Double Olympic swimming champion Ohashi Yui retires "absolutely happy"

Not bad for someone who never really liked swimming the 400m individual medley.

On her 29th birthday, Ohashi Yui, gold medallist in the 200m and 400m IM at the Olympic Games Tokyo 2020, lowered the curtain on her career on Friday (18 October), content after 21 years of competing in the pool.

Ohashi bows out as the only Japanese in history, male or female, to win more than one gold at a single Summer Olympic Games.

“My sister started swimming first and I followed her because I wasn’t the strongest as a kid,” Ohashi said during an hour-long press conference in Tokyo, free of tears and full of smiles.

“I am absolutely happy with the career I had. I’m so lucky to have done something I love for as long as I did and on top of that, I won two - not one, but two - gold medals at the Olympics, a competition I never dreamed of competing in.

“I was anemic, I had injuries and the three years following the Tokyo Olympics were terribly difficult. But in the end, I’m proud of myself to be sitting here and retiring with nothing but satisfaction.”

Ohashi Yui: "I really struggled to maintain my motivation after Tokyo"

Paris 2024 was unkind to Ohashi, whose second Games ended in the semi-final heats in the 200m IM, her lone event. She did not even qualify in the 400m for Paris at the Japanese trials back in March.

Ohashi swam her final career race at last month’s Japan Games, where she placed second in the 200 IM in 2:12.03, more than four seconds off her personal best, also the national record.

The Shiga Prefecture native will go into coaching and will also attend graduate school next year to study sports nutrition, which helped her battle the anemia and lack of strength that plagued her early years in competition.

Ohashi said she decided to hang up her goggles for good a year ago, when she realised she only had the mental and physical capacity for one more Games.

Originally, the plan was to walk away after the 2022 World Aquatics Championships in Fukuoka. But when the meet was postponed by a year due to Covid, so was Ohashi’s retirement.

That brought the Paris Games close enough for Ohashi to consider taking another crack, although the emotional rollercoaster she had been on made it anything but easy for her to commit to swimming.

“I really struggled to maintain my motivation in the three years after Tokyo. When I thought about competing in Paris, I had to go all in for one last time,” she said.

“The toughest was the year after the Olympics. In 2022, I had no grasp or control over my emotions. I was completely confused. And that was the state I was in for the world championships (sixth place, 2:11.27).

“After winning gold at Tokyo, I thought the results there were what mattered. But my take on it all changed during the last three years. What made me who I am, what gave me the courage to get through things, was the actual experience of getting the most out of myself at the Tokyo Olympics.

“There was fear but I managed to muster the courage to swim my best race on that stage. And that experience is what got me through the last three years to Paris.”

Ohashi Yui's coach: "She was the one"

Her coach Hirai Norimasa, who also worked with Japanese legend and quadruple Olympic breaststroke champion Kitajima Kosuke, said he knew Ohashi was different the moment he first saw her race at the Japan 12 years ago.

“I saw this girl with long arms and legs swim the individual medley and I knew in my heart then and there that she was the one,” said Hirai, who convinced Ohashi to stick with the individual medley - and was proven right. “I had never seen a Japanese medley swimmer with so much upside.

“Before the 400m heats at the Tokyo Olympics, she was shivering like a frightened baby bird. I wasn’t sure if she was going to make it but I told her to not worry about the result and swim her heart out.

“I will never forget the final. As she turned from 300m to 350m, then from breast to freestyle, she let go just as we had talked about. When I saw the burst of speed, I knew she had it.”

Ohashi said the lone regret she has is that she didn't attempt to chase harder breaking her 400m IM Japan record of 4:30.82 as well as the world record.

"I wish I could say I give myself a 120 out of a 100 but the one thing I fell short of was the world record. When I hit 4:30, I should have gone for more. So with that, I give myself a 95."