2016 RIO OLYMPIC GAMES
- Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
- Swimming: August 6-13
- Olympic Aquatics Stadium, Barra Olympic Park, Rio de Janeiro
- Prelims – 9:00 a.m/12:00 p.m PST/EST (1:00 p.m local), Finals – 6:00 p.m/9:00 p.m PST/EST (10:00 p.m local)
- SwimSwam previews
- Rio Schedule & Results
- Live Stream (NBC)
The relay lineups for tonight have been released, and it is Maya Dirado who gets the nod for the Americans in the 800 free relay. Neither Missy Franklin or Melanie Margalis (both 1:57.0) did anything special this morning, opening the door for the coaching staff to go off the board with Dirado.
Though she didn’t swim the race at Trials, Dirado has been on point all week winning silver in the 400 IM and bronze in the 200 IM. She swam a best time of 1:57.70 in early June which proved her ability in this race.
Take a look at the full lineups below:
- Japan (C.Igarashi, S.Mochida, T.Aoki, R.Ikee)
- Hungary (Z.Jakabos, A.Kesely, B.Kapas, K.Hosszu)
- China (S.Duo, A.Yanhan, D.Jie, Z.Yuhan)
- United States (A.Schmitt, L.Smith, M.Dirado, K.Ledecky)
- Australia (L.Neale, E.McKeon, B.Barratt, T.Cook)
- Russia (V.Popova, V.Andreeva, D.Ustinova, A.Openysheva)
- Canada (K.Savard, T.Ruck, B.Maclean, P.Oleksiak)
- Sweden (M.Coleman, I.Marko-Varga, S.Sjostrom, L.Hansson)
Along with the Americans adding Dirado, Katie Ledecky and Leah Smith to their lineup, five of the seven other teams also altered their lineup from the morning.
Hungary added Zsuzsanna Jakabos and removed Evelyn Verraszto, China added Shen Duo and removed Yang Shijia, and the Australians exchanged Jessica Ashwood for Emma McKeon.
The Russians moved out Daria Mullakaeva in favor of backstroke specialist Daria Ustinova, and the Canadians made two lineup changes, adding Penny Oleksiak and Brittany Maclean (who was reported sick this morning) in exchange for Emily Overholt and Kennedy Goss.
Sweden and Japan have gone with the same lineups as this morning, though Sweden has moved Sarah Sjostrom up one position from the anchor to 3rd.
I think Missy Franklin looks thinner lately. Anyone else notice? Maybe it’s just me?….
Kudos to US swimming coaches. Three times they made unexpected decisions that worked perfectly. Having someone from morning relay instead of DiRado would slow down American team by 1sec. That would make the race close, nervous and unpredictable. M. DiRado delivered a perfect race: the best start and confident balanced splits.
Ledecky could win the relay by herself 🙂
Katie now has 4 golds and 1 silver. Just missing the Olympic Record!
Katie could easily anchor the medley in prelims. Given that Simone just went 53.1 flat start, and Weitzel wel 52.5 on the free relay, I think those will be our two medley swimmers. But Katie’s 52.6 could certainly put her on the medley for a 5th gold
Well put, Vppolo…
She’d better go faster than Missy. I can’t believe how Marsh and Frank have skated after they screwed Weir for the media and Cal-darling the other day. I don’t know what to make of this. If she goes 1:55, then good for them; they know something. But if she’s 156 high/157 I hope someone takes them to task.
Having said that – I’m really happy for Maya. She’s come up huge at this meet.
Well, she went faster than Missy. Glad you weren’t the coach, Coach.
Disgusting, shameful, awful. Those are the only words I can say about this. Maya dirado didn’t do s*** in the 200 free to be on the relay. Why not just put in whoever we want if the trials are meaningless for relay spots? Missy did, she got second at trials, she earned her spot. The corruption in usa swimming continues to amaze me.
You remember that comment after the relay. She may surprise us all and go a 154 split in the relay
The coaches CAN put in whomever they want. Any swimmer on the roster is eligible to swim on any relay.
Finishing in the top 2 at OT guarantees you a spot in the 200 Free individual event, not a spot on the finals relay. Finishing in the 3-6 at OT gets you a spot on one of the relays, not necessarily both.
The staff’s job is to put forward the best US relays. They have seen the training and the performances, and we (the readers at swimswam) have only seen the performances. Subbing in Ledecky and Phelps was the right move both before and after they swam. I have no doubt that Maya is going to kill it tonight,… Read more »
Uhhhh, huh? Corruption at USA swimming? Because the coaches, whose job it is to put together a winning team don’t do what you want? The relay teams are based on trials, training camp and how the swimmers are doing at the time. The selection is not made by just one coach. How do you know what happened in training camp? Take a look at Missy’s times in the 200m(where she didn’t even make the finals) and the morning split. Did she earn her spot? Really? I’m sure that Missy is a nice girl but that is not how decisions are made. This also isn’t little league.
I hope Maya never reads your comment
Hey Mr. Anonymous!
Let’s abbreviate your rant…
Blah, blah, blah.
The USA has a superb coaching staff and I’m convinced that they’ve done a great job with their relay calls during the past few days. Marsh and his staff know what they’re doing, same as Bob B and company. Phelps certainly delivered twice and Ledecky was fantastic on her way to helping our women win a silver medal. Think you can do a better job than our Olympic staff?? Go get 3 or 4 swimmers on one of the teams and you can maybe be the head coach. Then you can make the hard decisions and see how things go.