Men’s NCAA Div I. Championships, Finals: Ryan Lochte Destroys Phelps’ American Record in the 200 Individual Medley

By Phillip Whitten

ATLANTA, Ga. March 23. THE 200 IM figured to be an exciting race …and it lived up to expectations.

Actually, it was two races in one: Ryan Lochte vs. Michael Phelps’ American record (1:41.30); and the rest of the superb field battling for second place.

Lochte was ahead of Phelps’ pace the entire way as Phelps, a volunteer assistant coach at the University of Michigan cheered him on.

At the end of the fly, Lochte’s margin was a scant 3-hundredths of a second, 22.19 to 22.22. But he moved well ahead of Phelps’ pace on the backstroke with an incredible backstroke split of 24.25. Turning at the halfway mark, he was 99-hundredths of a second up on Phelps.

But the breaststroke is Lochte’s weak stroke, while Phelps has a strong breaststroke.

No matter. The Florida senior extended his margin to 1.12 seconds with a 29.81 second split. Did I say that was his “weak” stroke?

With the packed crowd cheering him on, Lochte powered home in 24.30 to clock an amazing 1:40.55, destroying Phelps’ American record and his own NCAA mark (1:41.71), set last year.

In the other race, Arizona’s Adam Ritter clocked 1:44.20 to lead four swimmers with 1:44s to the wall. Auburn’s Eric Shanteau and James Wike were third and fourth while Arizona’s Dave Rollins was fifth. Lochte’s Florida teammate, freshman Brad Alley, finished sixth.

Event 3 Men 200 Yard IM
=========================================================================
NCAA: N 1:41.71 2005 Ryan Lochte, Florida
American: A 1:41.30 2006 Michael Phelps, Club Wolverine
US Open: O 1:41.30 2006 Michael Phelps, Club Wolverine
GTAC Pool: P 1:43.32 3/23/2006 Ryan Lochte, FLORIDA
Name Year School Prelims Finals Points
=========================================================================
=== Championship ===

1 Lochte, Ryan SR Florida 1:43.32 1:40.55A 20
22.19 46.44 (24.25)
1:16.25 (29.81) 1:40.55 (24.30)
2 Ritter, Adam SO Arizona 1:44.15 1:44.20 17
22.60 48.74 (26.14)
1:19.29 (30.55) 1:44.20 (24.91)
3 Shanteau, Eric SR Auburn 1:44.37 1:44.24 16
23.16 49.36 (26.20)
1:19.23 (29.87) 1:44.24 (25.01)
4 Wike, James JR Auburn 1:44.83 1:44.37 15
22.75 48.88 (26.13)
1:18.93 (30.05) 1:44.37 (25.44)
5 Rollins, Dave SR Arizona 1:44.93 1:44.75 14
23.20 50.07 (26.87)
1:19.34 (29.27) 1:44.75 (25.41)
6 Ally, Bradley FR Florida 1:45.23 1:45.16 13
22.88 49.22 (26.34)
1:19.48 (30.26) 1:45.16 (25.68)
7 Cass, Nate FR Stanford 1:45.36 1:45.84 12
23.35 49.59 (26.24)
1:19.71 (30.12) 1:45.84 (26.13)
8 Newman, Keenan SO Stanford 1:45.53 1:47.73 11
23.59 50.93 (27.34)
1:21.69 (30.76) 1:47.73 (26.04)

=== Consolation ===

9 Stovall, Gil SO Georgia 1:46.19 1:45.83 9
22.61 49.30 (26.69)
1:21.65 (32.35) 1:45.83 (24.18)
10 Stephens, Mark SR Stanford 1:46.30 1:45.91 7
23.03 50.43 (27.40)
1:20.61 (30.18) 1:45.91 (25.30)
11 Salatta, Lucas FR Florida 1:45.77 1:46.04 6
23.06 49.35 (26.29)
1:21.42 (32.07) 1:46.04 (24.62)
12 Cady, Kurt SR Auburn 1:46.47 1:46.16 5
23.03 50.27 (27.24)
1:21.19 (30.92) 1:46.16 (24.97)
13 Van Wie, Doug SR Auburn 1:45.88 1:46.21 4
23.12 49.64 (26.52)
1:21.40 (31.76) 1:46.21 (24.81)
14 Molina, Miguel SR Cal. Berkeley 1:46.25 1:46.60 3
23.77 50.77 (27.00)
1:21.65 (30.88) 1:46.60 (24.95)
15 Mitchell, Adam SR Minnesota 1:46.54 1:46.89 2
23.19 50.24 (27.05)
1:21.79 (31.55) 1:46.89 (25.10)
16 Oriwol, Tobias SR Stanford 1:45.67 1:47.99 1
23.07 50.24 (27.17)
1:21.65 (31.41) 1:47.99 (26.34)

=== Preliminaries ===

17 Alexandrov, Mike JR Northwestern 1:46.63
18 Mellors, Pat SO Virginia 1:46.67
19 Clark, Ian JR Southern Method. 1:47.07
20 Zoldak, Krzysztof SO Pacific 1:47.14
21 Rathgeber, Geoff SO Harvard 1:47.15
22 Dauw, Casey SR Tennessee 1:47.17
23 King, Nathan JR Ohio State 1:47.22
24 Sun, Hongzhe JR Stanford 1:47.35
25 McDermott, Caleb SO Texas 1:47.36
26 Connell, Rory SO Auburn 1:47.37
27 Donaldson, David JR Texas 1:47.42
28 Schneider, Joey JR Auburn 1:47.56
29 Hetland, Alex SO Southern Method. 1:47.58
30 Vayo, Louis SO Cal. Berkeley 1:47.93
30 Osborne, Sean JR Auburn 1:47.93
32 Eckert, Mark SO Cal. Berkeley 1:47.99
33 Gloeckner, Julius FR Louisiana State 1:48.15
34 Manley, Steven SR Kentucky 1:48.37
35 Nevo, Gal FR Arizona 1:48.52
36 Hasbani, Meir JR Princeton 1:49.29
37 Maire, Romain SO Purdue 1:49.31
38 Johnson, Mark JR Auburn 1:49.60
39 Nead, Kevin SO Florida 1:49.64
40 Murry, Steven FR Indiana 1:49.95
40 Kornfeld, Paul FR Stanford 1:49.95
42 Cormier, Kyle SO South Carolina 1:50.04
43 Marmolejo, Pablo SO West Virginia 1:50.11
44 Pogioli, Giordan SR Purdue 1:50.46
45 Nuess, CJ SO Arizona 1:50.89
46 O'Neil, Patrick JR Cal. Berkeley 1:51.90

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