An amazing night at the U.S. Olympic Trials produced 11 brand new Olympians but left plenty of wily veterans on the short end of the stick. The exuberant and the frustrated all walked through the mixed zone tonight, and here\u2019s a sampling of what they had to say.<\/p>\n
Townley Haas on Texas putting three swimmers on the 800 free relay<\/strong><\/em>: \u201cIt’s incredible. You have the two greatest coaches in the world, Eddie<\/strong> [Reese<\/strong>] and Kris<\/strong> [Kubik<\/strong>], training us, pushing us. I swim next to, or behind Clark<\/strong>\u00a0[Smith<\/strong>]\u00a0every day. I guess it’s just not that surprising, knowing how hard we work and how great of coaches they are and\u2014but it’s just incredible for me and all three of us to be able to represent our school in the Olympics.\u201d<\/p>\n Katie Meili on making her first Olympic team<\/strong><\/em>: \u201cRush of emotion, extreme happiness, extreme gratitude, disbelief. I never thought I would be here, so it\u2019s really special\u2026 I need to work on that swim because that time won\u2019t cut in in Rio, but just hoping to enjoy the experience. Now I can take a deep breath, take the pressure off and really enjoy it.\u201d<\/p>\n Ryan Murphy on what he saw during 100 back final<\/strong><\/em>: \u201cIn prelims and semis I was looking at the Jumbotron a lot. Finals I didn’t look at it at all, so I mean all I could see was splashes, and I didn’t know, like, whether it was coming from their arm going over or hitting the water, so I knew it was tight; I saw that off the turn, but I never knew I had it.\u201d<\/p>\n Murphy on maintaining American tradition in backstroke events<\/strong><\/em>: \u201cI was always a backstroker growing up, so that was the event I always got super excited to watch at the Olympics. I can’t remember 2000, so I can’t really remember the [Lenny<\/strong>]\u00a0Krayzelburg<\/strong> days, but definitely Aaron Peirsol<\/strong> was\u2014he was one of the guys for me, and one of the guys that I tried to model my swimming after.\u201d<\/p>\n David Plummer on beating out longtime rival Matt Grevers<\/strong><\/em>: \u201cI knew it would be tough on him. He’s just one of the greatest competitors in backstroke of all time. He’s been the most consistent guy over the last eight years, and it will be hard for him, but he’s had an amazing career, and he will do whatever he wants. He’s capable of anything.\u201d<\/p>\n Olivia Smoliga on taking down\u00a0past Olympic champions<\/strong><\/em>: \u201cI’ve been watching Natalie<\/strong> [Coughlin<\/strong>] swim my entire life, for as long as I can remember, just looking up to her. She has been my number one idol. I have always wanted to be like her. I remember watching her at the 2008 Olympics and how incredibly successful she was there; it was an honor to be in that heat with Natalie and Missy\u00a0<\/strong>[Franklin<\/strong>], and to race them and just having them\u2014having to swim against Olympians was definitely a huge motivation. It’s been my dream to be right here, to be an Olympian, so I’m just really excited about that.\u201d<\/p>\n Smoliga on Georgia Bulldogs<\/strong><\/em>: \u201cI think we’ve proved that we’re hard workers\u2026 It’s an old school program, Jack<\/strong>\u00a0[Baurele<\/strong>]\u00a0has been running it for so long, and I think it works\u2014I think it truly does work. We get up and race and have fun with it. I remember talking to Melanie Margalis<\/strong>, and she was giggling after her 100 Breast yesterday. She was like, \u2018That was so fun! I can’t wait to be in front of the crowd again!\u2019 She is just a racer and gamer, and I think that is what Jack trains us to be.\u201d<\/p>\n Missy Franklin on feeling pressure in 100 back<\/strong><\/em>: \u201cI think I am feeling more pressure than I ever have before, but that’s all part of the process is learning how to deal with it and learning how to move forward, and all I can do is the best I can do, and I had a race strategy and I went out and I did it, and it just wasn’t good enough this time.\u201d<\/p>\n Michael Phelps on 200 fly semifinal<\/strong><\/em>: \u201cMy stroke didn’t feel that good. I wasn’t long on any walls, which was good. Honestly, didn’t really feel that good in the whole race. It was decent. I probably would have liked to have been a little faster, but I get to swim in the middle of the pool tomorrow. That’s not something that I had a chance to do that much this year\u201d<\/p>\n Phelps on new faces on the national team<\/strong><\/em>: \u201cI said this to Claire Adams<\/strong>, when we were sitting back there before I went out, and I was like, “See a lot of new faces on the team,” and I was like, “I don’t even know half of them.” So it’s good, I think it’s good for our sport. Not to say anything bad against those guys [who] I’ve been on multiple national teams [with].\u201d<\/p>\n Ryan Lochte on how much his groin hurts on a scale of 1-10<\/strong><\/em>: \u201cIt\u2019s like a 7 or 8. But, I mean, I can\u2019t really think about that. I made the team. I\u2019m going to Rio.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" An amazing night at the U.S. Olympic Trials produced 11 brand new Olympians but left plenty of wily veterans on the short end of the stick. The exuberant and the<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":209686,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"dois","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[3,7],"tags":[56855,3622,28932,13727,25396,12011,25178,6302,25136,26457,1776,26904,19138,25269],"class_list":["post-209967","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured","category-usa","tag-2016-us-olympic-swimming-trials","tag-aaron-peirsol","tag-claire-adams","tag-david-plummer","tag-katie-meili","tag-matt-grevers","tag-melanie-margalis","tag-michael-phelps","tag-missy-franklin","tag-natalie","tag-natalie-coughlin","tag-olivia-smoliga","tag-ryan-lochte","tag-ryan-murphy"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"yoast_head":"\r\n