The struggles in Rio continue for Ning Zetao of China. Last summer Ning won the men’s 100 freestyle at the 2015 World Championships in Kazan posting a time of 47.84 and was considered one of the favourites to win the same event in Rio. In the semi-finals of the 100 freestyle on Tuesday evening he had a shocking result putting up a time of 48.37 finishing 12th missing the final all together.
His was not the only poor performance in Rio by someone who was extremely successful in Kazan just a year ago. The 2015 silver medalist Cam McEvoy of Australia finished seventh while the bronze medalist from Kazan Federico Grabich of Argentina finished 22nd.
Today in the prelims of the 50 freestyle Ning missed the semi-finals recording a time of time of 22.38 which put him 30th. In fact he was not the fastest Chinese athlete in Rio as Yu Hexin recorded a 22.20, but also finished outside of the top 16 placing 20th.
Although the 100 freestyle was an extremely surprising result Ning missing the semi-finals in the shorter distance is not a huge development. At the World Championships in Kazan he ultimately finished 15th recording a time of 22.28. His prelims time at the World Championships of 22.43 was slower than the time he posted today in Rio.
His training up till late June was amazing, according Coach Matthew Brown, but he got called back to China and the Chinese team tried to stop him from going to Rio due to some internal issues. His training was thus interrupted and he lost 10 pounds. It’s a shame we didn’t get to see his best! So was Cam McEvoy. I was really looking forward to seeing them compete again. What a shame
He had some serious altercations with the Chinese Swimming Federation in the 6 weeks leading up to the games because of commercial endorsement dispute. He was reported to have been blocked from using the training facilities and was threatened to be cut from the team. He lost quite some muscles in this period.
Thanks for sharing the insight, Zhen Sun. It should be about the swimming and what he can bring to the pool on that day. I am sorry to hear he was hindered from showing us his best, what we know he is capable of from previous performances.
Looks like he might be on a different training program than last year. ????
Too many endorsements and distractions leading up these Games.
Can I just say : I love this !