“It was something that I kind of needed - something fresh, something new, something different to give me the extra motivational boost.”
Daley is just a few days into his new training regime, having moved into his rented two-bedroom flat in Stratford last week, but believes the change is already paying dividends psychologically.
“I feel really happy at the moment,” he said. “It's been a big couple of months but it's great. I'm really excited about the future, especially working with Jane in London at the Aquatics Centre. I really hope it's going to give me the edge in 2016.”
Daley admits his happiness also stems from his new relationship, and from the positive reaction he received from the public when he announced on YouTube that he was “dating a guy”.
"The support from the public and the media and everyone has been overwhelming,” he said. "It's been so positive and it's put me in a great place and right now I couldn't be happier.”
Daley says he always prided himself in his ability to “compartmentalise” his experiences – to separate his life as an elite diver from his work in the media and from his personal and family relationships. It was a skill he demonstrated when he continued training and competing while his father was suffering from a terminal illness in 2011.
But he says the last few months have taught him that the personal and the professional cannot always be separated, and that happiness away from the diving pool can actually make him a better diver in it.
“I’ve tried to keep the different parts of my life all very separate so I can walk out of one, shut the door on that and go into another one,” he said. “I can do that.
“But it wasn't until now that I realised that actually when I'm happy in my social life it does make even more of a difference. I am good at shutting it out, but it does make a massive difference.”
Daley revealed that he made his mind up to change coaches as early as last summer and that he informed Banks, who is one of the three judges on Daley’s TV show ‘Splash!’, after the World Championships in Barcelona in August, where Daley was hampered with a triceps injury and finished sixth in the platform final.
“When I sat him down and started talking to him I think he thought that I was going to give him the ‘I'm quitting’ talk, so I think he was quite relieved anyway about he fact that I wanted to carry on diving and that I was happy,” said Daley.
“He said to me, ‘Tom, most divers don't spend 12 years with the same coach. It's completely normal to move away’.”
Daley insists he never truly considered quitting diving but he did struggle with his motivation after London 2012.
“Staying motivated after the Olympics is tough for anyone, but it was especially difficult last year because I had so many injuries.,” he said.
Figueiredo has been based at the University of Houston for the past 24 years, where she coached several Russian athletes to Olympic medals, including a gold for 3m synchro pair Yulia Pakhalina and Vera Ilina at the 2000 Sydney Olympics.
She praised the work of Banks but said she had already spotted some areas for improvement, not least Daley’s conditioning.
He has been lifting heavier weights to generate more explosive power and has been put on a low-carbohydrate diet to reduce his body-fat percentage.
Asked about her hopes for Daley at the Rio Olympics in 2016, she said: “I didn’t take this job to try to win another bronze medal. I learned that from coaching the Russian girls because for them it was all or nothing.
"I think at this stage in Tom’s career, and even mine, it’s about gambling everything. The bigger the risks we take, the bigger the pay-off, so it’s all or nothing for us.”
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