Every athlete sets out to win and swim fast, standard goals with a few personal conditions applied. For Daniel Wiffen, the 2026 Irish Open Championships were about proving that his move to the University of California was worth it. The Olympic gold medallist from Paris spelled it out before racing began: “If I don’t swim fast next week, I’m not going to stay in California.” He kept one promise, taking gold in the 400m freestyle, but fell short on the clock, leaving his training future uncertain.
On April 11, Wiffen added another national title in the men’s 400m freestyle in Bangor by stopping the clock at 3:49.35. He finished comfortably ahead of his twin brother Nathan, while Nathan and Cormac Ryan shared silver after touching together in 3:54.12. But Wiffen was the only swimmer under the 3:50 mark, yet still far from the 3:44 standard he had set for himself. That number had been on his mind long before he stepped onto the blocks.
He had laid out clear targets across his events, noting, “I have to be sub-14:40 (for 1,500m), around sub-7:42 (for 800m), around 3:44 in the 400m… If I’m around those times, under or around PB, then that’s great. That obviously means the training is working, and if it doesn’t work, then I [have to figure out] what I’m going to do after.”
Before this event, in the 1500m freestyle earlier in the week, a similar script followed. Sure, in that event, Daniel Wiffen took gold again in 14:51.38, but once more the time sat outside what he considers his best level.
Speaking after his race, Wiffen summed it up with a grin that couldn’t quite hide his mixed feelings. “I’d say it’s 50/50 as to whether I’m happy or not with the swim. I need to look at the splits. I felt really good up to like 1000m, and then I felt like I kind of faded away a little bit and was seizing up. That’s good for an 800m, that’s good for all other events, whereas with the 1500, sometimes you go unbelievable and then sometimes it’s not good at all, and that was kind of middle ground, so I’m pretty pleased, but also kind of disappointed,” he said.
In truth, his dominance was never in question, but the stopwatch told a tougher story. After all, just last week he had told the BBC he wanted to be around 14:40 in the 1500 free, 7:42 in the 800, and 3:43 in the 400. Instead, he finished well off that mark, clocking 14:42 in the 1500 (the same as last year), a reminder that even for an Olympic champion, progress rarely runs in a straight line.
Each race has ended the same way: a win on paper, but a time that falls short of his ambition. That gap now keeps attention fixed on his next move, whether California remains part of it or not. The pressure, though, has been building for a while.
Why Daniel Wiffen bet on California after Olympic glory
At the Paris 2024 Olympics, Daniel Wiffen reached the peak of his career so far! He won gold in the 800m freestyle in an Olympic record time of 7:38.19 and added a bronze in the 1500m freestyle, becoming Ireland’s first Olympic swimming champion and a double Olympic medallist at the same Games.
At that point, he was training at Loughborough University. But after Paris, the picture started to shift. Even at the top of the sport, Wiffen wanted more control over how far he could push his limits. That is what led him to a major decision: moving to the University of California, Berkeley in 2025.
The aim was simple but demanding: training in a faster daily environment, working alongside international-level swimmers. “I wasn’t convinced I could stay there and still go fast. I wasn’t convinced with the training and the way the program was moving that I could perform at the best of my ability, which is why I moved,” he added.
Also, another reason was Daniel Wiffen’s dream to win more in the next Olympic cycle: “I think about winning three gold medals in Los Angeles every single day. Every time I get into the water, I remind myself. I picture the people I’ll be racing, even though I don’t know who they’re going to be, because every year somebody new comes through.”
Since relocating to California, however, the full Olympic peak has not consistently reappeared in long-course racing. His progress was also interrupted in 2025 when he suffered appendicitis just weeks before the World Championships. Despite the setback, he still lined up for the 800m freestyle and finished 8th, before withdrawing from the 1500m as the illness began to affect him more.
Even so, Daniel Wiffen bounced back later that year at the European Short Course Championships, where he delivered a strong showing. He won gold in the 1500m freestyle in 14:13.96 and also picked up bronze in both the 400m and 800m events. It was a strong return but still not quite at the same level as his Olympic breakthrough, hence keeping the comparison to Paris very much alive and ensuring the next step in his journey remains open!
