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It was the mundanity behind the drama that still nibbles at Adam Peaty. The unremarkable way in which a remarkable athlete was fished from his kingdom and dumped somewhere dry, hard and unfamiliar.
‘I’ve never had an injury before, not once, and to get one like this was, well, pretty rubbish,’ he tells Sportsmail.
‘I was training in Tenerife, doing some side lunges, one of the simplest moves you can do. I had a band around me to counteract the movement, help the muscles get stronger and all that, and I just went over on my foot.
Adam Peaty (above) is battling to be fit for the Commonwealth Games next month
‘I have rolled a lot of ankles, so I thought it was a sprain, but I went for an X-ray and they said it was a broken foot. Not great.’
He puffs out his cheeks and contemplates how he, the most irresistible force in British sport, became quite such a slow-moving object.
It is to do with the protective boot that has lived on his right foot since that incident in May; a boot that has felt like a ball and chain at a point when plans are being hastily reconfigured.
The injury has already cost him a place at the recent world championships, taking with it the possibility, and indeed the extreme likelihood, of a fourth successive breaststroke double of 50m and 100m golds.
But the deeper concern is what it might yet mean for his place at the Birmingham Commonwealth Games, just 45 minutes from where he grew up in Uttoxeter. ‘I really want to be there,’ he says. ‘How many chances do you have for a home championships?’
Peaty has had to wear a protective boot on his right foot since that incident in May
For a man who has broken 14 world records across eight years, this is one clock that is putting up a good fight. The Games start on July 28 and by Peaty’s reckoning he is only ‘80 per cent’ sure he can pull it off.
As he puts it: ‘We live between what each scan says now. For Birmingham, I will have only been out of the boot for four weeks. It is not a long time to get properly ready for a championship at all, but if anyone can do it, I can do it.’
The wiring within the greats is always interesting — it is that mechanism built via necessity to see the good things in the bad. Peaty is new to those contortions of psychology, but he is giving it a go. He isn’t in his most ebullient mood when we speak — he is marvellously bullish and introspective, as usual, and yet he is also a little flat; compelling in his honesty and yet unconvinced that strong thoughts can trump a fracture and a tight schedule.
Maybe there is a broader clue in that about how this battle will play out. At the very least he provides a window into what makes this most captivating of competitors tick.
The three-time Olympic champion remains upbeat despite the 'rubbish' injury
‘You have to adjust your thinking,’ he says. ‘I’m not the most patient person. I am an athlete, I want to be the fastest in the world, and there is something stopping me right now. I want to rush it but I can’t. I just can’t.
‘It took some getting used to. But you have to use it for you. OK, so part of that is I have been doing what I can and building where possible. I have done a lot of kayaking as it is a similar movement, and I am swimming without my legs at the moment, so if anything my arms are getting stronger. Good. If anything I am getting fitter.
‘The biggest positive for anyone in this situation is having time for perspective. Anyone can relate to this — if you do the same thing for multiple years, and I have been doing this for 17 years really without injury or a long break, you get a new perspective. Mine is that I really want to do this correctly. I really want to get fitter and stronger and better and dominate. Also good.
‘When you choose to do something, the emotion is different from when it is taken away from you, such as the world championships. The emotion is that I am angry to miss it, but I have had a lot more drive pumped into me by this. I try to believe everything happens for a reason and this unfortunate thing is already making me hungrier. You find silver linings.’
It is quite an
