Women’s 50 backstroke
The women’s 50 backstroke prelim was extremely tight, with the top 11 swimmers all finishing between 28.2 and 28.4, with Russia’s Anastasia Zueva taking the top seed in 28.20, which is a solid prelims swim. China’s Gao Chang, Japan’s Aya Terakawa, Americans Missy Franklin and Liz Pelton, Aleksandra Herasimenia of Belarus, Georgia Davies of Great Britain, and Emily Seebohm of Australia (amongst others) were all within a good hard stroke (which I equate to precisely .26 seconds) of Zueva.
Britain’s Gemma Spofforth was further off the pace, in 28.79, but still did well to earn a second swim after a disappointing 100 back where she finished a disappointing 23rd in the 100. She is battling an illness and, like much of the British team, difficulty adjusting to the time zones. The longer this meet wares on, the better she’ll get though, and she’s resigned herself to using this as a big motivation towards London.
There were no really-big surprises to miss the final, though there were some big names left out. Shiho Sakai of Japan, who was seeded 9th, finished 18th, though as the races get longer she gets much better (and is a medal contender in the 200). Australia’s Belinda Hocking and Canada’s Sinead Russell (who blew away the Canadian Record in the 100) are more 200 meter specialists who missed out on the semis, but won’t be too disappointed.
Not much to analyze here until things shake out in the 50.
Full women’s 50 back prelims results.
Men’s 100 freestyle prelims
In the men’s 100 free, Italy’s Filippo Magnini, the 2007 World Champion, continued to show a bit of a career-revival at 29-years old by taking the 3rd seed in 48.36.
The only swimmer who may have shown a few cards is France’s William Meynard, who looked very solid in a 48.14, which is the 3rd-fastest swim of his career and easily his best in textile.
Aside from that, Magnussen finished 2nd in 48.20, which is less notable now that we know what he’s capable of. Magnini took 3rd, with Cielo 4th in 48.41. Cielo looks to have finally gotten a good feel for the track-start blocks, which have caused him problems all season, as he got off of the block in .64.
France’s Fabien Gilot, who came in as the top-seeded French swimmer, Andre Grechin of Russia, and Sebastian Verschuren all had solid swims of 48.60 or better.
Brent Hayden was slow in 48.7 in leading off Canada’s 400 free relay, though at the time that appeared to be on the basis of a “warmup swim” with little chance to final. He wasn’t any better here though in a 48.75, and still hasn’t done much to prove that his poor in-season times were on the basis of hard training.
The USA’s Nathan Adrian was 8th in 48.62, followed closely by his training partner Grame Moore in 48.65. The other American, Jason Lezak, missed the final in 49.03. Germany’s Marco Di Carli, who entered the meet with 2011’s fastest time, really bombed out in 49.00. That was a predictable outcome, as steep qualifying times and a late qualifying meet set by the German Swimming Federation doomed much of the squad from the outset.
Full men’s 100 free prelims results.
Men’s 200 butterfly prelims
Japan’s Natsumi Hoshi took the top seed in the women’s 200 fly prelim in 2:07.34. She and Hungary’s Zsu Jakabos (2:07.60) worked their way quite casually through the 4th heat of prelims to take the top two seeds headed into the semifinals. Neither seemed to exert any spectacular level of energy or specific pacing, and were about the same speed on each of the last two 50’s.
The USA’s Kathleen Hersey also looked very good in 2:07.91, though she had to push the front-half of the race fairly hard to do so. Hopefully, she was just using that to work some of the stiffness out after watching the first three days of competition before shutting down.
Great Britain’s Ellen Gandy finally posted a great swim for her country, which has struggled mightily throughout the meet. You’ll remember that Gandy secured her spots in both the 100 and 200 butterflies at Britain’s National Championships in March, which means that she didn’t have to put any rest into ASA Nationals in June to earn spots like some of Britain’s other swimmers did. That’s probably a large factor in her good performance here and in the 100.
China’s Liu Zige and Mireia Belmonte Garcia, the defending long course and short course champions respectively, qualified 5th and 6th. Belmonte really cruised through 150, but if anyone has the training to finish this race very hard it’s her, and perhaps sensing that she had been too casual in the early-going, bolted through a 32.7 closing 50.
Poland’s Otylia Jedrzejczak, who is trying to revive her career at USC after some rough personal years shortly after her 2004 Olympic gold medal in this race, swam a 2:09.01 to qualify 13th. That may not seem like much, but that stands as her best time since the 2008 Olympics.
Defending European Champion Katinka Hosszu missed the final in 2:10.06. It appeared as though she was taking some time off this summer to make a strong stretch-run to the Olympics, with her spot on the team already secured. Going from the NCAA season straight into the international season can be quite a brunt force on a swimmer for four years, and the need to recharge a bit before the final run is understandable. That swim was not an indicator of her true quality.
Full women’s 200 fly prelims results.
Men’s 200 IM prelims
Brazil’s Thiago Pereira looked really good in the 200 IM to finish in 1:57.82 as easily the top seed going towards prelims. He’s almost forced to swim fast times in the early rounds because his freestyle is one of the weakest amongst the contenders, and he can’t afford to risk a bad freestyle leg sinking him in an early round.
Hungary’s David Verraszto swam a huge career-best swim in 1:58.69 to take the 2nd seed. His country mate Laszlo Cseh qualified 13th in 1:59.80. This is the second time in this meet where Cseh, who’s a swimming legend in Hungary, was upended by the next generation of stars. It appears as though he may have used his taper up a little early at the Mare Nostrum.
Australia’s Kenneth To had a great swim to take the 3rd seed in 1:59.02. That’s another career-best for To, who seems to improve by huge leaps every time he dives in the water. Ryan Lochte cruised about as easily as he could to a 4th-seed in 1:59.04, and Michael Phelps qualified 9th in 1:59.48.
Germany’s Markus Deibler was probably the biggest surprise not to semifinal, as he finished 22nd in 2:00.99. Appears to be another casualty of Germany’s season-plan.
