Former Olympic champion James Magnussen has made the headlines with his incredible body transformation after taking performance-enhancing drugs.
The Australian retired from professional swimming in 2019 after winning one silver and two bronze medals in the summer Games, but his athletic career has now taken on a new direction.
James Magnussen is a three-time world championGettyIn February 2024, Magnussen announced he would be coming out of retirement to compete in the Enhanced Games – a sports tournament where PEDs are allowed.
The controversial event hold its first competition Las Vegas in May 2026, which will take on an Olympic-style format.
Track and field and weightlifting will be included alongside swimming in the multi-sport championship, which was launched in 2023.
There will be up to $500,000 in prize money on offer for each event, with $250,000 in store for the winner, while anyone who breaks the world record in either the 100m sprint or 50m freestyle will receive $1million.
And its fair to say Magnussen has pushed his body to the limit as he bids to break new ground in the latter.
A video shared on social media has showcased the 34-year-old’s drastic body transformation since beginning to train whilst taking on banned substances.
The clip begins with footage of Magnussen standing on the start line ahead of a recent race, with the swimmer pictured boasting a massively bulked-up physique compared to his non-doping days.
Alongside this, the title sequence reads: “This is how James Magnussen built his lats so wide that he blew up his super suit three times,” in reference to his huge back muscles.
This is then followed up by a training montage of the ex-Olympian, where he can be seen rattling through exercises, including pull-ups with a weighted vest, as well as lifting weights.
The video has already amassed over 50,000 views in less than 24 hours, with many taking an interest in Magnussen’s new look.
Magnussen’s weight reached a peak of 115kg on PEDs, up from 95kg in his swimming careerGetty A recent training clip showed Magnussen hard at work in the gym for the Enhanced GamesAnd the swimmer himself has since opened up on just how rapidly his body composition and physical capabilities changed after he began taking PEDs.
He revealed on the Hello Sport podcast: “I gained 10 pounds – or five kilos – in the first week, of lean muscle.
“There was points during that process where my athleticism was through the roof. For the first seven weeks I was in the States, I trained twice a day, every day. So 49 days straight, 98 sessions straight with no rest.
“The most relevant for swimming at certain periods were box squats. So you squat down to like a bench, sit on the bench and then stand up with the barbell.
“I was doing that with 500 pounds, which is about 230 kilos, just sets of 3, bouncing like it was nothing.”
He added: “And so what we saw was performance tracked like this, really steeply. It plateaued around that Christmas time, and then it started to decrease.”
GettyMagnussen is swimming’s world record holder in the 100m freestyle for someone wearing a textile suit, a costume now banned by World Aquatics[/caption]Magnussen later admitted he had bulked up too much when the viral footage of him emerged, which actually caused his performance to tail off, as well as making it a tall order to fit into his swim suit.
He continued: “I started getting too big, my nervous system’s fried.
“I’m having trouble with that top end speed stuff, from that explosivity, and my metrics start trending down.
“So it was taking about four people 30 minutes to get me into a suit.”
And despite going all-out in his attempts to break the 50m record, Magnussen was ultimately pipped to this by Kristian Gklolomeev.
The Greek bagged the staggering $1m prize after setting a world record time of 20.89 seconds in a time trial in February, despite only started taking banned substances in January 2025.
AFPKristian Gkolomeev competed in four Olympic Games before committing to take part in the Enhanced Games[/caption]Sharing his reaction to this, Magnussen said: ‘Kristian cruises in after eight weeks of protocol.
“He gets up and bam, breaks the world record in the week that supposed to be about me breaking this world record. It was a really weird feeling, it was really mixed emotions.”
He added: “So I was happy for him but that was meant to be me doing that. That was a hard moment.”
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