There were two glaring absences in the women’s 100m freestyle heats this morning as two world record holders didn’t show up for their swims.
Katinka Hosszu of Hungary who won the 200m IM in a new world record of 2:06.12 earlier in the meet was slated to swim in the 10th heat. Hosszu had a very legitimate chance at making the semifinal, entering the race with a seed time of 54.45.
Hosszu has no individual swims tonight and no more during prelims, however she is a member of the Hungarian 4x200m freestyle relay. Based on the start lists however, it also looks as though the Hungarians have pulled out of that race. They’re still on the start list scheduled to swim in the first heat, however they are the only nation that doesn’t have their athletes listed.
Hosszu’s next individual swim, the women’s 200m backstroke prelims, will be contested tomorrow. Hosszu is still on the start lists for that event.
Thus far the reasoning for Hosszu’s absence is unknown.
Also skipping her swim was 200m freestyle silver medallist Frederica Pellegrini in heat eight. She as well had a very solid chance of making the semifinal, going in with a 54.37 seed time.
Although the reasoning for her skipping the race isn’t confirmed, Pellegrini likely skipped the sprint freestyle race in order to focus on the 4x200m freestyle relay that will occur later in the session. There, Pellegrini is anchoring the prelim squad that will likely earn a spot in finals.
It took just a 54.90 in order to qualify for the 100m freestyle semifinal, a time that was attainable by both athletes mentioned above.
Hosszu has cooled down, as her 200 free and fly showed. She got greedy. Hopefully it won’t affect her 400 IM, where I thought she could break the WR.
Very smart decisions.
Why give reasons? 😆
The only reason is common sense.
I always repeat that the big names must swim only the races in which they have medal chances and especially gold medal chances.
Hosszu and Pellegrini had no medal chances in that event, even no chances of final so why waste energy for nothing???????????
After the 200 free and the 200 fly yesterday I think Hosszu has now understood she had no future in freestyle and butterfly events. Her 4 best events for Rio are clearly 100 back/200 back/200 IM/400 IM and she has to focus only on them.
I think she should have swum the 100 back this week instead… Read more »
Yeah this is a kind of reality check for the Iron Lady. They just wanted a bit too much.
This is a major event you cannot have everything like in the smaller events.
She is great but Ledecky is better at least on this race. The WR might just took out more from her than they sought she might just had a bad day. It is impossibly to judge it from outside.
She is not a machine and not indestructible, she can cry, she can fail, she is human.
And a great athlete (and this is not her WC even after the WR)