Here's a photo of Michael Phelps and Ryan at the Ultraswim that was posted on Floswimming.org. Thanks to Caroline for pointing it out.Ryan swam the 200m IM this morning, finishing 1st in his heat and 8th overall with a time of 2:06.76. Ryan scratched his other two events - the 200m back and 100m free.
This has been a tough meet for Ryan and I think he knew it would be tough going in. Based on what the commentators have been saying during the finals, Ryan is in hard training and his body is worn out. I give him credit for going to Charlotte and trying to compete. It had to be difficult for him knowing that he was tired and probably would not do well but that peoples' expectations would nevertheless be high. Plus he knew a ton of media attention would be focused on this meet given Phelps' return. I'm sure he wanted to do well but knew the limitations he was facing given his training.
Someone in the press finally asked Ryan about Ryosuke Irie breaking his world record in the 200m back. Ryan said this:
Beijing Olympic champion Ryan Lochte lost his 200 backstroke world record a week ago to Japan's Ryosuke Irie.
"Records are made to be broken. Hopefully I will get it back," Lochte said. "I'm not too familiar with him. I'm just going to have to study. I know there is a lot more that I can still do so we will see."
Lochte wears simple briefs and sees no disadvantage.
"I still don't feel like I'm at a disadvantage," he said. "It's just crazy this technology, how far it has gone."
I'm still wondering if Speedo is going to come out with a suit to compete with the new suits from Arena and Jaked and if those new suits will be approved by FINA.The source article can be found here: http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5jeip_aZ7agyMKn6q7VNgIeRlbJRw
I will not be shocked if Ryan's meet is over. He may swim the finals of the 200 IM tonight, but he may skip it altogether. I'm not surprised that Ryan scratched the 200 back either. It's his best event and his WR was just broken last week. If he didn't feel good in the water, why swim it and risk a poor result. This was not the time or the place to do it.
Tyler Clary continued to have a good meet. He placed 3rd in the 200IM prelims with a time of 2:05.24 and he set a meet record in the 200m back prelims, finishing 1st with a time of 1:59.14. Even though Ryan will not be swimming in the 200 back finals, it will be a great race with Clary, Marco Loughran, Aaron Peirsol and Nick Thoman.
6 comments:
I keep thinking that maybe Ryan shouldn’t have entered this meet, with Michael presence it became madness and his results are not there with the others. And it seems that all the media don´t know much about the sport, they only know that Ryan isn´t doing good.
I really like you blog I don’t comment much because English is not my first language and I get embarrassed by my mistakes.
Hi emanuella - You could be right about Ultraswim not being a good meet for Ryan to compete in given Michael Phelps' return. It's been a while since Ryan has competed against real competition (Feb-March) so he probably did not want to get rusty. Nevertheless, all of the media attention at Ultraswim adds so much undue pressure.
Thanks so much for reading and commenting. I really appreciate it! Your English is great. Please don't let it stop you from commenting again.
I just read that FINA is actually meeting "tomorrow" to make the decision on the suit issue for the remainder of this year and then another meeting will take place later this year to set standards for suits beginning in 2010… Also that 22 "manufacturers" have submitted suits for approval so this should be interesting to see which ones actually make the cut… It really is getting crazy with everyone trying to jump on the bandwagon… Apparently Cullen Jones was planning on swimming the 50 free final in a Jaked but felt like he couldn't breathe in it when he tried it on the first time.
I'm not sure how I feel about the suits at this point since I was never a swimmer and like you, I really don't know enough about the technology to really have a valid opinion... But I was talking to my mother about it the other night and we were discussing how almost every sport has its own technology and how things have changed so much over the years with more advanced materials, science, etc., so why should swimming be any different?... I jokingly told my mom (who played tennis until she was 60) to think back to her first tennis racket and she laughed… The fabrics used in swimsuits have already evolved so much over the years—is this just the next era in swimwear?... Though I suppose they will have to draw the line at installing miniature jet engines in the suits!!!
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5hIF0LOGnwVDo3ZV5dHZZsZ2zLvewD987KC900
I think I found the article you read LzzyBee1...thanks for bringing it up! I love your comments, they are always so insightful and informative.
You make a good point about technology impacting tennis, and golf is similar. Have you seen a driver lately? The club heads are enormous and there have been some crazy technological advances in golf balls as well.
I think it's good for the sport to have a number of fast suits available from different manufacturers. Last year when the Speedo LZR became the only option it was bad for the sport given that so many of the pro swimmers rely on suit contracts to support themselves. Speedo can't support everyone and it's better for the swimmers to have as many options as possible.
That being said, FINA needs to take control of the suit situation and act from a position of strength so the suit companies are not viewed as controlling the sport. I'm afraid that a lot of people view FINA as weak and that ultimately will not be good for swimming.
@ emanuella, for English not being your first language you seem to be doing a pretty good job.
@hoipolloi, Swimnetwork is also posting pics so go there if you haven't done so already.
I'm having a bit of a hard time catching up on the races. Thank goodness for Google and thank you for the updates. This is still all new to me so I don't know all the in's and out's of swimming. With all the news, media, and slight drama over the suit situation it can be a tad confusing. They should just go back to using the speedo's. I'll be going to my first swim meet in June. Not sure what to expect but I'm sure it will be entertaining and fun.
Caroline, there are a bunch of us learning this sport together and I'm glad you are commenting here so we can learn from each other.
Let us know what new information you learn when you go to the meet in June.
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