2018 TYR PRO SWIM SERIES – MESA
- Thursday, April 12 – Sunday, April 15
- Skyline Aquatic Center, Mesa, AZ
- Long Course Meters
- Meet site
- Psych Sheet
- Live Stream
- Thursday Prelims Heat Sheet
- Live Results
There weren’t many A final scratches for the first finals session of the 2018 Mesa Pro Swim Series, but one was significant.
Two-time Olympic gold medalist Conor Dwyer has taken his name out of the 200 free final after posting the top time of prelims. Dwyer swam a 1:49.45 this morning, four tenths ahead of Patrick Callan (1:49.86). This was Dwyer’s first competitive swim in a while.
With Dwyer’s scratch, Callan is now the top seed for the final tonight, and Michael Chadwick moves up to the A final after going 1:52.53 this morning.
In the 400 IM, Elena Koutsouveli scratched the A final after going 5:01.38 in prelims. On the men’s side, Gianluca Urlando has bowed out of the A final after going 4:30.69 this morning. Koutsoveli will instead focus on the 200 back B final, while Urlando is set to race in the 100 fly A final.
The other A final scratch came in the men’s 200 breast. Grand Canyon University’s Youssef El Kamash, who tied for 7th this morning with Michael Andrew at 2:16.60, won’t race that tonight.
This is what separates people like Dwyer and Phelps. Dwyer gets a little bit of fame from the 2016 Olympics, and then his performance falls considerably because he gets caught up in the limelight (I follow him on IG and it doesn’t seem training is a priority for him). Phelps however, had that mentality to keep at it (famously never missing a day of training leading up to 2008). I hope Dwyer can get back to form since the relays could really use him.
So do I. Maybe he’s on the fence about whether he wants to continue this or move on to his next career.
Don’t forget that Phelps didn’t take training seriously though from 2008-2012. Something he admitted to very frequently y. If Phelps trained fully those years we would have seen best times for Phelps events on a frequent basis those years and 2012 Olympics. But we didn’t :(. But yes you are right to hoe Phelps was pre Beijing
While he may not be everyone’s favorite ambassador, Dwyer is an important case study for ‘professional swimming’ in the US.
Won’y make the team this summer ……
Yup, barely squeaked by for the 2017 team.
Scratching is understandable from a training perspective. The reality is that this meet means nothing to the top swimmers and times in early April mean nothing. The meet has the significance of a Spring Fling meet for 8 and unders.
The problem is that it is one of the few showcase meet for professional swimmers, at least from a public perspective. People actually paid money to watch top swimmers try hard. Either don’t have a meet in April, or at least try to make it look like a real competition. Otherwise it’s the Harlem Globetrotters without much entertainment, and that’s bad for all the swimmers trying to make a living.
“pro meets”, “pro swimmers”
There is nothing professional about all these scratches. I haven’t seen anything like it in any other professional sports. And swimming community wants swimming to become more popular and taken seriously by the general public and sponsors?
That’s because in other professional sports you get fined. And this kind of thing will hurt the sport. With Michael Phelps retired and Ryan Lochte MIA (and ironically sponsored by Tyr) the other pros need to step up. I hope the sport does not have to do what tennis was forced to do a while ago and have a requirement to show up to certain events. It’s better if the sport can police itself.
He has to go back on vacation.
his Instagram account gives an impression that pro swimmers are bask with money affording vacations every other month and living in a front beach house…in one of the most expensive cities in the country..
Yeah it’s really nice to have mommy and daddy’s money!
well thats it, folks, back to Manhattan Beach…
i don’t blame him for doing that
“I dont want to train too hard this early on so i can peak for 2020”. Said the same thing for 2016. Seriously he’s been 1:45 since london
Did he actually say that?
If he did, I think it is actually a reasonable approach.
I think he’d be thrilled to go 1:45 in 2020…
The problem is that he needs to be able to go 1:45.00 three or four times.
Says who?