Life as a long-distance swimmer is an exercise, primarily, in tedium. Sure, there’s a huge technical element to everything they do – a constant need to create more efficiency as they cut through the water – but beyond that it’s a relatively simple process: lap after lap, hour after hour, day by day, year by year.
aniel Wiffen only turned 20 last week, but he’s been at this routine for close to a decade, fitting a part-time acting career and a full-time degree in computer science around his daily workload. At his base at Loughborough University in England, he covers 70-80km a week in the pool – an average of 750 laps, or 1,500 lengths.
“It’s quite a lot,” he says. “But it’s average swimming distance mileage.”
That work will all find its outlet in Tokyo next week, Wiffen making his Olympic debut in the heats of the 800m freestyle on Tuesday and the 1,500m freestyle on Friday. Back in Magheralin, Co Down, his family will watch in nervous anticipation, having been there for every step of his journey.
Wiffen was born in Leeds, but his family moved to Northern Ireland when he was two. Through his childhood he had a healthy but fiercely competitive rivalry with his twin brother, Nathan, who for obvious reasons he describes as “the most compatible person” he’s ever met.
His mother was also a swimmer, and his older brother Ben was the first of the siblings to take up the sport.
“He loved it and my Mum said, ‘let’s get the twins into it too’,” says Wiffen.
In those early days it was just lessons, but at the age of 10 the pair started racing.
“My Mum had to separate us, doing different events because we’d fight about who would win,” says Wiffen.
“When we got older we raced individual medley a bit; we got equal amount of wins against each other.”
The twins’ lives have always been inextricably linked. They share the same apartment at Loughborough, both harbouring the same Olympic dream in recent years.
Nathan took five seconds off his personal best in the 200m backstroke at the Swim Ireland performance meet last month, clocking 2:04.25, but it wasn’t enough to earn him a spot in Tokyo. And so this is one event he will go to without his brother.
“I know he’ll be cheering for me in Tokyo,” says Daniel. “I’ll be thinking of him when I’m down on the blocks.”
The life of a swimming prodigy is one of immense commitment, and that extends to the family behind the athlete. What kept Wiffen going through his teenage years was the fact all his friends were in the sport, those early-morning sessions as much a social outlet as a training slog.
Through his days at school his alarm typically went off at 5am, his mother driving him to the pool, and then to school, before heading back to the pool in the early evening, Wiffen eating his dinner in the car to save time.
That was their routine from Monday to Friday, with Saturdays offering the relative luxury of a single session and Sunday a day off.
His schedule is much the same now, but given his academic flexibility Wiffen only has to get up at 8am – “basically a lie-in.”
He just finished his first year at Loughborough and it’s no accident his form has sky-rocketed since relocating to the Leicestershire town, where he’s coached by Andi Manley.
The star of the group is Austria’s Felix Auboeck, a freestyle specialist who’s a medal contender in Tokyo, while Wiffen also draws much inspiration from Greece’s Andreas Vazaios, who will also compete at the Games.
“Everyone has the same goal and no one is there not to work hard,” says Wiffen. “That’s infectious in Loughborough; it’s why everybody is just so fast.”
Beyond swimming, there’s scant time or energy to engage in the typical student life but Wiffen and his team-mates have a rule from Saturday afternoon until Monday morning: “forget about swimming”.
He and his brother were in high demand through their teenage years as actors, appearing in Game of Thrones where they played Walder Frey’s identical twin sons.
“I was loving every moment,” recalls Daniel, who met all the top stars during his time on set. “They were all very nice.”
He also appeared on ITV’s The Frankenstein Chronicles as well as Dani’s Castle, a children’s comedy drama that aired on CBBC.
But his focus for the foreseeable future is swimming, and Wiffen’s trajectory suggests he could go a long, long way.
He has already carved a whopping 21 seconds off his 800m freestyle time this year, clocking 7:52.68 at the Irish team trials in April before going on to finish 11th at the European Championships in Budapest.
While many athletes cursed the postponement of the Tokyo Games last year, Wiffen was not one of them, the delay allowing him the time to progress to the level required.
“I don’t think I’d have made it last year but (after the postponement) I said, ‘I can make this team if I put my head down and work hard.’
“I knew I needed to find a group that would push me as hard as I wanted to push myself. Loughborough was a good option. I worked really hard with my coach and found out technical deficiencies and worked on those.”
He thinks he can hack another five seconds off his best in Tokyo, which would move him towards the level needed to reach the 800m freestyle final – something in the 7:40s.
“I can’t wait to be out there,” he says. “Whatever happens will happen. You have to enjoy it to perform well.”
The earliest Games he can remember watching are 2012, a reminder of just how much road Wiffen has ahead of him, and his role model in the sport is Gregorio Paltrineri, the Italian who has the world record in the 1,500m freestyle and who’s closing in on that mark over 800m.
In a little over a week, Wiffen will be out there with him, against him. While it’s unrealistic to expect him to get near the best in the world this time around, three years down the line at the Paris Games could just be his time.
“My old coach always said, ‘this Olympics is a bonus one to get experience and the next one is for the medal,’” he says. “But we’re definitely going to go for the medal either way.”
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Record Irish team set to make a splash
Ireland will send its largest ever swim team to this Olympics, with nine swimmers in action across 14 events at the Tokyo Aquatics Centre from July 24 to August 1.
Longford native Darragh Greene will double up in the 100m and 200m breaststroke, with Newtownabbey’s Danielle Hill doing likewise in the 100m backstroke and 50m freestyle.
Sligo star Mona McSharry will go in the 100m and 200m breaststroke, the 2017 world junior champion aiming to come of age at what will be the first Games for the 20-year-old.
Shane Ryan will contest the 100m backstroke, 100m butterfly and 4x200m freestyle relay, with Brendan Hyland, Finn McGeever and Jack McMillan joining him in the latter event and Hyland also contesting the 100m butterfly.
Ellen Walshe will make her Olympic debut in the 200m individual medley, the event in which the 19-year-old Templeogue swimmer holds the national record.
Daniel Wiffen completes the team, the 20-year-old Loughborough student attempting a long-distance double in the 800m and 1,500m freestyle.
It’s been 25 years since Ireland won a swimming medal at the Games, the three golds and one bronze won in 1996 by Michelle Smith, who was banned from the sport for four years in 1998 for tampering with a urine sample during a drug test.
Shane Ryan was Ireland’s top performer at the Rio Games, finishing 14th in the 100m backstroke in a national record of 53.85.