The women’s 200m freestyle is impossible to predict. Now it’s Arnie’s to lose — but only just

Mollie O’Callaghan is playing the underdog card in Paris.

The second-fastest woman in the world over 200m declared after her narrow semi-final loss to stablemate Ariarne Titmus that she would have “nothing to lose” when the pair meet again to tussle for the title at Paris La Defence Arena at 5.48am Tuesday AEST. It will be the biggest race since … Titmus conquered Katie Ledecky to win the 400m freestyle two nights earlier.

O’Callaghan was six hundredths of a second slower than Titmus in the semi (beaten by a gold-painted Titmus fingernail) and the 20-year-old claimed relinquishing the world record to her training partner in the most pulsating of races at last month’s selection trials meant there was no pressure on her in Paris.

“I think the pressure of having that world record previously weighed on me and screwed me around,” O’Callaghan told Nine.

“To walk in here and be like this is my first [individual swim at an] Olympics, I have no title on my head, nothing to lose.”

Titmus and Callaghan barely looked at each other after hitting the wall in their semi. They both train under the eccentric coach Dean Boxall, but O’Callaghan spends most of her time with the sprint group while Titmus slugs it out with the middle-distance crew. The 200m final will bring the warrior (Titmus) up against the worrier (O’Callaghan).

Mollie O’Callaghan says she will have nothing to lose when she goes up against Titmus in the 200m freestyle final.Credit: Getty Images

O’Callaghan is famously nervy, and dissolved into tears after she was beaten by Titmus at the trials as soon as she was away from the cameras. Titmus has looked in complete control in Paris so far, of her emotions and her races. Asked how she felt after she was beaten by Ledecky in the heats of the 400m on the opening morning of competition here, Titmus responded: “Bro, it’s a heat.”

“I was lot calmer [here] than I was at nationals,” O’Callaghan said after clocking 1:54.70 to Titmus’ 1:54.70. Both Australians looked comfortable. “Obviously, I still get nerves. Like I’m lying there in bed trying to nap before the night [session] and I can’t nap because I’m just overthinking so much. But I have an amazing support team behind me.”

After the morning heats, O’Callaghan went so far as to pile the pressure on Titmus, who is gunning for the 200-400, back-to-back double. “I’m not ranked first, so in the end the pressure is on the people who are No.1 or past Olympic champions,” she said. That would be Arnie.

Titmus, for her part, indicated her strategy in the final would be to go out hard and try to hold when O’Callaghan puts her foot down in the last 50 metres, as she did on Sunday night. “They have more speed. I have to go out, hold on. I have to play to my strengths,” said Titmus.

“It’s going to be a tough race tomorrow for sure. But it will be good to see what I’m capable of, get out there and have a crack. It’s been a massive two days.”

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