coast. Picture: Albert Perez/Getty Images

It is a common injury that swimmers sometimes get, that requires a lot of rest to fix, so Titmus was told to play it safe and take 14 weeks off full training.

“We’ve definitely been over cautious but I think you have to be because this is her first real injury, and she’s back in full training and seems to be ticking along nicely now,” Boxall said.

“It’s just a subscap tendon that basically just flared up. There’s no tear, there’s just no nothing, but it just needs to be managed because she’s a distance swimmer that does a lot of repetitive motion with her shoulder.”

Titmus returned to full training in Brisbane at the end of March and has entered the 100m, 200, 400m and 800m events at the Gold Coast — though has watered down her expectations because she’s just started a heavy training block so won’t be rested until the official trials, in mid June.

“I honestly don’t know where I’m at the moment so that’s going to be the biggest thing for me,” she said.

“I know where I’m at training-wise but it’s a different thing when you’ve got to put a race together so that’s pretty much the biggest thing I’m looking for, to see what I have to tweak before the trials.

“I just need to do some racing.”