Opinion: Caeleb Dressel knows pressure after winning 5 gold medals: ' I probably lost 10 pounds'

TOKYO — Caeleb Dressel, shirtless and exhausted, stood with his three U.S. men’s medley relay teammates for one last time in the mixed zone at the Tokyo Aquatics Centre. He lowered his mask to gulp down an energy drink. He fidgeted. He rested his head on teammate Zach Apple’s shoulder.

It was early in the afternoon on Sunday, the final day of swimming at the Olympic Games, and he was finished in more ways than one.

“I don’t even know what time it is right now,” he said later. “I don’t know what day it is.”

In the years to come, he will remember the day, and probably the time. He concluded his remarkable Olympics by doing exactly what he came to Tokyo to do, finishing with a flourish by winning two gold medals in little more than an hour Sunday, one individually in the men’s 50 freestyle, and one in the 4x100 medley relay, the final swimming race of the Games.

Those two golds brought his total gold medal haul here to five. Prior to Sunday, he had won three golds, two in individual races and one in the men’s 4x100 freestyle relay. His final tally of three individual gold medals is something only Mark Spitz and Michael Phelps had done before him in U.S. men’s swimming at a single Olympics.

He also set a world record in the 100 butterfly Saturday, and helped the medley relay team to another in Sunday’s finale.

It was a magnificent week’s work. But now?

“I’m going to take a break, take a little break here,” he said, looking at the journalists in front of him. “I’m pretty over swimming, guys.”

Dressel called the whole Olympic experience “fantastic,” saying that he “wouldn’t change a single thing.” He said he was proud of himself, that he “reached what my potential was here at these Games.”

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An introspective, emotional, 24-year-old who says he is a loner who cries “a lot,” Dressel had told himself to take in every bit of his Olympic experience, including the difficult parts.

“It is a lot different here,” he said in his press conference later on Sunday. “It’s a different type of pressure, I’m aware of that now, I’ll stop lying to myself.

"It does mean something different, an event that happens every four years, for a race that happens 40-something seconds or 20-something seconds, you have to be so perfect in that moment. Especially you add an extra year, it’s a five-year buildup to be perfect.”

He continued: “There’s so much pressure in one moment, your whole life boils down to a moment that can take 20, 40 seconds. How crazy is that? For an event that happens every four years. I wouldn’t tell myself this during the meet, but after the meet, looking back, I mean, it’s terrifying.”

Dressel also is a private person who would prefer to avoid the spotlight, although that was impossible here this week. He and Katie Ledecky were the male and female standouts on the U.S. team, two of the team’s three multiple individual gold medalists. (Bobby Finke was the other.) Ledecky spoke about the pressure the other day. It was Dressel’s turn Sunday.

“This is not easy, not an easy week at all,” he said. “Some parts were extremely enjoyable. I would say the majority of them were not. You can’t sleep right, you can’t nap, shaking all the time. I probably lost 10 pounds. I’m going to weigh myself and eat some food when I get back. It’s a lot of stress we put on the body.”

But Dressel said he still relished it.

“It’s not the most enjoyable process but it is worth it. Every part of it is worth it. Just cause it’s bad doesn’t mean it’s not worth it.”

Dressel has been keeping a journal at the Olympics, so he was asked what his final entry might be.

“I can’t even write, lift my arm,” he laughed. “I don’t know. I want to be in the right frame of mind. I actually didn’t journal last night. I was too tired. I want to get in the right frame of mind, maybe on the flight back, so I can really reminisce.”

When that time comes, he will have quite a story to tell, with a perfect ending.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: US swimmer Caeleb Dressel knows pressure after 5 Olympic gold medals