Alicia Coutts, the star of the Aussie team at London 2012, will make her 2013 race debut in a 100m free clash with fellow 4x100m free Olympic champion Melanie Schlanger at the Victorian Open swimming championships at Melbourne Sports and Aquatic Centre this weekend.

The meet will be the first long-course meet for Coutts since she claimed five medals at London 2012. Schlanger is ready to climb out of a post-Olympics hole when she takes on Games gold medal-winning relay teammate Alicia Coutts at this weekend's Victorian Open swimming championships.

Schlanger, who anchored the sprint relay to victory at the Games, made her return to racing last month at Queensland State Championships - and felt the pain of a return to heavy training in the wake of a long break after London.

"We were in a bit of a hole at that stage so I didn't swim all that fast," Schlanger tells AAP today. "Just with the Olympics, coming out of a bit of a break and going back into training we were hitting it pretty hard and I probably hadn't adapted to the training at that stage."

Many efforts this weekend will serve as a warm-up for the Aquatic Super Series in Perth next week, the Victorian Open also set to feature Blair Evans, Belinda Hocking, Matson Lawson, David McKeon, Leiston Pickett, Matt Targett, Christopher Wright, Brenton Rickard, Ashley Delaney, Rachel Goh, Marieke Guehrer, Sarah Katsoulis, Jarrod Killey, Grace Loh, Travis Mahoney and Samantha Marshall.