Florent Manaudou is a swimmer, Olympic champion in the 50m freestyle and flag bearer for the Blues for the 2024 Olympic Games.
A candidate announced several weeks ago, the Villeurbanne native was chosen by all the athletes of the French Olympic team to represent them alongside discus thrower Mélina Robert-Michon. After being the first bearer of the Olympic flame in France when it arrived in Marseille, Florent Manaudou is now the representative of the French athletes. This Olympic enthusiast has long proclaimed his desire to be a flag bearer: “When you’re a kid, obviously you want to be an Olympic champion. Then there’s also carrying the flame, carrying the flag. These are things that, symbolically, are incredible.” He had already applied for the Tokyo Games in 2021. It is therefore an immense reward for him to have been chosen. He had declared last fall that he would be “very happy and very proud to be able to carry the flag during this beautiful opening ceremony on the Seine.”
Short biography of Florent Manaudou
Born on November 12, 1990 in Villeurbanne, in the suburbs of Lyon, Florent Manaudou preferred to play handball rather than dive in pools in his youth but combined the two sports during his early years. Encouraged by his parents, the young boy ended up giving up handball to devote himself to swimming in 2003, at the age of 13. Initially trained by his older brother, he ended up joining the Cercle des nageurs de Marseille and coach Romain Barnier in 2011, where his sister Laure also trains.
At 22, he qualified for the London Games and surprised everyone by winning the 50m freestyle ahead of the Brazilian César Cielo.
From 2014, Florent Manaudou entered a new dimension. He won four European championship titles in London in the long course, then six medals including three titles in Doha at the short course world championships, a record. In 2015, he won three world championship titles in Kazan in the long course, in the 50m butterfly, the 50m freestyle and the 4x100m relay. Double silver medalist at the Rio Olympic Games, notably in the 50m freestyle, Florent Manaudou then put his swimming career “on hold” in order to return to his first passion, handball. But despite a few matches within the squad of the Aix-en-Provence first division club, the French swimmer has not managed to make his dream come true. Since his return to the pools in 2019, Florent Manaudou has loudly proclaimed that his goals are the Games. First there was Tokyo, with a new medal in the 50m. And above all there are the Paris Games. Beyond his personal objective, Florent Manaudou has a special status: that of flag bearer for the French delegation.
How old is Florent Manaudou? What is his weight, height?
Born on November 12, 1990, Florent Manaudou is now 33 years old. An age that did not seem prohibitive when considering a return to swimming in 2019. “I tell myself that it will be easier than before. I think we are capable of swimming late, he explains today. Our sport is more and more professional.” Weight is also not a problem according to the French swimmer, who explained before the Tokyo Games: “When I arrived in Marseille in 2001, I weighed 86 kg. At the 2012 Games, 94 kg, at the 2016 Games, 100 kg, and now I weigh 104 kg. What counts is the power-to-weight ratio.”
Florent Manaudou achieved his consecration at the London Olympics in 2012 with a gold medal in the 50m freestyle, but also collected two silver medals in Rio in 2016 (50m and 4 x 100m freestyle), and a new one in 2021 (50m). He also won four gold medals at the 2015 World Championships, notably in the 50m freestyle and 50m butterfly. He also has 3 world titles in the short course (2014). The Frenchman also collected six titles at the European Championships in 2014 and 2016, as well as 5 titles at the European Short Course Championships in 2012, in Chartres. Concerning the French Long Course Championships, he collected 45 medals in total, including 32 gold.
- Olympic Games: 1 gold medal (50m, 2012), 2 silver medals (50m and 4x100m in 2016), 1 silver medal (50m, 2021).
- World Championships: 4 titles in long course (4x100m in 2013, 50m freestyle, 50m butterfly and 4x100m in 2015) and 4 titles in short course (50m freestyle, 50m backstroke and 4x100m in 2014, 4x50m mixed in 2022)
- European Championships: 6 long course titles between 2014 and 2016, and 5 short course titles, all in 2012.
- French Championships: 32 titles in the long course including 5 in the 50m freestyle and 20 in the short course.
Florent Manaudou’s annual income jumped after his Olympic victory in 2012. At the time, when he was earning just over €20,000 per year, it rose to around €140,000 per year, then €350,000 in 2013. Thanks to several partnerships and sponsorships, his earnings climbed to over €500,000 in 2015 before his handball break from the end of 2016. He has since returned to swimming and found his sponsors again and, even though he only earns a fixed salary of €2,000 from the Cercle des Nageurs de Marseille, he has also participated in the International Swimming League, a closed and private swimming competition with an attractive financial endowment.
Florent Manaudou is the brother of the French swimmer Laure Manaudougold medalist at the 2004 Olympic Games and multiple world, European and French champion. He also has a brother, Nicolas, who was his coach at the beginning of his career. The name Florent Manaudou is inseparable from that of his sister Laure who served as his guide in the world of swimming during his younger years and who decided to retire from swimming in 2013, at the age of 27, after a successful career (three Olympic medals including one gold, three world champion titles, eighteen European champion titles, etc.). The image of Laure Manaudou jumping on her brother’s neck after his victory in the 50m final at the London Olympics in 2012, which went around the world, bears witness to the beautiful bond that unites them. Before returning to swimming, Florent Manaudou also said that he had told his sister. “She was one of the first people I spoke to about it,” he explained. “She thought I was going to start again, but maybe a little later.”
After having practiced both swimming and handball for a long time during his childhood, Florent Manaoudou finally opted for the pools, at the beginning of his adolescence. A choice that paid off, which notably allowed him to create a surprise at the 2012 Olympics by winning the Olympic title in the 50m freestyle. After several at the highest level, he finally decided to take a break in September 2016, after winning two silver medals at the Rio Olympics. He then declared: “I remain an active swimmer. I want to preserve and keep the pleasure that has been my main driving force during these eight years. I decided to take a break”. It ultimately lasted two and a half years.
After announcing his retirement from the pools in 2016, Florent Manaudou quickly and naturally turned to his childhood passion, handball, and the Aix-en-Provence club, which welcomed him for more than two years in its reserve team (National 2). For the main person concerned, the bet was successful. “I knew I would never be in the French team,” he says today. “I knew it would be complicated to play in D1. In fact, I broke my finger in November playing handball, just before that I had been contacted by a professional club. It didn’t happen but in my head, I had succeeded in my challenge.”