On Thursday morning, the pop star-turned-swimmer raced in the heats of the 100m freestyle but missed out on making the final after clocking the 10th fastest time overall (49.04 seconds). His personal best at the time was 48.99 seconds.

The eight fastest swimmers from this trial get to compete in the A-final, which is where Olympic squad spots are up for grabs.

In a cruel twist, later on Thursday night, the 27-year-old tied for first place in the ‘B final’, alongside Matt Temple, with a new personal best time of 48.67 seconds, which would have seen him finish in sixth position in the ‘A final’ and likely given him a serious shot at going to the Olympics, if only he’d produced the PB when it counted most.

While Simpson was disappointed following the heats, he still has a chance to qualify for the Olympics at the 100m butterfly race this coming Saturday.

"It's a stacked field in the 100 free so I knew it was going to be a bit iffy trying to get into that final," Simpson said.

"It's a good warm-up for the 100 fly. I have had a really good last six months of training just absolutely flogging myself. Swimming is tricky ... you're training for a long time for really marginal gains, microscopic sometimes. I have just been banging at the brick wall trying to get to that next level. And the faster you get, the harder it is to keep getting faster."

To fulfill his Olympic dream, Simpson will need to shave half a second off his personal best and finish in the top two of the 100m butterfly final on Saturday night.