Freya Anderson, the reluctant Olympic champion
The British swimmer claimed gold at Tokyo 2020 as part of the 4x100m mixed relay team but having only played her part in the heats, the title of Olympic champion doesn't sit easily.
Freya Anderson chose the night before her first swim at Tokyo 2020 to tell her mum that she had a tattoo.
Aware the offending mark would show through her ultra-thin GB swimsuit, the then 20-year-old knew her mum would have to temper her reaction, what with her daughter about to compete in her debut Olympics and all.
Anderson was right.
"I hid it from my parents for I think it was a whole year and a half, and I'd been on holiday with them and everything in a costume, and every time I'd just be so conscious of just having them see it," Anderson told Olympics.com in an exclusive interview ahead of the 2023 World Aquatics Championships taking place in Fukuoka, Japan from 14-30 July.
"And it got to the night before my first race at the Olympics, I think it was the women's relay and obviously in our race suits, you can basically see through them sometimes because they're so tight and I just had enough of trying to hide it.
"I was like, listen mum, I've had this tattoo for a year and a half, you're gonna see it... and she thought it was fake! But she took it alright, and now she doesn't really care about all my other ones, but it was a big deal at the time."
Anderson now has seven tattoos to her name, including the athlete's rite of passage after competing at an Olympic Games.
"I've got my rings on my back and then I've got the word gratitude on my wrist area, that's just to remind me to be grateful about where I am and the life that I can live. I've got my Nan's handwriting – who passed away last year – just so I can have it with me always. I've got an orchid flower on my ribs and then I've got this little lion on the bottom of my ankle, which I got matching with Sydney Pickrem. She swims for Canada, so we sort of have a little matching one. I have 777 but you really can't see it at all.
"And then I've got my first one, the butterfly on my rib."
Reluctant Olympic champion
The freestyle sprint specialist took to the water in Tokyo, safe in the knowledge her secret was out, before coming away from the Games an Olympic champion.
But you'd never know it from Anderson's online biographies.
Anderson swam the anchor leg in the heat of the mixed 4x100m medley relay, receiving a gold medal when the team, now with Anna Hopkin on anchor, won the final.
Yet Anderson is loathe to call herself an Olympic champion.
When asked why her Instgram bio doesn't say 'Olympic champion' and why she doesn't describe herself as such in promotional material, Anderson told us: "I would never call myself an Olympic gold medallist.
"I don't know why it just feels wrong to me. Yeah, I got them in the final, and I think we did a good time or something, I think I had a good split but just to me, it just feels wrong to call myself that.
"It's something that I'm trying to work on, and I've been told, when you think about say a football team won the FA Cup... the players that got taken off at the first half or something, they're no less of a player that won the game, you know what I mean?
"And there were other [swimmers] that swam the heats and got medals, but I'd never look at them and say that they're not. So I don't know why when it comes to myself. I'm just like that."
Good vibrations in British Swimming squad
The foursome that did compete in the gold medal race at the event that made its Olympic debut in Japan were Kathleen Dawson, Adam Peaty, James Guy and Hopkin, wining the Olympic title in a world record time of 3:37.58. The squad will be hoping the same country location will see them add world champions to their tally, but competition will be fierce.
The United States will defend their title from June 2022 in Budapest, secured in a time of 3:38.79 with the likes of Hunter Armstrong, world record holder in long course 50m backstroke and Torri Huske, world champion in long course 100m butterfly, part of the quartet then.
Australia, who were second, included the likes of triple Olympic champion and backstroke world record holder in the distance, Kaylee McKeown and Olympic and world champion in 200m Zac Stubblety-Cook (3:41.34). The Netherlands were third (3:41.54) pushing GB out of the medals into fourth (3:41.65).
So the world title will be a bunfight come Wednesday 26 July in Japan.
A flare up of a shoulder injury two months before the championships hasn't been ideal preparation but with that now under control Anderson has been looking forward the only major champs of the year in swimming, a very different scenario to 2022.
"It's a really good vibe at the moment," said Anderson of her coaching group at the British Swimming Performance Centre in Bath ahead of the worlds. The training squad includes the likes of British team-mates Tom Dean and James Guy, both double Olympic gold medallists. "We're all raring to go. It gets to that point where you've just been training so much for it, and you just want to get out there and just start swimming.
"If you think back to last year, we'd already done the worlds at this point, and I think we would probably have gone into the [Commonwealth Games]. So, it's very different. It's kind of this one chance we have this year. So, it's a bit more of a high pressure, but I think that makes everyone a bit more excited and raring to go."
With the day of the mixed 4x100m medley relay at the World Championships falling on the year-to-the-day that the Paris 2024 Games start, 26 July, Anderson and co will be hoping to make their mark in Japan ahead of a defence of their Olympic title.
And for Anderson, she'll be hoping a second Games might be marked not only with another milestone tattoo but by finally accepting she's an Olympic champion, whatever results she secures should she be selected to compete in France.