The lights. The crowd. The pyrotechnics. For some, an entire swimming career reaching its pinnacle point in front of thunderous cheers. Such is how some of USA Swimming’s biggest stars remember competing at the U.S. Olympic Trials, the country’s biggest swimming stage.
As of August 12th, 1420 swimmers have qualified for the 2016 U.S. Olympic Trials set for Omaha, Nebraska and each of them will take away distinct memories. In the video, sprint specialist Cullen Jones, recalls a past experience racing against Jason Lezak and Gary Hall, Jr. in 2008 which left him haunted with feelings of being ‘psyched out’. Even after making the team in the men’s 50m freestyle in 2012, Jones describes Trials as “the most nerve-wracking meet” in which he has ever competed.
For Micah Lawrence, the shock of qualifying for the Olympic team in 2012 detoured her post-race celebration. But, her SwimMAC Elite Coach, David Marsh made sure she was able to recreate an enthusiastic ‘dryland cellie’ memory the next day in a conference room.
Also in the video, former University of Michigan Wolverine, Connor Jaeger, puts the enormity of the experience into perspective, expressing that racers can “think about it and be afraid, or you can have fun with it.”
“It doesn’t have to be a perfect race, you just have to earn your slot and punch your ticket”, so are the words from wise racing veteran Natalie Coughlin, who is gunning for her fourth Olympic appearance.
In a meet where anything can happen, the only thing that is for certain is that the spectators will be witnessing another thrilling chapter in U.S. Swimming history.
After the big decision on the lane rope colours , another Olympic leap for America will be the train infrastructure required by the IOC. For the games to be awarded to LA .
Looking back from Atlanta Sydney Athens Beijing London & Rio all have upgraded th train network including the airport to venue link . Rio is about to receive its 400th train unit ( up to 80 Trains ) designed & built in China for its upgraded arterial routes to the stadium & venues & the burbs
The IOC demands trains both for the olympics & as a legacy? What can LA do?
The one thing US Swimming can do to improve the viewing experience of Olympic Trials for spectators is to adopt the lane line configuration used in the Olympics and FINA World Championships, namely YELLOW lane lines in lanes 3-5, BLUE in lanes 1-2 and 7-8, and RED on the outside. This system allows viewers to easily identify which lane is which and to quickly grasp where their favorite swimmers are. US Swimming Executive Director Chuck Wielgus has indicated that they plan to use the traditional identically-colored lane lines for next year’s Oly trials.
I ran a poll on SwimSwam on August 5 (on day #3 of Worlds) asking SwimSwam readers which system they preferred to view a meet. The results… Read more »
To see the August 5th SwimSwam poll, go to this link and then scroll down about 20 comments. Some other readers added their viewing preferences as well.
http://swimswam.com/2015-fina-world-championships-day-four-finals-live-recap/#comment-357256