Morning Splash: Checking in on the Principles in the Blue-Riband Event

Photo Courtesy: Delly Carr

Editorial Coverage Sponsored By FINIS

By David Rieder.

Kicking off this afternoon’s prelims at the Olympic Aquatic Center will be swimming’s glamor event, with perhaps the most coveted gold medal in the pool on the line. Not to mention the fact that the men’s 100 free is typically one of the most hotly-contested events of the Olympic Games.

Go back to 1996, when Alexander Popov had to hold off a young Gary Hall Jr. and the first-ever field comprised entirely of sub-50 second swimmers. Then, in two of the next three Olympics, swimmers set world records earlier in the Games in the 100 free but fell short when it counted most in the final.

In 2012, James Magnussen entered as the big gold medal favorite, but he could not follow through on the hype, losing his grip on the race in the last few strokes as the USA’s Nathan Adrian snuck in to take gold by one one-hundredth of a second.

Four years later, Adrian is back at the Olympics, back in his best form, and hoping to join Popov and the Netherlands’ Pieter van den Hoogenband as the only the only men in the last 80 years to successfully defend an Olympic gold medal in the event.

Adrian had about as good a start to an Olympics as one could hope for—in his first race, he dove into the water for the anchor leg of the American men’s 400 free relay with a half-second lead, and he extended the margin. He split 46.97—the fastest in the entire race—to give the United States the gold medal.

But almost as quick was Australia’s Cameron McEvoy, regarded as the consensus favorite for gold all spring after he posted a blistering 47.04—the second-fastest time in history—at Australia’s Olympic Trials in April. Tasked with following up slower-than-expected legs from Magnussen and James Roberts, McEvoy dove in fourth but managed to pass Russia to sneak onto the podium with a 47.00 anchor split.

Also on the Aussie squad was Kyle Chalmers, the 18-year-old with seemingly unlimited potential. He dropped a 47.04 split in prelims before going slightly slower in finals with a 47.38. A spot in the 100 free final is within his reach, but the best is yet to come—in the next Olympic cycle or two.

The French ended up with the silver medal in the relay—their third straight Games finishing in the top two in the event. A disappointing 48.20 second leg from Fabien Gilot left the French gasping for air, and excellent splits by Florent Manaudou (47.14) and Jeremy Stravius (47.11) couldn’t save them.

But both look like much stronger candidates for individual medals in the 100 free at this point—Stravius currently sits fifth in the world in the 100 free in 47.97 and Manaudou seventh at 48.00, and those relay splits indicate there is some room to drop.

Michael Phelps split a swift 47.12 on the second leg for the U.S., but he is unlikely to improve on his best time this year, a 49.49 that ranks outside the top-100 in the world—entirely because he’s not swimming the event.

Less impressive was Russia’s Vladimir Morozov, originally banned from Rio after his name was listed in the McLaren report but cleared to compete just day before the competition began. He split 47.31, but that sort of form will not get it done for gold or even a medal against this deep field.

Marcelo Cherighini (48.08) and Caeleb Dressel (48.10) each posted best times on the leadoff splits and look like contenders to sneak into the final, but Santo Condorelli, Dressel’s former teammates at Bolles, could be in trouble after his 48.51 leadoff split.

Obviously, a lot can change in the span of a few days as the sprinters get settled into the meet, and some are certainly more comfortable in individual events than on relays.

But if McEvoy arrived in Rio as the obvious favorite with a large margin to spare, that margin is gone. Sure, he’s likely to improve from his first-ever night swim at an Olympics where he had a sluggish 0.42 reaction time.

But with Adrian and the French swimming fast—and others like reigning World Champion Ning Zetao yet to make their Olympic debut—it’s not as much of a lock as it might have seemed a week ago. Expect a tight one.

*The results in the men’s 100 breast can be a good predicator of form for the 200 breast later on in a meet, but not so much this week after three of the top five seeds for the event did not even compete in the 100.

The USA’s Josh Prenot and Great Britain’s Andrew Willis each finished outside of the top two in deep fields at their respective Olympic Trials, and defending World Champion Marco Koch of Germany did not hit his country’s cut-off time. So all three will make their Rio debuts in today’s prelims.

How about Kevin Cordes and Yasuhiro Koseki? Both put up solid times early on—especially Koseki, who qualified second out of prelims with a 58.91—but neither brought their best form to the final.

And then there’s defending Olympic gold medalist Daniel Gyurta, who enters seeded sixth in the event. Gyurta has long been better at the 200 and has never won a World Championships or Olympic medal in the 100, but when he was at his best in London, he finished fourth in 59.53, just 0.04 behind bronze medalist Brendan Hansen.

In Saturday’s prelims of the 100 breast, Gyurta posted a 1:00.26. That tied him for 16th, but he scratched the swim-off, knowing that even if he won, he had no realistic chance of making it past the semis.

So what have the results from the first three days indicated about what is to come in the men’s 200 breast? Basically nothing.

Click here to view full heat sheets for day four prelims.

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