Cam McEvoy will be 38 when Brisbane hosts the 2032 Olympics. He’s keen

Ariarne Titmus is still pencilled in as a “maybe” to defend her 400m crown again at the 2028 LA Games, but fellow gold medallist Cam McEvoy says he is not only keen to swim on, he wants to compete as a 38-year-old at the 2032 Olympics in Brisbane.

Australian swimming’s mad professor shared the plans for his next experiment after arriving back on home soil on Wednesday, joining a large contingent of Aussie Olympians at a homecoming event at Sydney Airport.

The Paris Olympics were McEvoy’s fourth, but he’d never returned wearing a gold medal before.

McEvoy’s triumph in the 50m men’s freestyle was Australia’s first medal in the event, and at 30, made him the oldest Australian to win an individual Olympic swimming medal.

With a degree in physics and maths, McEvoy did it after revolutionising his training. He vastly reduced his training load, bulked up and focused on speed and power in short sessions.

So with the training at a new level of sustainability, there is no contemplation of hanging up the goggles.

Cam McEvoy celebrates his gold medal.Credit: Getty

“I am definitely looking toward ’28. There is a lot I want to do in between, as well,” McEvoy said.

“We have racing next year for worlds, and then [I will plan] how to get to LA in one piece and better than how I was in Paris. And do that while keeping Brisbane in mind, and hopefully get to Brisbane [in 2032] too.”

Most swimmers are retired by the time they reach 30, if not because of the tedium of training, then because success against younger athletes is difficult. But McEvoy has already proved the training can be done differently and, typically, has crunched the data on older swimmers winning.

“An American [Anthony Ervin] won the 50m free in Rio at 35 in 2016, so it is very doable,” McEvoy said. “There is a 42-year-old who won a butterfly world championship [Nicolas Santos in 2022]. So age is on my side … and it’d hard to pass that up.”

McEvoy said the incredible home crowds at the pool in Paris, which roared for his rival Florent Manaudou and hometown hero Leon Marchand, made the appeal of experiencing the same support in Brisbane very enticing.

“I was the generation that came just after Sydney, and Sydney has long been touted as the best Olympics,” McEvoy said. “So I want to be a part of an Australian Olympics – I am sure that’d be insane.”

Ariarne Titmus with her mum and dad at the Olympic return function.Credit: Rhett Wyman

The oldest Australian to win an Olympic swimming medal is Cecil Healy, who won a relay medal in 1912 – but he was just 150 days older than McEvoy in Paris. Ervin is the oldest to win an Olympic gold medal, after taking out the 50m freestyle in Sydney, and then shocking the world to win the event again in Rio in 2016.

Titmus, meanwhile, was giving no firm commitments on Wednesday about swimming on in Los Angeles in 2028, where she would seek a third consecutive 400m title. Only three women have won three consecutive gold medals in individual events: Dawn Fraser (100m freestyle), Krisztina Egerszegi (200m backstroke) and Katie Ledecky (800m freestyle).

Kaylee McKeown could add her name to the list, and she is still only 23 years old.

“We’ll see – I would love to get to three Olympics and going to try and defend my title in the 400m freestyle would be a massive feat,” Titmus said.

“But it is very hard to comprehend at the moment. I am just trying to enjoy as much as I can. These moments don’t come around often, so I think I will regret it if I don’t absorb this as much as I can.”