Michael Phelps: ‘Keeping Options Open’

MINNEAPOLIS, Minnesota, November 14. THE Associated Press just spoke with the man of the hour, Michael Phelps, and received his thoughts regarding the atomic bomb that dropped today that he is back in the United States Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) testing pool.

Phelps told the AP that “nothing is set in stone” regarding his return to competition, but that his coach Bob Bowman talked him into returning to the testing regimen back in the end of the second quarter of testing to keep his options open.

That news definitely validates earlier reporting in May that Phelps was making serious steps to return to the sport, even though the early public attention stopped a likely rendezvous with Bowman in Colorado Springs at the Olympic Training Center.

Bowman explained to the AP that Phelps would be eligible to compete in March, which would be just in time to close out the last few stops of the Arena Grand Prix tour in Mesa, Charlotte and Santa Clara.

Phelps still stands by earlier statements that he’s swimming “mainly to get back in shape.” But, as explained by Nathan Jendrick earlier in a Swimming World column, the daily regimen of telling USADA exactly where you are every hour of the day isn’t exactly something a fitness swimmer would do.

AP article.

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