Earlier today, Tunisia’s Ous Mellouli was scratched out of the men’s 1500 free. As it turns out, he will be out for the entire meet.
Mellouli’s Australian visa, which took over 60 days to process, just arrived on Wednesday according to a public relations representative, leaving him without time to make the necessary arrangements to travel to Australia for the meet.
That means Ous will settle into training before attending the Dubai and Qatar World Cup meets at the end of September. All of that will lead to the Short Course World Championships, a meet for which he has been named an official ambassador.
But where he will be training is more news out of the Mellouli camp. After a short trial with the elite North Baltimore Aquatic Club training group under Bob Bowman, Mellouli is returning to Southern California to resume training with the Trojan Swim Club, where he has been for a decade.
According to his representatives, Mellouli loved working with Bowman and the NBAC team, but decided that the Southern California lifestyle was a better fit for him.
Mellouli was the 2008 Olympic champion in the 1500 free and the 2012 Olympic champion in the 10km open water race. He also has 8 career long course World Championship medals and 6 career short course World Championship medals on his resume.
I live in Baltimore and swim 3-5 times a week at Meadowbrook, often on the other end if the pool from all the NBAC swimmers. For what it’s worth, you should know that the transition from LA and a facility like USC to Baltimore and Meadowbrook would be no small thing. Particularly with a girlfriend, house and 10 years of history/connections back in CA. I understand why people make the trek to join Bowman here, but many of you would be in for a serious shock if you saw the facility that NBAC those elite swimmers in. “Not fancy” is an understatement. You had better be there for one reason: coaching. Heck, they don’t even have facilities for dry land… Read more »
I have shared the deck with Coach Bowman more than once.
He is an amazing Coach. Is he tough / are his workouts and seasons tough? These things are in the eye of the beholder.
But gosh darn it, this Coach gets results. No one ‘hits’ 100%. But to get a guy to swim a World Class 100-400 of ANY discipline? — Show me a better coach that’s coaching today!
A lot of comments from the peanut gallery.
HG, you’re way off. Most major cities including DC have direct embassy offices to expedite a Visa. For an American seeking a UK work permit for 6 months it can take the full 60 days. Even if you avail the embassy with everything asked for promptly, it still runs a course you can’t control.
A work permit for the UK requires a list of employment & financial & medical requirements including an appointment for an eye scan at an Embassy / consulate. ( I know I did one in 2010) . 6 weeks max for those within the parameters for an Expedited Nation .But the UK is not Australia , so your argument is nil.
And yes Australia does penalise lying on previous visa applications. You won’t get one .
A 10 day event does not require a work permit which are harder to obtain. But he can always blame his federation.
Ous is not settling for less…it isn’t like he is suddenly heading up to swim for a YMCA team in New Hampshire because he likes mountains. We don’t know his reasons, but one is he had a lot of success with Salo. He had a nice diversion with Bowman and some fun, now back to business in LA for last 2 years.
Thanks Bobo, Agnel clearly stated ehat we have been suspecting. Going full tilt and practice racing the dream teamers at NBAC every day twice a day is simply not working for any of them to get the recovery they need to stay sharp. Like coach once said, there’s no All-America (or Olympic gold) for best 100x100s on the… Read more »
That’s my whole point, if that first paragraph was directed to me. Ous isn’t going to leave NBAC if it’s working for him just because the weather is nicer somewhere else. He may say it’s the Southern Cali lifestyle, but we can infer that he feels as if he’s gonna get at least the same results he could get at NBAC, if not better, with Salo.
And I agree about Bob Bowman. I think he got too many new superstars all at once, each with different responses to different kinds of stimuli, different personalities that he has to learn to work with, different recovery needs, etc. Now that he’s had some time to get to know all of them and… Read more »
I can’t speak for any elite swimmer, but my thought is that if I’m trying to be the best in the world, I’ll train in Antarctica if that’s where the best team for me is. To be fair, though, as Braden pointed out above, there are a lot of factors that go into these decisions. A serious girlfriend would understandably be a big part of that.
Still, “the Southern California lifestyle is a better fit” is an interesting reason. In my mind, either the full quote is “the [University of] Southern California lifestyle [and practices] are a better fit” or Ous genuinely misses SoCal and feels he can get the same results under Salo. Either way, I have trouble imagining… Read more »
you say ‘worse program’ in reference to training at Trojan. Let’s not forget that Ous won 2 Olympic Gold Medals (08 and 12) both times training at Trojan, so it’s hard to argue that his training program was worse at USC.
You’ve misunderstood. I’m saying that the fact that Ous chose USC over NBAC shows it’s not a worse program. He says it’s great, but the bottom line is he’s leaving for his old club. He did the work to earn gold medals at the Olympics. The kind of person with that drive doesn’t choose a different club because of the weather or location. So I’m saying his attempt at leaving gracefully (aka without straight up saying NBAC doesn’t work for him) is pretty transparent.
Ouch, Sven.
But come to think of it, Salo’s training style was better suited for Agnel to begin with.
Next week will be a serious moment of reflection for the NBAC group. They all seem very happy together, but happiest is not training well it is swimming veey fast at the end.
Yannick Agnel said in interview after the race that he still has entire confidence in Bob Bowman.… Read more »
However, he wants to have a serious discussion with him in the next weeks.
He said he can’t make another year of training like this one.
He explained that training in full speed in every session is good for 15 or 16-year-old bodies but it’s hard for the older bodies.
He wants another strategy for the next 2 years.
I translate what he probably meant. 🙂 Less yardage and not always at full speed and perhaps more technique. That’s what I have understood.
But he still thinks this hard year of training will pay-off in long term.
I wouldn’t be surprised if that was the general consensus with this post grad swimmers.
Sounds like Agnel would be better off somewhere like Swimmac in North Carolina
He seems like a very intelligent and philosophical athlete. I imagine the communication between him and bob is fantastic. Didn`t he originally leave France to find a coach that would coach him more like an individual and not an “age grouper“
Perhaps he doesn’t think he can improve at NBAC.
Or perhaps it’s just a love affair.
Or perhaps he simply prefers the Californian weather.
Bad thing for Yannick Agnel.
Ous was the only guy in the training group who could speak French with him.
c’est la vie
Easy fix for Agnel… Go train with Ous under Salo.